by Matthew Marcus
It was a fairly dry night, not too cold, and very transparent. I was pulling in 13'th mag objects with my C8. In the logged file are:
| SN2002ap | As Robert said, the 2nd brightest star in the field at about 12M |
|---|---|
| J900 | A tiny PN listed as a 'challenge object' in the RASC handbook. The challenge is that it's nearly stellar. |
| Medusa Neb | AKA PK205+14.1 in CMi. Another RASC challenge object. It's listed at about 13M and it's extended. I saw a cashew-shaped blob of nebulosity using an O3 filter. |
| 1973-1975-1977 | The complex of neb'y surrounding the two bright stars N of M42. I thought I'd logged it long ago but couldn't find the entry, so I redid it. 1977 is the long streamer surrounding the two bright stars. 1973 and 1975 surround two fainter star groups to the N. Presumable part of the M42/M43 complex. |
| 2371/2372 | A tiny, 2-lobed PN in Gem. I had logged it but without recording the magnification, so I redid it. Although it's small, it shows the interesting bilobed shape, with the S lobe brighter than the N. |
| 3319 | The infamous Gx in LMi that provoked so much traffic on TAC. In the 8", it's a streak. Robert's 17.5" showed that the streak is the core and that there's a halo showing some trace of mottling. Still no idea why it gets 3 stars. |
| 3177 | Gx in Leo. A small, round blob with a bright core. |
| 3681,3684,3686,3691 | Gx group in Leo. The faintest, 3691 was just barely there in the C8 and clear in Colin's C11. Aperture wins! I had previously logged this but hadn't seen 3691. 3686, the brightest member, showed a distinct, elongated, core-halo structure, while the others were blobs. |
| 3344 | Colin introduced me to this Gx in LMi. It's a face-on spiral. In the C8, it looks rather like a RN illuminated by the 'pointer' stars. Careful observation shows that the core is non-stellar. In Robert's scope, it showed hints of spiral structure. This is a large, bright object which belongs with the "Messier missed 'em" list of objects you can show off. |
| 3904/3923 | Two Gx in Hya. These were the last in Hya for my Deepmap survey. 3923 is much brighter, elongated, with a near-stellar core. By this time, everyone else was gone. |
| 3132 | Another in the Deepmap survey. It's in Vela, at dec=-40. I caught it with about 5 minutes to spare as it went down behind trees (not the big tree). My sketch shows a boundary line labeled 'Tree obstruction'. It's the Eight-burst Nebula, a round PN with a prominent central star. I don't know the reason for the name. It would be quite impressive if at higher altitude. |
| 4517 | Now to clean up the Virgo objects left on the Deepmap survey. All these are Gx (what else in Virgo?). This one is a long streak, fairly faint, with a star just off the center. |
| 4567,4568,4584 | This is the group containing the 'Siamese Twins', which looked like a pair of mittens hanging by their string. 4584 is to the N about 1/2 degree. I could make out the outlines and position angles of the Twins pretty easily, but no obvious central concentration. |
| 4596,4608 | Two more galaxies. |
| 4958 | This galaxy is listed as edge-on. When you first look at it, it looks like a small 2:1 or 3:1 ellipse. That's the core. The halo shows up on longer inspection as thin extensions from either end. |
| 5363,5360,5364 | A nice trio. 63 is the brightest. 64 is fainter but larger, round and with no obvious core. 60 is much smaller and fainter. I couldn't find 5373 which should be there. |
| 5701 | An unremarkable galaxy. |
| 5718 | This otherwise unremarkable galaxy is neatly framed within a diamond of stars of equal brightness, making a pretty picture. |
Objects seen but not logged:
M1. This showed more detail than I usually see in it. The shape was more like it is in pictures than the 'tattered hanky' I usually see. In Colin's scope, hints of filaments could be seen unfiltered. With an O3 filter, the brightness went way down, but the contrast on the filaments increased so that what little light remained was all in filaments. This is because most of the light is synchrotron light which is broadband and has no filaments in it. This light is blocked by the filter, leaving the O3 from the filaments. I had never seen that effect for myself before. Users of bigger scopes might want to check this out.
I left at 3:30AM. Usually, I get chased out by fog, but not this time. As I was driving out, I saw Scorpius rising. I've got lots of targets in there for the next few months!