2217 replies to this topic

[csa/montana]

Keep those observations coming everyone; time to start a new thread!

 

For reference, here is the previous thread.

[BrentKnight]

Three two thousand plus long topics and counting!  Must be a record??

[NYJohn S]

I'm going to chime in so I can follow the new thread. Not much new here. Last time I was out was Monday night. I got a text from a friend "live sky.com" clicked on it and it took me to Sky Safari where there was a big arrow to follow. I was now connected to his observation. I thought it was cloudy and had no idea the sky had cleared. Went out with my 10x50's and followed the arrow to Nu1 & Nu2 Coronae Borealis. A nice binocular double I was unaware of. 2 widely separated bright orange 5th magnitude stars. If I didn't get the text I would have still been sitting on the couch. 

 

I looked at nearby M13 and scanned around a bit. Corona Borealis, the Moon. The sky wasn't great as evidenced by the glow around the Moon but the new technology and nudge by a friend got me out to see a few sights and a nice binocular double.

[Jehujones]

Both the Transparency and the Seeing were much improved here from Friday night (8/12).

 

Observing from the upstairs balcony with the Coulter Compact:
10.1" F4.5
GSO Coma Corrector
31.5mm SWII 90°
30.5mm MEr 74°
18mm ES82 82°
8.8mm 5000 82°
8.8mm + GSO 2.5X

 

I scanned around with the 10x50s for 30min letting my eyes adapt and then assessed the sky unaided.

Naked eye low in the southwest ranged from about 4 in Sagittarius to 4+ in Scorpius.

Naked eye in Hercules was almost 5, with some patience I could see Nu, Xi and Omega.

Local seeing allowed the rings of Saturn to be divided at 320X for extended periods, star twinkle was minimal.

 

I started out by looking for all the usual summer suspects. Most of them I had forgotten their names so I looked them up this morning.

 

In Scorpius I found:
M80, difficult, small
M4, easy (faint)
NGC 6242, a tight group about a low power field south of the Mu twins
Collinder 136, that big loose congregation about a low power field north of Zeta
NGC 6231, a nice rest stop within view of Zeta, a bright little group
NGC 6124, such an easy target to hit and colorful
M7, another one-shot target, not impressive without a backdrop
M6, bright and busy, took some scanning because I thought I remembered it closer to Shaula

 

Sagittarius
M22, easy, best view at lower power, at 64x many stars seen on the face, at 130x brighter stars showed patterns but background fuzz was lost

M24, easily found but not impressive (bright members only)
M17, surprisingly bright for the conditions. Quite obvious and sharp without any filters
M25, easy to find but unremarkable
M23, also easy to find and more concentrated than M25
M8, didn't find it even though M17 was easy. I got lost and found M21 instead (not one of my targets). just a gathering of common field stars
 

 

Ophiuchus
M14, small and faint but definite
M10, larger and better than M14
M12, smaller than M10 but still easy to see
Melotte 179, a bright gathering of a dozen stars the size of the moon in the northern suburbs of Beta Oph
NGC 6633, a condensed version of Mel179

(This was not one of my targets, don't know if I've seen it before but I stumbled on it and noted the location)
I forgot to look for M107

 

Vulpecula
Alpha, the white and yellow contrast pales in comparison to nearby Albireo
The Coathanger, (CR399) no trace of NGC 6802 at all, not even with imagination turned all the way up.
I didn't bother with The Dumbell and I totally forgot about M71 in Sagitta

 

Lyra

M57 looked great, very bright at 130x

M56, was happy to find it. Small and faint but obvious.

 

Hercules

M13, (of course)

 

I ended the session with Saturn, I could only make out one band and wasn't sure about the polar zone.

The rings were easily divided.

[kjkrum]

July 29-30, 2022
Ramsey Vista Campground, Huachuca Mountains, AZ

Another camping trip with rain in the forecast, so I brought 7x50s and a 114mm f/4.5 mini Dob. The first night was cloudy. The second night was one of the weirdest observing experiences I've had. We were surrounded by thunderstorms, but the sky above was clear. Seeing and transparency were both great. The Milky Way was distinct. I could see at least mag 5.7, maybe closer to 6. Then I'd be blinded by lightning. I didn't have an observing plan and expected to get soaked any second, so I just scanned the Milky Way. It never did more than sprinkle on us the whole trip.

[therealdmt]

July 29-30, 2022
Ramsey Vista Campground, Huachuca Mountains, AZ

Another camping trip with rain in the forecast, so I brought 7x50s and a 114mm f/4.5 mini Dob. The first night was cloudy. The second night was one of the weirdest observing experiences I've had. We were surrounded by thunderstorms, but the sky above was clear. Seeing and transparency were both great. The Milky Way was distinct. I could see at least mag 5.7, maybe closer to 6. Then I'd be blinded by lightning. I didn't have an observing plan and expected to get soaked any second, so I just scanned the Milky Way. It never did more than sprinkle on us the whole trip.

Nice.

 

I had one of those last fall, though just from my front deck — very wild and dramatic. Towering thunderheads lighting up all around*, but the sky was wonderfully clear overhead. Intermittently, the eyepiece would suddenly light up, and of course the constant rumbles. With a breeze in my hair, I felt like a mad scientist, lol. 

 

*[the thuderheads were close enough to be dramatic, but far enough that there was no danger of a strike hitting anywhere near the house, plus the lightning seemed to be within and cloud-to-cloud anyway]

 

Glad you got to have such a cool experience, kjkrum. Sounds like quite a camping trip

[therealdmt]

Got in a second session for the weekend. Like the previous night, this time was with the 10" Dob only, though this time I set up in the back yard, away from the streetlight out front, and with a view to the south. 
 

Unfortunately, the lot behind us (which is even more unfortunately in the process of being developed) has weeds and brush that are going wild, and I found that they are now towering so high as to block my view of Scorpius and the bottom half of Sagittarius with my Dob. I could see those constellations fine standing up, and could even see most of the areas I wanted through the finderscope, but by the time  I got down to the main scope, the weeds and brush were in the way. In particular, I really wanted to have a look at the elusive-for-me M4 (I’ve seen it before, but I need a good night, and once or twice on a rare special night I’ve gotten very good views of it). Transparency last night was very good, light pollution not bad (it varies to the south depending on commercial fishing activity) and I could see Antares and Alniyat right there so it looked like a good opportunity, but bend over down to the eyepiece and…arggh. Where’s a refractor on a tall tripod when you need one (answer: back inside).

 

Went over to Sagittarius and got a nice look at globular M22 and then a bit later, with the bright Moon coming out from behind some low clouds, saw globular M28 by Kaus Borealis as just a smudge. From there I went over to M8 and M20/M21, of which I could see all three together in the 50mm finder. Back in the main scope, the eyepiece being used was the 30 UFF, and I just cruised from there, without even going to the finder, up through M24 (Small Sagittarius Star Cloud), the terrific open cluster M23 off to the side, and then back up through M24 to M17 (Omega/Swan) and M16, the Eagle Nebula. Couldn’t see much nebulosity in any of those nebulae and meanwhile my Oiii filter is still pretty new for me and I’ve been wanting to try it out on these, so I went back in the house and got the Oiii. Unfortunately, the rising Moon was becoming ever more of an issue, but the filter showed the Lagoon well; however, the Trifid was quite faint. Similarly, the filter worked pretty well on one of the M17/M16 pair, I think M16, but the other didn’t get helped much (I forget which one benefited now, unfortunately).

 

I could see Aquila high above in the clear (there were lots of low cumulus clouds quickly moving through, plus some more stationary high thin clouds in various parts of the sky) so I had a look for one object I couldn’t get the night before, M11. The open cluster looked almost globular through the 30mm, very impressive (especially with the Moon now temporarily behind some clouds). After that, I switched to using either of a 14mm or an 11mm 82° eyepiece for the rest of the night, and again, M11 was great — this was my best views of it yet, and I can now see why some list it as among their favorites.

 

Clouds and moonlight were increasing, but Hercules was frequently in the clear and away from the Moon, so I had a good look at M13. While taking a little break, a great shooting star came right over the house heading south. With the Moon higher, I was thinking about switching over to the planets and briefly went to Saturn. However, I was kind of "Saturned out" from the previous night, so I wasted some time trying to find my nemesis, the nearby globular M72. Clouds were starting to get out of control by now anyway.

 

Kind of calling it a night, I moved my scope up onto the deck to bring it in, but ducking down to about Dob height, I could see Jupiter and the Moon from under the deck cover, so I reset up there and had a Jupiter followed by lunar session. I’ve done almost all my viewing from refractors, so I was having a hard time seeing the Great Red Spot which a webapp said should be in view. I kept trying to look by the equator, but once I moved my gaze farther up (so, south on Jupiter), I finally saw it and it became pretty distinct at times in the variable seeing. The color blended in with the surrounding bands, but the outlined oval was distinct enough. Like the previous night, the lower (northern) hemisphere was almost completely white.

 

Finished up with the Moon. Again, I need more time with the Dob as I’ve been a refractor viewer and the upside down Dob view can throw me off at times. The main lunar features are straightforward enough, but trying to get into the nitty gritty, I found myself getting a bit confused with the orientation when trying to compare it to the features on an upside-right map. The map can be reoriented, but I was tired and hot and wrapping things up anyway, so…I just wrapped things up. 
 

A fun and unexpected three hour session. It was cloudy, but not as bad as I’d expected it would be from the forecast. Best part was, it was outright raining back at my apartment up by work, so this was a total bonus

[river-z]

Finally had some good conditions here in LA.  It's been kind of cloudy at night this summer.  

 

Split 10 pairs of stars in Serpens, all the way down to 1.8 arcseconds.  

Then I had a good long look at Saturn, which was mighty fine. Cassini division fairly distinct.  

Nice to be out in the backyard observing again.

[chrysalis]

I'm going to chime in so I can follow the new thread. Not much new here. Last time I was out was Monday night. I got a text from a friend "live sky.com" clicked on it and it took me to Sky Safari where there was a big arrow to follow. I was now connected to his observation. I thought it was cloudy and had no idea the sky had cleared. Went out with my 10x50's and followed the arrow to Nu1 & Nu2 Coronae Borealis. A nice binocular double I was unaware of. 2 widely separated bright orange 5th magnitude stars. If I didn't get the text I would have still been sitting on the couch. 

 

I looked at nearby M13 and scanned around a bit. Corona Borealis, the Moon. The sky wasn't great as evidenced by the glow around the Moon but the new technology and nudge by a friend got me out to see a few sights and a nice binocular double.

Same here. Valuable and entertaining thread !!!

[Migwan]

Courageous go at M57 jehuhones.  Great idea on playing tunes for effort on dark adaptation.  On that note I think I'll charge up my blue tooth, which hasn't been used in ages. 

 

Brent, M101 gave me a lot of grief with the ST80 despite having altitude (Co) and the use of different mags.  Took a dark site to see it.  Good get with the 25x100s.  

 

therealdmt & jcp482p;  Didn't get to "like" those closing posts, so do so here.  They were worthy closers.

Edited by Migwan, 15 August 2022 - 06:23 AM.

[therealdmt]

 therealdmt & jcp482p;  Didn't get to "like" those closing posts, so do so here.  They were worthy closers.

Haha, yeah we shut that place down!

[Jehujones]

Finally had some good conditions here in LA.  It's been kind of cloudy at night this summer.  

 

Split 10 pairs of stars in Serpens, all the way down to 1.8 arcseconds.  

Then I had a good long look at Saturn, which was mighty fine. Cassini division fairly distinct.  

Nice to be out in the backyard observing again.

Good thing you didn't go out Friday night, it was a mess. Saturday night was excellent for us too.

[therealdmt]

Back at my apartment now, the skies finally cleared and I took my 72ED out of "storage". With muggy weather, disgusting city bugs, relentless clouds and the rainiest summer in memory, I’d given up on observing from the apartment during the summer almost 2 months ago now, disassembled the scope setup and put the telescope away in its case instead of leaving it mounted and ready to [grab and] go like usual. But now, the rain-washed skies had cleared beautifully in the afternoon, leaving relatively terrific transparency [it’s deep Bortle 9, so only relatively] as I walked home from the subway station through a local park after work. I kinda should have grabbed the scope and gone right back to the park even with all the lights still on there, but with all my gear put away, when I’d have gotten back there the park would have been just about to enter it’s closing time foofaraw which would force me out, and then by the time I could re-enter (after 11:00pm) I had a FaceTime call scheduled. So, I let the opportunity pass, did other things and then got out and assembled my gear after the video call.

Saturn was up to the south, with Jupiter just clearing an apartment roof to the southeast and the Moon still blocked by buildings, so I just set up in my typical place right outside my window, where the direct glare of the parking lot’s LED streetlight can, with careful positioning, be blocked out by the streetlight pole itself. Started with the 7-21 zoom on Saturn, which was fine but small. Decided to switch to my still relatively new 6.7 ES82 and… I couldn’t get the dang planet back in view. Oh yeah, no finder! (guess I’d gotten a little lucky with the zoom). Arggh. Left everything outside and ran back in to get my RDF which was buried somewhere in my stuff. Eventually found the finder and got back outside where my gear remained untouched (whew). Titan and Rhea were clearly visible, with perhaps hints of other moons in averted vision. Consulting a phone app however, not all my "hints of other moons" lined up with the then-current reality. Conclusion: I have a good imagination Cassini division was sometimes visible (seeing was good), as was some banding on the planet itself. Switched back to the zoom but adding a 3x focal extender and the view was much dimmer. Only Titan was visible among the moons now.

I could see two stars above Saturn (an unusually good night for this location), of which my GoSkyWatch phone app showed me that one was Spica and the other Enif. Hmm. I’ve been waiting for the chance to have a go at M2 and M15… M15 was a bit high to deal with but M2 should be right there above Saturn a bit… boom, there it was, the globular cluster M2 as a faint patch, now added to the very short list of DSOs I’ve gotten from my city parking lot with the 72ED.

Moved on to Jupiter where the moons were in quite a different configuration than they’d been in 2 nights previously back home. That time with the 10" dob two nights ago though must have had me well-prepped because I was quickly able to make out the Great Red Spot (well, that and the conditions were unusually good), a detail which has been a challenge for me in the small scope from the brightly lit concrete and asphalt parking area, viewing over buildings, etc. As in the Dob, the GRS appeared brown and small, but with a white outline that helped make it distinctive.

The Moon was now in the clear, so I finished up with some lunar. The change back from the upside down Dob view of the other night was a bit re-disorientating. There were some cool craters on the terminator, but the main thing that stood out to me was a wide circular rim paralleling but outside the main "shore" of Mare Crisium — looked like the effect of a big impact shock that could have created the basin (or it could be related to cooling, etc., I don’t know — just an impression).

Speaking of impressions, my main impression after using the 72 in my next session right after two nights of a 10" Dob was that the little 72 can still show quite a bit. In some ways, I even prefer the lunar views through the 72. With the 10" Dob, the Moon is a harsh desolation, but with the lower resolution and perhaps also the viewing-through-a-lens aspect of the little refractor, the Moon takes on a softer, more friendly and even somewhat mysterious appearance. For example, one of my favorite areas on the Moon has become Palus Somni, the Marsh of Sleep. With the little refractor, I can imagine it being just like the name says and I’ll often wrap things up there as a little entre to dreamland. But viewed through the Dob, the reality of the area being nothing but an airless, radiation and meteorite-blasted wasteland of rock is immediate and inescapable. Anyway, both telescopes are good, but in different ways.

Second impression is how well a red dot finder works. I usually eyeball things, aiming from the hip, to get an object or nearby star in an 8x50 or 9x50 finderscope and then star hop from there, but with the RDF, I just pointed it into the right area in an almost blank city sky and there my globular cluster was. The short focal length scope (420 mm) and 82° AFOV eyepiece certainly helped, but the eyepiece focal length was only 6.7 mm. Anyway, as someone who has only used an RDF to find a non-naked eye DSO on just a very few occasions, I was impressed

[desertstars]

IV

 

We're doing intravenous observing now?

 

This is what I call hard core...

[Job99]

Backstory: My wife and I just got back from a trip to the UP of Michigan and I brought along the scope. It was a blast seeing Pictured Rocks, Mackinac Island, Apostle Islands, and all kinds of waterfalls while camping at various locations along the Great Lakes. There were a few days of rain, and every night was so windy, misty or at the dew point that we never even had much of a chance to use the telescope we brought with. The Headlands dark sky park canceled the presentation on the Perseid's because of a family emergency on the part of the presenter. Hopefully everything turned out ok in whatever that situation was!

 

Even though we had such bad luck with everything (and the full moon too) we still made the most of it. On one of the clear nights, I was able to grab the binoculars and enjoy M31, M13, and M92. Next, I gave star hopping instructions to my wife to be able to find the same objects in that same order. It was so fun seeing her get the hang of basic hopping and when she found the objects she lit up and was impressed that even with such simple gear, one can see such amazing sights. Next I showed her where Cassiopeia and Cygnus were and told her to start slowly scanning the bins along a curved path between them. She about lost her mind at how many stars she was seeing! After enjoying the majesty in silence for a while I had her look at Vega and Arcturus to give her a feel for how different the colors of stars can be. She then started scanning around again to see color differences.

 

All in all, I would say that even though we couldn't enjoy the scope on the trip, I still had a ton of fun spending time with my wahine and seeing her have such a fun time really made our trip that much better. I hope that the astronomy bug grows stronger in her so that we can have more kid free outings like this! 

[Migwan]

8/17-18/22,  23:30-01:30,  66>61°,   Calm,   94%?,   (Clear Skies) Trans 2/5 , See 4/5,  0 Jet, 50% moon at 00:00,   NELM 4.85,   PS 7/10 Sadr,   LP Map SQM 20.4,  755’,   Home,  C11&ST120

 

I had planned to drive to an older dark site that had a good view of the north and hopefully see the Northern Lights.  The idea was to get west of the lights from the wind farm to my north.   Surprise, surprise.  The lights on the wind farm were off and I only had to go 4 miles to find a very large open  field.   I was just able to see a bit of green hugging the horizon from due north to the NNE.  The 8x40s did make the green more obvious, but gave no detail.  Basically, no elevation, no curtains, no show.  

 

When I got home I pulled the C11/ST120 out to have a look at Saturn and Jupiter.  Though I had a decent PS on Sadr, neither of the two planets were showing much.   Saturn showed only the more obvious bands and a rather fuzzy Cassini Division.   I could see Rhea, Tethys Dione and Titan.  No Enceladus or Mimas. 

 

Jupiter had all four moons, but not much going on it’s surface and it wasn’t really showing much anyway.  Just some rather fuzzy bands.  A couple of times I thought I could see a bit of a storm on the NEB, but not.  

 

Considering the Pickering Scale, I was a little disappointed.   I gave the C11 half an hour with the fans on after I pulled it out, but the temp did continue to drop.  Not sure what I can say about Saturn other than it is rather low.   Jupiter was over the city, which isn’t exactly the best scenario either.    Also, 136x didn’t look much sharper than 333x.   Odd.   Neither seemed to quite focus.   Maybe next time.

Edited by Migwan, 18 August 2022 - 09:38 PM.

[dave253]

I had a rather remarkable experience today;

set up the 14” about two hours before sunset, just to check everything and let it acclimate.
Hmm, I wonder if I can find Alpha Centauri in full daylight? Set the altitude to 76*, as SS6 said it would be, and slowly scanned back and forth due south. (It was just past the meridian).

Amazingly found it! Then decided to power up, and try the alignment process without levelling or pointing north.
Centred A Cent, then scrolled the handset for a second star. It suggested Antares. Ok. Sure enough, there it was!

All this in broad daylight. While waiting for darkness, Antares was an easy split at 200x.

Then had a blast just trawling through Sag and Scorp until family went lights out. 

I then spent a few hours looking at faint obscure southern galaxies in Pavo, Indus, Microscopium, Grus, that general area. 
The go to was hitting everything perfect, absolutely brilliant. I now have a few new favourite faint fuzzies, I’ll put together a list tomorrow, hitting the sack now. 

[Studly]

Greetings to all.

 

Though I am primarily a visual observer, I grabbed some crude footage of Saturn last night. The conditions were certainly not ideal, and I am in *no* way an expert at any form of astrophotograhy. The images are small, but I think they turned out decently, especially considering the below-average Seeing I was experiencing:

 

Using a focal reducer to produce smaller image:

 

Still using the focal reducer:

 

Now without:

 

And again:

[Migwan]

Greetings to all.

 

Though I am primarily a visual observer, I grabbed some crude footage of Saturn last night. The conditions were certainly not ideal, and I am in *no* way an expert at any form of astrophotograhy. The images are small, but I think they turned out decently, especially considering the below-average Seeing I was experiencing:

 

Using a focal reducer to produce smaller image:

 

 

Still using the focal reducer:

 

 

Now without:

 

 

And again:

Might be just my eyes, but I get bit of green???   

 

Your images show the A, B & C bands.  Near the edge of the A band, I can just see a bit of difference in brightness.  I always assume that is where the Enke's gap is when I can see that in the telescope (which has been a long time).   I see that best in image 2 &3.   If that isn't an illusion on my part, that's a pretty cool capture.   Especially as seeing seems to have knocked the black right out of the Cassinni Division. 

[Jehujones]

I'm still deciphering my notes from last night but I gotta say that we had some great conditions here.
There was no discernable twinkle at all. The only limits on my seeing was the quality and available selection of my optics.
Transparency was great here too. By 3am stars were visible to mag 4.95 in Cassiopeia (Phi) and averted to mag 5.4 (Lambda)

I wish I could say M31 was visible but I think it was my imagination after viewing it so long in the scope.

I hope conditions repeat tonight, it would be worth the hour long drive to darker skies.

If you're in SoCal I suggest you get out there tonight.

[wxcloud]

IV

 

We're doing intravenous observing now?

 

This is what I call hard core...

 

Sometimes when one is deprived of any observing, it's helpful to have an IV of supplemental observations from others in the form of CN reports or "observations by proxy"

 

It kind of helps as my last couple outings I ended up coming down with a case of astrophotography bug again. It keeps coming back lol 

[therealdmt]

I had a rather remarkable experience today;

set up the 14” about two hours before sunset, just to check everything and let it acclimate.
Hmm, I wonder if I can find Alpha Centauri in full daylight? Set the altitude to 76*, as SS6 said it would be, and slowly scanned back and forth due south. (It was just past the meridian).

Amazingly found it! Then decided to power up, and try the alignment process without levelling or pointing north.
Centred A Cent, then scrolled the handset for a second star. It suggested Antares. Ok. Sure enough, there it was!

All this in broad daylight. While waiting for darkness, Antares was an easy split at 200x.

Two terrific observations there; Alpha Centauri during the day and then splitting Antares any time, but during the day as bonus  

[Speedy1985]

I had a nice unplanned session last night using just my PVS-14 night vision monocular handheld with a modified 3x magnifier to accommodate various filters. Conditions were very calm and warm, and seemed better than what Astrospheric was predicting. At one point I was just laying in the grass scanning the sky! 

 

Nebulae observed with a 3.5nm h-alpha filter included

 

NGC 7000 North American- brilliantly crisp and nearly overhead

IC 5070 Pelican- in the view with NGC 7000

IC 1318 Gamma Cygni- as with the N. American, this massive nebula was stunning with even the fainter regions visible 

M8 Lagoon- the dark lanes of this one were clearly visible

M20 Trifid- visible but the dark lanes were not

M16 Eagle- the shape unmistakable

M17 Omega/Swan- another more prominent one with it's darker "cove" and the bright stars within were easily seen

IC 1396 Elephant's trunk- this was expectedly very faint, but it was the first I'd been able to see it in this configuration, so I knew the conditions were better. The darker "trunk" area was visible, but without great detail. 

NGC 7380, IC 1470, NGC 7635 Bubble Nebula- I confirmed these faint smudges in SkySafari with their SW to NE alignment and location proximal to IC 1396. It was at this point I was sorry I hadn't set up the refractor as the Bubble is one I have not had a good look at yet.

NGC 7822 and Cederblad 214- 7822 almost has the shape of the California nebula, but much smaller. Again, these 2 confirmed better conditions. 

NGC 6995 Eastern Veil, 6960 Western Veil, and 6974- I was completely surprised to be able to find these because they are not as bright as some of the others. It took me a minute to get focused on them with my eyes.

 

Switching over to a Lumicon Night Sky 642nm that allows both the stars and some nebula luminosity to pass through gave some beautiful views of the Milky Way star fields and dark lanes. In a light polluted area such as mine, this is a welcome treat and I'm also pretty sure I was able to spot M7, Ptolemy's cluster, low in the sky. I was even blessed by a nice meteor passing through my view. Using a 685nm long pass filter shows the incredible amount of stars and a couple of the more prominent globular clusters. I did not confirm but M56 was likely one based on it's altitude and where I was looking. Overall, this device just continues to provide me with incredible views! 

[dave253]

Two terrific observations there; Alpha Centauri during the day and then splitting Antares any time, but during the day as bonus  

Cheers mate, I’d never managed to split Antares in the dark, always found the primary overwhelmingly bright.

The seeing right before sunset was pretty good, later in the night when Saturn was about 40 degrees up, it was not good.
I went out again at 3am, much better, but lower in the southwest. 

[Jehujones]

Last night was not as good as Friday night. It started out promising.

I didn't see any twinkling, stars in Hercules were visible down to 4.6 mag.

Chi, Omega and Nu were visible, Upsilon and Kappa were not.

However, further south NELM was only 3.8 at best.

In Sagittarius I was able to find Mu with averted vision and then finally directly.

In Scorpius I could not see Nu or Rho.

 

The neighbor's lights were on and it limited me to a small zone from the zenith to the northwest.

I tried to find some galaxies in Draco but transparency just wasn't good enough.

I decided to look for some new targets using some recently acquired eyepieces that were picked up in Spring.

My notes were created for using those EPs based on their FOVs.

Wow, what a struggle. I was off every time that I tried to hop my way around.

After more than several complete failures I was beginning to think the notes I made from Stellarium were to blame.

I put the notes away and pulled up some charts that I had in my phone.

These are charts that I put in my phone just in case I forgot my notes when I would go to darker skies.

 

 

When I used the charts I found every target that I expected to.

(I was just picking out clusters and doubles)

 

Well, I figured it was time to do some experimentation... I went to the "Coathanger" and made sketches of the FOV limits of the EPs.

I know this is not nearly as accurate as drift timing but I was looking for some seriously glaring discrepancies.

Using the Antares SWII 31.5mm 90°AFOV in a 10.1" F4.5, the sketch I made netted approximately 1.9°

 

 

Next was the Antares 29.5mm MEr 74°AFOV, the sketch I made netted approximately 1.4°

 

 

Now I popped in the ES 18mm 82°AFOV, the sketch I made netted approximately 1.2°

 

 

Finally I put in the Meade 8.8mm 82°AFOV, the sketch I made netted approximately 36'

 

 

All of this was done without the comma corrector.

I know Antares is not a "premium" brand and I have no false expectations but the AFOV seems to be seriously overstated.

I'm sorry if I'm getting off topic.

 

Anyways, I still love those EPs and they're great with the CC.

M71 was very nice and tight

M92 was showing resolved stars across the face

M13 was M13

M57 was kind of spooky, no color but bright

M56 was resolving some stars

I tried to find variable Chi in Cygnus but couldn't find it, maybe it was at minimum or maybe the zenith was getting the upper hand.

M29 was blending into the background and hard to make out

M11 was really a standout, I had a lot of fun with that one.

M26 was playing hide and seek and won the game.

I tried to find NGC 6712 using my notes but had to go back to the charts to get it.

Nearby NGC 6728 was far less impressive.

By the time Saturn was up high enough the air had filled with moisture.

I noticed a glow around it and realized that my mirror was getting dew.

I guess I spent too much time at the zenith.

 

This morning I searched the forums to find a decent 2° EP and ended up ordering an AT 28mm UWA so I hope that works out for my future session planning.