Telescope Reviews: NGC 6905 Blue Flash Nebula from suburbia?

I spent some time on NGC 6905 last Saturday and Sunday evenings with my 22-inch Dob from my urban backyard.

Saturday night was hazy -- I could not see the diamond astermism in Delphinus naked eye. Sunday night was very clear, one of the clearest I have seen in months. The diamond asterism was easily visible.

The pn was easily visible in the 22 on both nights at a magnification of 151x (17mm Nagler T4 w/Paracorr) without a UHC filter. Saturday night I couldn't detect any color, but Sunday, at this magnification, it showed a fine pale blue shade. Quite beautiful. I would say this was the most pleasing view I had of it.

The pn takes magnification well and exhibits a lot of interesting detail with larger aperatures, even under urban conditions. At 447x (5mm T6 w/o paracorr), I caught glimpses of the central star on Saturday night, and could see it 80% of the time, but could not hold it steadily on Sunday night. The pn appears to be somewhat elongated roughly north-east to south-west, but I think this is because the opposite sides are fainter. The surface illumination is uneven. The NE side is brighter.

The edges of the pn were not distinct or sharply defined, possibly due to the over all sky glow. They might be more easily seen from a dark sky site.

I tried the UHC filter on the pn at different levels of magnification, but could generally see more detail without it.

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Fiske Miles
Nikon 8x42 LX / 12x50 SE Binos
Mini Borg 60ED, TV-101, AT80Ach, XT-8, C11/CI-700, 22-Inch Dob
Way too many Nagler eyepieces
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