A Couple of Globular Clusters & The Dumbbell Nebula

For my most recent night outside with the telescope I dedicated to hunt down a few Messier objects I hadn't seen before which you can see detailed on the image below.

Messier 71
RA: 19 54 Dec: +18 47
Type: Globular Cluster
Magnitude: 7.1

Messier 71 is a Globular Cluster in the Sagitta Constellation and is a distance of around 12,000 light years away from Earth. For quite a while this cluster was actually dense open cluster due to it lacking a dense central region. However, further research has confirmed that it is actually a very loosely concentrated globular cluster, much like M68 in Hydra

To be honest, I really struggled to see this object in my telescope. It was very faint and it took a fair amount of time at the Eyepiece and some averted vision to bring out a very faint smudge of light. To be honest I was having issues of light pollution from my home as my wife kept switching on the lights which wasn't helping. I will need to take a further look at this globular cluster from a darker site at some point.

Messier 92
RA: 17 17 Dec: +43 08
Type: Globular Cluster
Magnitude: 6.4

After barely being able to see Messier 71 I decided to check out Messier 92 which was another Globular Cluster, this time in Hercules. This cluster is about 26,700 light-years away from Earth and is one of the oldest known Clusters.

My first interesting observation on this cluster was that it was much brighter than Messier 71 even though it is so much further away from Earth. It was very clear, compact and bright in the 32mm eyepiece with an obvious brightening towards its centre.

Messier 27 / The Dumbbell Nebula
RA: 20 00 Dec: +22 43
Type: Planetary Nebula
Magnitude: 7.5

My final target of the night was the Dumbbell Nebula, also known as the Apple Core Nebula or Messier 27. It is a planetary nebula in the constellation Vulpecula and is a distance of about 1,360 light years from Earth.

The GOTO on my mount was actually off by a little bit when I tried to find it but the nebula was actually visible in my finderscope so it was easy enough to centre it in my 32mm eyepiece. The moment I realised I could see it in the finderscope I knew I was going to be in for a treat and sure enough it was a lovely sight. I could clearly make out an hour glass shape and I am sure I even managed to pick up a hint of green colouring. I am actually a bit upset I left it to last as light cloud was affecting my view and I suspect I could have gotten a clearer view if I had looked at it earlier. It can join the ever growing list of objects that I want to look at again from a darker location.

Clusters in Cassiopeia

Cassiopeia has been a regular target for me since the late summer nights started getting dark enough for me to be out with my telescope. The constellation is full of clusters, several of which I have already mentioned in previous blog posts however there are others and I decided last night to try and see a couple more of them in addition to imaging my favourite of them all, NGC 457.

Messier 52
RA: 23 24  Dec: +61 35
Type: Open Cluster
Magnitude: 5

Messier 52 is an open cluster that is anywhere between 3,000 and 7,000 light years away and is comprised of at least 190 stars. I wasn't sure if it would be that easy to find this cluster as the brightest star has a magnitude of 11 but due the number of stars I actually saw it in my finderscope as a small hazy patch. Through the telescope it didn't initially look that special but once I used averted vision it became a lovely compact collection of faint stars. Even now 9 months since I started my astronomy adventure I find the power of averted vision to be quite amazing.

Supposedly the Bubble Nebula is less than a degree away from this cluster but I couldn't see it, then again from a light polluted back garden with my small telescope I didn't really expect to.

NGC 7789 / The White Rose Cluster
RA: 23 57  Dec: +56 43
Type: Open Cluster
Magnitude: 6.7

The White Rose Cluster is an open cluster that is approximately 8,000 light years away and was actually discovered by William Herschel's sister, Caroline. The name is because when viewed visually the loops of stars and dark lanes supposedly look like the swirling pattern of rose petals. Personally, I don't see what the heck people are talking about as to me it just looked like a plain old cluster of stars but I may need to take a look at it from a dark site in the future to see if that was the issue.

NGC 457 / Caldwell 13 / The Owl Cluster
RA: 01 20 Dec: +58 17
Type: Open Star Cluster
Magnitude: 6.4

I have discussed NGC 457 previously when I detailed my visual observations but to recap it is an Open Cluster about 9,000 Light Years away and is comprised of about 200 stars in a region 30 light years wide. It does have a beautiful shape and I was therefore determined to try and get an image of it to share with you all. Amazingly enough I think I did a pretty good job considering the limitations of my set up but feel free to make up your own mind on how good a job I have done.

The furthest planets in our Solar System

So over the past 9 months of owning my telescope I have looked at and imaged three planets, Mars, Jupiter & Saturn. A few nights ago I decided that I would see if I could capture the 7th and 8th planets in our Solar System, Uranus and Neptune.

I started with Uranus and was annoyed to find that it was rather close to some  very annoying street lights. It was so bad that my finderscope just showed orange glow when I did get the main telescope pointed at Uranus. It is times like this that I really appreciate having GOTO capability as my alignment was good enough to get the planet into my 25mm Eyepiece FoV straight away. I was pretty chuffed to see that I could make a slightly green/blue tinged disc hovering there. Unfortunately, when I moved to the webcam I failed utterly to get an image appearing, I even used my reticle eyepiece to make sure it was centered but still nothing. To be honest, I suspect the low aperture of my telescope means that there is not enough light getting through. I did do a quick check on Astrobin and most people who have posted images are using 8 inch telescopes. Perhaps from a really dark site I would have more luck, but I think I will skip trying it again until I get better webcam.

After this minor disappointment I decided to look for Nepture in the hope that I could catch sight of this, the most distant planet in our system. There were no street lights this time although the Moon was close by which did wash out the view a little bit. However, I did managed to spot it as a tiny pin head of blue tinged light. I did try and up the magnification with my 2.5x barlow but the dimming effect all but made it impossible to spot Neptune beyond the odd fleeting glance. I don't see anyway that my telescope could pick up this planet to be honest so I guess imaging it will need to wait until I get something bigger.

In the end it was still nice seeing both these planets and actually getting some form of colour. I am sure I will take another look in the future from a darker site which will hopefully enable me to get some more magnification.

The Lunar 100 - Three More Off the List

So it has been a fair bit since I last tried to explore the Lunar 100 but last night I decided to once again continue my journey exploring the Moon's surface. So I fished out my check-list and decided on three targets from the list with the first of these being L6 - Tycho which is a rather prominent and well known crater in the Southern lunar highlands.

Tycho is in a pretty busy section of the moon with quite a large amount of craters surrounding it, some of which were formed by ejecta from Tycho itself. One thing I really like when looking at the Moon are the ray systems and Tycho has a very distinctive ray system so I spent a fair amount of time gazing over it. The image I took which is shown below doesn't show off the ray system as much as I would have liked but it is still visible to some extent.

After Tycho I decided to head south to L9 - Clavius which is one of the largest crater formations on the Moon. I loved looking at this crater, mainly because it contains a lovely semi-circular arc of smaller craters on its floor which seem to line up in size order with the largest on the Southern rim being called Rutherfurd. If you look at the image below you will notice a 2nd crater sitting on the rim which is called Porter.

My final stop of the night was at L13 - Gassendi which is a large crater sitting on the Northern edge of Mare Humorum ("Sea of Moisture"). The crater  filled with lava during the formation of the Mare but the outer rim of Gassendi is still visible as a circular shape. A smaller crater known as Gassendi A intrudes into the northern rim which gives the crater formation the appearance of an engagement ring.