Davis, 7/15/06

by Shneor Sherman

I wanted to check how some eyepieces and filters worked with the Starblast. The eyepieces I used were a 24mm Panoptic, a 9mm Adorama Ultraview and a 4.8mm Nagler. The filter I mainly used was a DGM Optics NPB filter.

A word about the sky and location: Limiting magnitude was maybe 3.5, 4 at best, and the Davis sky was somewhat murky. I was near my house, in the back yard, where I have a relatively narrow strip to observe from, because the pool takes so much space and the area on the other side of the pool is in the stream of light coming from my neighbor's large glass slider. So the furthest south I could see was Hercules. And of course, trees block various other parts of the sky to the north and west.

My first target of the night was Jupiter. I set up in a spot which let me see Jupiter, but not much else. It was pretty in the 24 Pan (which gives about a 3° apparent field), the 9mm showed bands and the 4.8 showed the bands better, but without much more detail. I was observing over my overheated house, of course. I moved the telescope nearer to the house, and got a nice view of M57. At first, it the 24 Pan, there was just a hint of a non-stellar object, but in the 9mm and 4.8mm the ring was very pretty, as usual (though dimmer than I'm used to, of course). I turned to the northwest, and looked for M51. It was visible in the 24 Pan, with both cores visible (M51 and N5195) with surrounding nebulosity. The view was enhanced and quite pretty in the 9mm and the 4.8mm. It may have been my imagination, but I thought I saw hints of spiral structure with averted vision. Since I was in the neighborhood, I checked out M101. In the 24 Pan, it looked quite large, though dim. In the other eyeoieces, it was difficult to see at all. I then moved to Cygnus to view the Dumbbell. Again, a great view in all the eyepieces, very crisp in the 24 Pan, and the dumbbell shape discernable in the 9 and 4.8.

Now I inserted the NPB filter in the 24 Pan, and looked for the Veil (still pretty low). I had a good view of the easstern arc of the Veil (N6992), and I was delighted - I should be able to see the entire arc in clear dark skies. I took the filter out and copped a view of Albireo, always a beautiful sight with the gold and blue contrast. Then I wrenched my neck a bit and found M13. I couldn't resolve anything even with the 4.8mm, but it was above the side of my house, so it was not a surprise. And the mosquitos had a feast...I quit at 11.

(Friday night I had a view of M81, but that was before I had the telescope properly collimated.)

I'm really impressed with this little scope. It really performs with good eyepieces (and no, a Paracorr is totally unnecessary). I'll try to bring it with me when I'm out observing.

Clear skies,
Shneor Sherman