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The Cigar Galaxy (aka M82) is awesome isn't it? Under dark skies it becomes WAAAAAY brighter. And a sight to behold.

The Blue Snowball is way brighter than M82. If you keep at it, it will be an obvious and pleasing sight for you.

The Pleiades was probably a better sight in your binoculars than the 8".

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Jack,

Actually the Cigar Galaxy was not too spectacular, just a long thin fuzzy - probably due to it's location in the sky. There were 2 areas of city glow on the horizon and it was probably a little to close to one of them. Still felt good to find it though.

You are correct about the Pleiades - did not fit in the FOV of my 8SE with the zoom EP. Binoculars were great, but the best was my buddies Z8 dob with another buddies Nagler (not sure of the size) in it. That was perfect and beautiful!

As far as the Snowball goes, I'm not really sure why I could not find it. All of my other Goto's put the object in the FOV. Good thing, because my GLP was pretty much invisible in the night sky. It seemed pretty bright doing my initial align, but got almost unusable shortly thereafter. Not sure if it was a battery going out or the cold. I tried it again last night in my backyard and it was not very visible again. My only other option was the original RDF and I did not even bother putting it on the scope. I think I am gonna have to go ahead and get a RACI finder and maybe a telrad as well to help with the star hopping.

Honestly, because there was SO much sky to choose from, and I had never had that luxury before, I was relying almost entirely on the Goto. It really was kind of a smorgasbord. I was thinking that it may be a long time before I get a night like this again! Starving man in the buffet at Golden Corral!

As I get more experiences like this one, I'm sure I'll learn to spend more time and truly savor each object like a gourmet (though I will say I looked at the Orion Nebula for at least 30 minutes).

And thanks for the help. I'll definitely be trying again for the Snowball.

Clear skies!

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Gordon

Celestron Nexstar 8SE with XLT coating - Baader Planetarium Hyperion 8mm-24mm Clickstop Zoom eyepiece
Celestron Skymaster 20x80 Binoculars
Smart Seat II Observing Chair
all in the hands of a total neophite
----------------------------
Register at ScopeBuddies.com to find local astronomy buddies!

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The Blue Snowball is way brighter than M82.

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Hey Gordon!

Congrats! Sounds like a great time! Was that your Wimberley trip finally working out with the weather?

I still haven't yet seen Mars in my dob, and am eagerly awaiting its arrival in the evening. What'd you think of it?

I just got the Cat's Eye as a first last night, too! Thought it was really cool--like a small core with a larger halo around it. How did it look to you?

The Cat's eye seemed a little brighter than the snowball to me, but I think the snowball may be a little larger.

Here's my Snowball starhop: Start by locating Lamda, Kappa, Iota, and Omicron in Andromeda. These are all naked-eye even with our light pollution. The first three form an arc just north of the Pegasus square. About 1/3 of the way from iota to omicron, there's a 5th mag. star (13 And) visible in your finderscope (about 2 deg. west of iota). That star is the key to finding the Snowball. Look about 1/2 deg. SSW from 13 And. That's pretty close, so you don't have far to scan. At low power, it will probably look stellar, but even at 100X you can tell it's not.

Good report!

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Hey Tim,

I saw your report too. Was this out at Pedernales Falls again? Sounds like you had a great time too. Gotta go check that out some night.

Yeah, this was another Wimberley trip - same guys but an alternate location. (I actually went down there last time, but the clouds were so bad, I did not even pack up the scope. Just had dinner). I have 2 friends with scopes down there, and both have pretty good viewing sites, though this one really is the better of the 2. It's a pasture, with no lights, and no really bad visual obstruction in any direction. Best of all, he said I have an open invitation to use it.


So to the objects:

Cat's Eye:
It was pretty bright, but I did not see much internal detail at all. It looked like a small puff of smoke with pretty distinct edges, unlike most of the fuzzies I've seen. I guess it was the core that I was seeing, but I did not see the halo you saw. Seems like I could not get much magnification out of it either. I did try my OIII and UHC filters on it, but they did not really help me much (still trying to learn what they will help on). It was definitely cool though.

Mars:
It was just a small reddish disk. Not much detail. It did not come up until pretty late (1:30 am or so), so I was looking at it pretty low on the horizon, and it would not handle much magnification at all. Again, still fun to get a chance to see it.

Jupiter:
Forgot to mention it my initial report, but this was by far the best views I've gotten of it. Really beautiful. And my friend had never really seen it with much magnification.

Milky Way:
Also forgot to mention this, but it was the first time I've seen it, at least realizing what I was seeing.

Blue Snowball:
Not sure if this was just a missed Goto or what. With my GLP issues and lack of other real finder (see previous post) I could not do much but just wander around a little in the vicinity. It also may have been getting pretty close to the zenith when I went for it (poor planning!), and that seems to make for a little less accurate Gotos and definitely harder to slew around looking. I'll keep trying for it though, with the help of your nav instructions. I'm probably gonna try for a backyard session tonight, with the moonless night and it looks like continuing clear skies!

Clear skies!

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Gordon

Celestron Nexstar 8SE with XLT coating - Baader Planetarium Hyperion 8mm-24mm Clickstop Zoom eyepiece
Celestron Skymaster 20x80 Binoculars
Smart Seat II Observing Chair
all in the hands of a total neophite
----------------------------
Register at ScopeBuddies.com to find local astronomy buddies!

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The Blue Snowball is way brighter than M82.

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That's a problematic statement! NGC 7662 in Andromeda, sometimes called the Blue Snowball, is listed in some sources at magnitude 8.3, which is only marginally brighter than M82's magnitude 8.6.

However, the two objects are not comparable in any way. M82 is a galaxy, and a very big one, spread out over a sizeable piece of sky. It's very easy to recognize at low magnifications; in fact, it really sticks out through binoculars under a medium-dark sky.

NGC 7662 is at the opposite extreme; it's a typical small, super-intense planetary nebula. It's extremely easy to see, but at low magnification, it's equally easy to confuse with a star. In binoculars, there's hardly a hope of making out its tiny disk.

At 150X, you'd have no trouble seeing that NGC 7662 is non-stellar. But that requires that you locate its position with great precision, otherwise it won't be within the field of view at all.

With a nebula filter, you could find NGC 7662 at low power by "blinking" it.

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Thanks for the info Tony. This sounds really helpful in locating it.

Raising my Noob flag here!

Explain "blinking"?


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Gordon

Celestron Nexstar 8SE with XLT coating - Baader Planetarium Hyperion 8mm-24mm Clickstop Zoom eyepiece
Celestron Skymaster 20x80 Binoculars
Smart Seat II Observing Chair
all in the hands of a total neophite
----------------------------
Register at ScopeBuddies.com to find local astronomy buddies!

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NGC 7662 is at the opposite extreme; it's a typical small, super-intense planetary nebula. It's extremely easy to see, but at low magnification, it's equally easy to confuse with a star. In binoculars, there's hardly a hope of making out its tiny disk.

At 150X, you'd have no trouble seeing that NGC 7662 is non-stellar. But that requires that you locate its position with great precision, otherwise it won't be within the field of view at all.

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Good points about the concentrated light in the Blue Snowball. But I think 150x is overkill. In my severely light polluted skies, it's pretty obviously non-stellar at 100x, and its the bluest object I have ever seen through my scope.

I think that people with fast scopes should be especially interested in your comment about easily confusing it with a star.

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Celestron CPC 1100
Denkmeier S2 Power Filter Switch Diagonal (.66x Reducer, 2x Barlow)
Ethos 17mm, Baader Scopos 30mm
Lunt 60mm Hydrogen-Alpha Solar Scope, Lunt Zoom

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Explain "blinking"?

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Hey Tim,

I saw your report too. Was this out at Pedernales Falls again? Sounds like you had a great time too. Gotta go check that out some night.

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I'm probably gonna try for a backyard session tonight, with the moonless night and it looks like continuing clear skies!

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Explain "blinking"?

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Blinking is a really fun shortcut for locating planetary nebulae. You take a low-magnification eyepiece with plenty of eye relief and pass the filter between the eyepiece and your eye. All the stars dim greatly, because the filter blocks 95% of their light. But the nebula is barely affected.

Because your eye has huge ability to accomodate for a big range of brightnesses, what it actually *looks* like is that the stars get just a little dimmer, while the nebula suddenly appears much, much brighter. Very cool.

Obviously, this only works if you own a nebula filter, though!

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Very cool, Tony! I got to give this a try sometime. I wonder how this would work on the 'blinking' planetary nebula,NGC 6826. Maybe it will just start blinking really fast.

Maybe I am just kidding though!

Clear Skies to All!

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Best,
Dain
Adirondack Mountains (my true dark sky site)
@ Cedar River Flow



Local Site


Clear Skies?

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My struggle with "blinking" a 2" O-III is I keep seeing distracting reflections in the filter from what is behind me!

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Tim , Try a dark colored towel draped over your head at the eyepiece like the old time photographers did . A black or otherwise dark colored "T" shirt with just the neck pulled over your head works good as it will stay with you & when you need it just pull the rest of the shirt up over your head ,& draped down over the eyepiece . I have a black "T" shirt that is dedicated for this purpose .

This works great anytime you need to block surrounding light . Looking with both eyes open can really help in what you see through the eyepiece & having that shirt or towel allows you to view with both eyes open & still be in the dark . I like it better than using an eye patch .

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LXD75 AR5
LXD75 SN8
Series 4000 Plossls
Misc. other stuff


Fort Rock , Az .

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