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Hrundi
Pooh-Bah
Reged: 02/06/08
Posts: 1237
Loc: Estonia
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I wonder, can you see the milky way where you live?
I'm fairly sure that it's visible at moderate apertures whenever the MW is.
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Muffin Research
scholastic sledgehammer
Reged: 09/28/07
Posts: 992
Loc: Belgium
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I never get M51 from light polluted home with an 8" SCT.
I have however seen it through a 20" dobson on a very dark site and in those circumstances spiral structure is very obvious.
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www.myspace.com/1978recordingstudio : Ambient/Experimental/Electro
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wfj
sage
Reged: 01/10/08
Posts: 259
Loc: California, Santa Cruz County
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Get all sorts of different results myself depending on seeing/LP.
Have a 4" left in the car for the times I'm spontaneously traveling through dark sky, and I've hauled it out and seen what seems like a lumpy circular haze around two fuzz spots.
When I've had 10" along, I definitely see kinks and arms, but they're not pronounced.
Near my orange LP level house, I've had good nights where my 12" has clearly shown some of the brighter HII regions, which has caused my jaw to drop, as most of the time I'm lucky to see a faint circle of haze with two fuzzy lumps with it.
To this end, last thursday night I was waiting for my son to finish up a project outside, keeping him company. The sky cleared while I waited, so I set up the 12" briefly and fined up collimation, jumping up magnification slowly up to 900x. Then as he finished up, we both looked in and around M13 at 250x-900x, and the sky was stable and dark, he found IC 4617 (!) for the first time, and we had a long unexpected discussion about globs! Shortly after had to quit.
Often I can gauge the night by if I can't see much difference through the 4" or the 12" - usually pack it in very quickly then. The variability of the sky greatly exceeds the variability of my instruments.
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Avatar
sage
Reged: 05/27/06
Posts: 232
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Actually, No, I can't see the Milky Way no way, from my home site! Really lots of light pollution where I'm currently living. For many years I lived way up on coastal property of Lake Huron (one of the Great Lakes). Absolutely black skies always,but this was many years ago. Then, for about 23 years I lived in Massachusetts, some of that time spent in the western part of the state. I remember wonderful nights,,with no street lights, in western, northern Massachusetts near the Vermont border. Skies as black as black can be, and the Milky Way clearly visible, in both of these northern locations. Here, I usually have to concentrate to see a 5th magnitude star. On some evenings I've got to really look hard just to make out 4th mag stars.
With that said, I can make out globs, so far, only down to mag 7.7. Dimmest galaxy only to about mag 8.4 or 8.5. This really limits the DSOs that I can view. However, many planetary nebulae seem so far to present little problem. They're small,,so concentrated points, easily seen.
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Hrundi
Pooh-Bah
Reged: 02/06/08
Posts: 1237
Loc: Estonia
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I'd say try to go to a darker location and catch it from there. From dark skies, M51 is incredibly easy. Then you can familiarize yourself with the object and location, and it'd help with picking it out where you live.
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Javier
sage
Reged: 05/03/09
Posts: 434
Loc: New Jersey
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Yup, weather permitting I'll be at a nice dark location this Saturday.
Jav
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ensign
member
Reged: 12/16/08
Posts: 39
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Are you able to travel to a darker observing location? I find that dark skies make even more difference than aperture. At our club's mag 6 site in my 4.3 inch refractor a sighting of M51/NGC5195 and even M101 is a sure thing - you know you've seen it!
Michael
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- Mike
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Modified 10" Sky-Watcher Dob
William Optics Megrez 110/EZTouch
Nagler Type 4 - 12,17,22
Pentax XW - 10,7
William Optics UWAN 28
Siebert Observatory class 40
Other assorted items too numerous to mention
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Avatar
sage
Reged: 05/27/06
Posts: 232
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Jav,
You live in NJ? Is the dark vewing site in question in southern NJ by any chance? I'm always interested in finding dark, easy access sites, that are astro friendly.
Bruce
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Avatar
sage
Reged: 05/27/06
Posts: 232
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Mike,
Where is your Mag 6 Site?
Bruce
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