New clusters for me

[JimmyH155]

Well last night looked nice and clear, the meal was all prepared, so out came the 12" LB complete with Arvo Navis. I lined up on Spica and Acrux and then set about my tour.
I told AN to find open clusters in Scorpius region, and WOW What a lot! I spent some time on my favourite - NGC 6231, then let AN take over. What a surprise... I was told to go to Collinder 316 - never heard of that one - boy, it was HUGE and beautiful Next it told me to go to vd B-H 205 (What on Earth is that??) UN believable!! I went and got my Meade 26mm wide angle "Cluster Buster" and the cluster was too big even for that!! Magnificent clusters - whirls, blues, oranges and doubles.
Anyone know what vd B-H 205 is?? Not in my atlas. I think they are all mixed up - clusters within clusters!! They are now in my special list of favourites. Thanks Argo Navis for finding them for me

[DavidU (Dave)]

I may be wrong but BH 205 is a loose cluster within NGC 6213.
What is the RA Dec?

[citivolus (Ric)]

That is an alternate designation for C 1652-405, aka Cl VDBH 205, aka Trumpler 24. Simbad data here.

Using that data, we find that Cartes du Ciel lists it as:

Open Cluster
Tr 24
Magnitude: 8.60
Surface Brightness:
Dimension: 60.0 x 60.0 '
Position Angle: 90
Class: IV 2 p n
Description: vvL,B,E,Irr
200 * in rich Milky field
nebula IC 4628 invl
Name: Harvard 12
Constellation: Scorpius
Coordinates: Apparent
Apparent RA: 16h57m 42.1s DE:-40°41'05"
Mean of the date RA: 16h57m 40.2s DE:-40°40' 52"
Mean J2000 RA: 16h57m00.0s DE:-40°40'00"
Ecliptic L: +257°38'42" B:-17°54'44"
Galactic L: +344°42'04" B:+01°29'44"

For the curious, I had the coordinates from a web reference, and ran this through Simbad to get the above designations:

query sample region(circle, 16:56:09 -40:40:00, 1d) & maintype=ocl

Regards,
Eric

[JimmyH155]

Thanks, Guys, yes I feel a bit of an idiot, cos when I went to my Harold Bobrof Atlas, there on map page D12, was the most humungous circle depicting a cluster, just north of NGC 6231 is Collinder 316, and inside that one is vb 205 I measured the coordinates of 205 as 16h 56m and 40.8 deg South. That area of sky is absolutely packed with beauties, I will have another look this weekend.

[glenc (Glen)]

vdB-H is this catalogue:
Catalogue of southern stars embedded in nebulosity. Van den Bergh S., Herbst W.
http://cdsarc.u-strasbg.fr/viz-bin/Cat?VII/218