by Richard Crisp
Since my astro-Jeep is in for repairs after the wheel falling off incident which happened on Tuesday night on the way home from the Peak, I had to cram the C14 and the imaging trimmings into my Astro Rocket, the '86 Porsche 928 (150K+ miles). At least it is a hatchback! I will have to admit that Pete S. gave me the inspiration for trying to use an old Porsche as an astro-car. His 911 held a lot more gear than I would have thought possible. Plus Rashad told me that Jay the Weasel used to carry Harvey, his C14, around in a Geo Metro, but I don't think Jay was hauling an AP1200GTO with a 48" pier and all the trimmings for imaging too, but please correct me if I am wrong on this.
Anyway, the very fine location at Plettstone gave me the chance to finish my emission line exposures of M8, picking up OIII and SII data. I also began the engagement of a new object, NGC281, a large emission nebula of low surface brightness suggested by my friend Ben Lutch.
NGC281 is really faint I found out so I had to substantially increase my photon gathering time. So I was only able to get Ha and OIII data on Friday night.
Here are both: the rehash of M8 in narrowband emission lines and the beginnings of NGC281 in Ha and OIII.
http://www.rdcrisp.darkhorizons.org/m8_hourglass_region_emission_page.htm
http://www.rdcrisp.darkhorizons.org/ngc281_emission_nebula_page.htm
Once again thanks to Michelle Stone for inviting me to her lovely home in the Sierra Gold Country which made this possible.