Monday, June 27, 2016

finished with carbons

Last night had very good conditions, and I finished off the Carbon Star list using the 8-inch.  I hate to say but this one seemed like a chore -- perhaps because its documentation requirements were more stringent than others?  But the stars are very pretty, and I hope I'll remain sensitive to seeing them:

S Scuti: Beautiful orange, brightest in the field, but some in field are nearly as bright.  Close double to SE.  Rich field. 

UX Draconis: Bright orange, brightest in a poor field; forms a triangle with other stars.

I needed to use the Vixen wide field binoculars to find both stars -- it helps reveal all a constellation's brighter stars so it looks closer to an atlas view for better orientation.  UX Draconis by first finding Polaris, then Ursa Minor, then finding the odd trapezoid pattern of stars in the curve of the Dragon; from there it was an easy Quickfinder find to the correct field.

S Scuti was a little more effort.  I knew it was nearby to M11 the Wild Duck Cluster, and I was going to wait until it had risen above the neighbor's tree.  But then I saw Altair rising above the roof and I used the binoculars to follow Aquila's stars down to its lower three stars which form a swooping pattern toward M11.  I moved the scope to the right spot in the yard to view and again, M11 was an easy find.  It was a profusion of faint stars separated by gaps.  A bright star in the eastern portion of the spray, with stars raining down from it toward the west.  It looked like the tip of an arc welder with sparks spraying out and down from it, scattering and extinguishing in the sky.  This was the first I've seen of M11 in a couple years and it was magnificent.

I had the usual views of Jupiter, Mars, and Saturn, all very satisfying.  A good evening.

Sunday, June 26, 2016

a couple good nights

Thursday and Friday nights turned out very well.  I observed with the 8-inch and gained some traction on the Stellar Evolution and Carbon Star lists -- a nice feeling to make progress. 

Both nights featured views of Jupiter, Mars, and Saturn during the astronomical twilight.  Thursday features a GRS transit of Jupiter; it seems to ride on the SWB.  Saturn's Cassini division was well seen, along with four moons each night.  Thursday was cut short by marine layer.  Some scraps of it started to fly through Scorpius so I changed observe in Lyra and Hercules.  I was just about to make my observation of AC Herculis after a long hop from Beta Lyrae, and after checking the chart looked back in the eyepiece and found it totally clouded out.  Otherwise, very good conditions.  All observations at 184x.  I had a couple non-list observations, too:

Gliese 581 = HO Lib, red dwarf in Libra: Small, faint, slightly red.  20 light years away, a red dwarf with 4 or more planets, intensively studied for habitable planets.  Has a debris disk providing 10x the comets as our system

18 Scorpius: Unremarkable yellow-white star.  45.3 light years distant, shares many characteristics with sun.  Good candidate for hosting planets with life, but none yet discovered

Antares = Alpha Scorpius: Bright shimmering red-orange.  No companion seen.  Red giant; one of the largest and brightest observable stars; 883x radius of Sun.

Zeta Ophiuchi: Pretty, brilliant white star.  Aged only 3m years, but will expand to red giant in a few million years and go supernova.  It has high velocity and NASA has imaged it creating a bow shock in an interstellar dust cloud

Rasalgethi = Alpha Herculis: Beautiful orange yellow A with a closely split much fainter greenish B.  A is a asymptotic giant branch star, with both helium and hydrogen shells around a degenerate carbon-oxygen core.  400x the sun, it is experiencing rapid mass loss.  B has its own pair, not seen

Barnard's Star = HIP87937: ordinary, faint, slightly red.  Low mass red dwarf 6 light years from earth.  EE Barnard measured its proper motion as 10.3" per year.  7-12 billion light years old, among the oldest in the Milky Way.

Vega = Alpha Lyrae: Brilliant white; said to be a double.  25 light years away; was the northern pole star in 12,000 BC.  1/10th the age of the sun but will only live 1/10th the time; it will become a planetary nebula in about 500 million years.

RR Lyrae: ordinary, 8-9th magnitude, a little yellow-white.  Brightest of its type of variable stars which serve as standard candles to measure stellar distances

Albireo = Beta Cygni: Astonishingly beautiful gold (A) and blue (B), in a rich field of stars.  First view this season, wow.  430 light years distant; 35" separation; not known if physical pair.  A has a confirmed 0.4" pair, too close to see. 

Sigma Draconis: Pretty yellow-white.  18.8 light years away, has a high proper motion of 1.825" per year. 

Altair = Alpha Aquilae: very bright brilliant white.  16.7 light years distant.  Rotates very rapidly, more than half its break-up speed, bulging its equator.  It is a multiple system with four components, two of which are gravitationally bound to A; I didn't notice any of them.

η Eta Aqlilae: Light yellow ordinary star.  Cepheid variable, ranges from 3.5 to 4.3 over 7.17 days -- have to watch this one!

Epsilon Draconis: Very pretty bright yellow A and ~4 magnitudes fainter, close but split white B.  Probably an optical pairing.  3.2" separation 4.0 mag A, 6.9 B

K Draconis: Bright white with a dim yellow B, large magnitude difference, well split. 

V Ophiuchi: carbon star: Very red, fairly bright; seen in finder.  Est. 8.0 C6 [AAVSO 7.5, C5-7]

TW Ophiuchi: carbon star: Very deep orange; makes a triangle with other stars but otherwise a star poor area.  Est. 7.0, C5.  AAVSO N/A C5

SZ Sagittarii, carbon star: Faint red-to-orange in a string of four stars -- also makes a triangle with other stars.  Est. 8.5, C6.  AAVSO N/A, C7

FO Serpentis, carbon star: Very faint, whitish yellow  In a wide triangle of brighter stars.  Est. 8.5, C2 [AAVSO N/A, 8.5-8.7, C4]

AC Herculis, carbon star: Very faint, white with a little orange.  Est. 6.0 C1 [AAVSO 7.5 6/20/16, C0)

I thought I was finished with the carbon star list, but after sorting out my file today find I have two I thought I observed but for which I don't have the documentation.  They are both up in the sky now, so I should be able to finish the list, maybe tonight.

Thursday, June 23, 2016

frustrating night

Last night was very frustrating.  I had cooled the 12.5-inch as I usually do and started observing after dark.  But the seeing was atrocious.  I could not form clean images on anything, even as low as 170x.  I started with Jupiter, then Mars.  Through the murk and haze I was able to see Syrtis Major, Sinus Sabaeus, Sinus Meridiani, and so on.  But it was very poor.  I tried different solutions but only the apodising screen seemed to help, but little.  There must've been some seriously bad roof currents, and general heat dissipation from the ground.  At 9:40pm I turned my scope back to Jupiter to watch Io reemerge from the planet's shadow; the ephemeris or my watch may have been off since Io was already there -- it wasn't supposed to appear until 9:44pm.  I thought perhaps the seeing would be better at zenith, so I tried Cor Caroli -- but it was horribly smeared.  I checked the primary mirror to see if it was dewed, or if collimation had somehow gotten way off -- but nether was the case.  So I packed it in early, and just had some simple naked eye viewing.

I suppose the only solution to suburban summer viewing is to get up early; it's the only chance for the local seeing to be somewhat settled.  It was a frustrating night, but I'm not upset about it -- you just have to take what the sky gives you.

Wednesday, June 22, 2016

jupiter and mars

Had a session last night using the 12.5-inch, but was disappointed with the seeing.  Very watery and difficult to hold detail.  I think the upper atmosphere was fine, but near the ground there was a lot of turbulence due to the temperature swing from the 90s to the 60s after dark -- too much heat being released by houses, streets, and the ground.  Tonight's forecast is much the same, with great transparency and good seeing -- it's not as hot today so perhaps it will be better.

I only made two observations, Jupiter and Mars.  Io had just started a transit when I began a little after 9pm, but I could not see its disk despite being at 340x (and the planetary filter & apodising screen).  Not like Fremont Peak last month with the 20-inch, where we tracked Io as long as we wanted.  My sketch reveals some largish festoons in the central band, but nothing remarkable.  I observed Mars for a while then turned back to Jupiter at around 10:15pm to see Io's shadow, a very small round black dot on the NEB.  Always nice to see a shadow transit; Jupiter is getting pretty low so there won't be many chances.

Mars looked better, using the same set-up.  Syrtis Major was a prominently dark triangle near the western limb.  I also observed the lighter sweeps of Sinus Sabaeus, Sinus Meridiani, and the beginnings of Mare Acidalium.  Arabia was a clean clear orange color, with Eden pointed directly at me from the center. 

Tuesday, June 21, 2016

full moon

Yesterday evening Carol asked when the moon was to rise.  I pointed it out over the East Bay hills when we were driving home from a party Sunday night.  She wanted to see it again.  So we went for a walk out to a nearby levee trail which had clear views to the west.  No moon, it was still too early.  I promised I'd look at it at night.

While reclining on the couch reading before bedtime, the moon shown down through a gap in the window and reminded me of my promise.  I stepped out onto the back patio and saw a wonderfully transparent night with some altocumulus bands illuminated silver by the moonlight.  I grabbed my 7x35 binoculars for a closer look.  Scoprius was standing on it's tail, with just the lower curve blocked by a neighbor's house.  Mars and Antares were brilliant red.  The clouds moved and changed shape imperceptibly: I'd look for a while tracing the glowing broken shoals, then coming back notice they had been transformed.  One small cloud had a wavy pattern to it, like sand ribbed by slow shallow surf.  That apparition lasted for about 10 minutes.  The moon itself rode placidly above the scene.

I dutifully reported what I observed to Carol this morning, and she was very pleased by it.

Sunday, June 19, 2016

father's day eve observing

Last night I repeated some of the observations of Thursday night, but the seeing was rather worse.  We were having a camp-out in the backyard so I was somewhat distracted, too.

Jupiter at 340x was a little mushy.  The GRS was nearly midway through transit, and I could clearly see two thirds of the oval were darkened.  There was a surprisingly dark medium size lenticular barge in the NEB nearly below the GRS's position.  Preceding it was a bright oval on the northern edge of the belt. 

I tried the same series of Virgo doubles as Thursday but without any more success.  The moon was nearly full and the transparency spread its light across the sky -- so I had little hope of seeing the very faint pairs.  I experimented with the 5-inch off-axis mask: it really helped steady the star images and made very nice tight Airy disks, but it also hurt resolution so that the fainter stars were more difficult.  I suppose it is best used for tight pairs of similar magnitude. 

I observed Mars for a while, at 340x with the apodising screen and planetary filter.  By now the seeing was a little better and I saw about as much detail as Thursday, of the same features, but with the planet rotated a little to the east. 

As I was staying out a little longer, past 11pm, Antares and Saturn cleared the tree.  While the seeing was not great I gave Antares a try.  The apodising screen steadied the seeing but the star was a little jumpy.  I tried the off-axis mask and it helped to better steady the star; but still no companion star.  Finally I used a blue filter with the off-axis mask, and all the diffraction disappeared.  It was spooky how it did that.  After a while I could discern a very faint concentration -- it wasn't really a stellar point -- to the WNW fairly close to the star.  I suppose it was the "B", which is in 277 degree PA now and 2.59" separated.  I'll call it a possible sighting, but I'm not particularly confident about it.  However, I am impressed with off-axis masks and will make one for my 20-inch to play around with.  With the 20-inch's focal ratio, an 8-inch mask will be f/14! 

Finally I observed Saturn.  It was best with the apodising screen and with my boundary layer fan on -- Cassini division and Enke's minima, and some darkening in the D ring.  Lots of color in the planet.

I might not have the opportunity to observe tonight, but Monday is predicted to be above average for seeing and transparency, so I'm hopeful for better views to come.

Saturday, June 18, 2016

missed multiples, made up for with mars

Thursday night was predicted to have poor transparency, but fortunately that did not materialize.  I started out observing Jupiter during the twilight.  At 340x I saw the usual dark barges in the equatorial bands, the one in the southern very long and tapering at the tips like a lenticular galaxy.  The GRS was nearly finished with its transit and there was a dark forking barge following it, along with two lighter ovals -- first time I recall seeing such a feature.  The barge had swells in them as they extended under the GRS.  There was even a barge in the SSTB -- though the whole South Temperate and South Polar region appeared uniform in color.  The North Tropical zone was distinct from the Temperate and Polar zones, but these were also a mild uniform color.  I'll have to look for separations in these zones in the time remaining this season.

While waiting for the moon and Mars to clear the neighbor's tree, I viewed some doubles in Virgo at 340x; seeing was about Pickering 7:

Rst 3829 / Sh 162: This is a quadruple system with three visible; but I only noted two stars, AB, a widely separated yellow A and orange B, 1 magnitude difference.  The Aa Ab system is 0.6 separation, and the BC system has a wide magnitude difference (C is 13.34) which I didn't notice.  That's what I get for randomly observing things without research beforehand...

86 Virginis; Stelle Doppie says this is also a quadruple system, and all four should be visible.  Again I only noted two, a brighter A and very faint / almost averted vision B widely separated.  What I saw was actually the AC pairing, with mag 5.66 A and 11.9 C, 27.3" separation.  The AB is 1.2" separation and 5.66 A & 8.47 B.  The CD pair is 11.90 and 13.10, 2.4" separation -- I should have noticed a nearby "double double" but did not.  I will need to go back...

81 Virginis: I saw a well split close pair of yellow stars about equal magnitude (2.7" 7.79 A & 8.08 B).  Unfortunately, this is a triple system with three visible!  Missed again!  I saw the AB pair but AC is quite widely separated at 137" and a much fainter C at 12.28.

72 Virginis: Bright A and very faint B, widely separated.  Luckily this is correct; A 6.14 separated by 29" to 10.74 mag B

STF1775: The losing streak continued: I observed a pretty pairing of a bright orange A and a faint bluish B widely separated.  This is probably the AB pair, 27.7" separated and 7.21 mag vs. 10.06.  The AC, not noticed, is 38.6" and 14.16 mag.

STF1788: And I closed with a total failure: This is a quintuple system and all 5 are visible.  I saw a bright pair of near equal magnitude, both yellow-while color.  This is the AB pair.  I give you the Stelle Doppie link so you can see how inattentive I was:  http://stelledoppie.goaction.it/index2.php?iddoppia=58333

The double session was impromptu, so perhaps I shouldn't be so hard on myself.  But, knowing what I can & should see I will retry them the next opportunity.

Mars was now clear of the tree.  Seeing had become considerably better, Pickering 8 or 9 -- all the air around me had become still, and the usual loud white noise from the highway was greatly diminished.  I pulled out all the stops, as it were: 553x, planetary filter, and apodising screen.  It was my best view I've had through my own scope yet, and approaching the very brief look I had through the 36-inch Great Refractor at Lick Observatory about 15 years ago. 

Sinus Miridion reached down in a triangular form, with Sinus Sabaeus as a dark barge to the east.  The rest of Mare Erythraeum was a dark but somewhat greyish mass covering the rest of the hemisphere; could there have been clouds making the greyish color come out?  I noticed two small bright ovals to the west of Margatitifer Sinus but can't account for what it was.  Mare Acidalium was a large thick crescent, and I could see the bulge coming out of it to the east, along with some mottling in the brighter plain to the southeast.  The southern rim was bright with what could be clouds.

I now understand why observers become so excited during a Mars opposition: with the planet so much closer it offers up a lot more detail.  Lin came out for a look and said it looked like the moon -- all the mare visible.   I had planned to observe the moon's terminator that night too, but with Mars the way it was I decided to stay on it until bedtime; I can see the moon any month, but not Mars.

Sunday, June 12, 2016

planetary nights

Friday night I took out the 8-inch for some "shallow sky" observing.  It falls dark very late, and there was some light fog blowing in from the ocean, so it's not a night for anything except the bright stuff.

I was keen to observe Jupiter, since that night Chi Leonis would be 0.1 degrees south of the planet.  At 113x Jupiter's bands showed nicely, with some darkening and hints of festoons.  The four Galilean planets were all in a row: Europa and Io to the east, fairly close; and Ganymede and Calisto to the west.  Ganymede was about as far out from its relative Jupiter limb as Io, but Calisto was very far away.  Chi Leonis shown as an errant fifth Galilean moon to the south about as far as Europa was. 

One of the reasons I used the 8-inch was I wanted to observe Mars and Saturn, for which I need to have the scope on the other side of the yard from where the 12-inch is set-up.  I spent a good deal of time on Mars at 184x, both with and without the planetary filter.  I sketched what I could see during the periodic stillness, and over the course of the observation built up a fairly good sketch (by my low standards).  Mars was at about 270 degrees aphelic apparition.  The white cap of Planum Boreum shown plainly, along with the darker landscape of Mare Boreum and Utopia, with peninsula jutting into the lighter plain.  Syrtis Major and Mare Tyrrhenum made a strongly dark "C" shaped arc to the north, and I picked up Sinus Sabaeus trailing to the west.  Hellas was a small lighter section near the limb.  With more looking and patience, I noticed some surface shading extending east, which is Aetheria and Elysium. 

Saturn was only "ok."  It was still pretty low and was hurt by the haze and deteriorated seeing.  Cassini's division was clear and the brown equatorial band and greenish yellow polar region.  Moons Titan, Rhea, and Enceladus were easily spotted arcing from the south east of the plant.

I was out again last night with the 12-inch, and had another look at Jupiter.  Chi Leonis seemed to be further away to the west, however since I was using a different scope my sense of scale may well have been thrown off.  A GRS transit was in progress, a little more than halfway across.  I spent a good deal of time on the moon's terminator at 553x & 277x, but was fighting the seeing.  I waited until Mars cleared the neighbor's big tree, and could only see about as much detail as I had in the 8-inch the night before.  So, I will be waiting for better nights to come.

Friday, June 10, 2016

willow springs

Last Saturday night I went to Bob Ayer's Willow Springs property.  I met Mark Johnston, Mark Wagner, and Steve Gottlieb at the entrance.  There was a bank of wildfire smoke to the west and north, and we debated the dangers of setting up and the impact to sky quality.  But in the end we all decided since we had made the effort to come down and may as well head up to the site; we should still have usable sky to the south and east.  As it turned out, the wind shifted direction just after we arrived to the site, and cleared out the haze.  During the night Steve was getting consistent SQM readings of 21.70, so it was really good. 

I used my 20-inch and tried to make some headway on the H2 list but I was a little bit unfocussed in my observing.  I noticed some interesting things on the chart and spent time observing those.  I mooched some views of different things on the others' scopes (MJ showed Copeland's Septet in his 18-inch; MW showed an attractive galaxy and star field in his 18-inch; SG showed some of his galaxy pairs and we spent some time on the Hercules Cluster in his 24-inch).  I shared my 2.1x42 Vixens with MJ & MW and we all enjoyed the view (I liked it when MW exclaimed: "Scorpius just turned into a giant open cluster!").  I was already tired when I started observing, and since Astronomical twilight was not until 10:30pm there wasn't a lot of time to observe before I conked out at around 3:30am.  No matter, it was still a rewarding night.  Here are my recorded observations, all at 205x except the Hercules Cluster at 333x:

SN 2016coj in NGC 4125, galaxy in Draco: 4125 is a bright elliptical core with very faint halo, WNW-ENE 2:1.  Supernova 2016coj was just to the east of the core, still well within the halo; a bright point, brighter than the core itself.  Est. 14.3 magnitude.  To SSE is NGC 4121, small faint roundish patch.  http://www.astronomerstelegram.org/?read=9095

NGC 3065, Gx in Ursa Major: Small, bright round core, stellar nucleus.  Round haze hints of halo.  NGC 3066 3' to the SSE, a little fainter but about as large, round.


NGC 3516, Gx in UMa: Small.  Bright core, very slightly out of round ENE-WSW; very diffuse round halo.

Arp 329, Galaxy cluster in Dra = HCG 55 = UGC 6514: A small, faint mist, shallow-S shaped, 1.2' long, with three condensations seen.  I should have tried higher magnification; these are three of five members of the galaxy chain, 16.88 mag to 18.03.

NGC 3622: Gx in UMa: Need to keep 6.2 mag star SAO 15478 to SSE out of FOV.  2:1 N-S elongation, fairly bright core appears disrupted with a couple bright patches on the west end of the core.  Very faint halo appears a little longer to the south of the core.  Said to be an inclined spiral.

NGC 3735, GX in Dra: Lovely bright long edge on, 4:1 NW-SE.  Stellar nucleus is a little SE of center and is like a ball floating on the halo.  Bright elongated core and uneven brightness halo which fades imperceptibly to the tips.

NGC 4133, Gx in Dra: Face on spiral.  Needed to keep nearby bright star to south (HR 4627, 6.34 v mag) out of the FOV.  Rather small and faint, the core is oval and of uneven surface brightness, faint.  Seems to be a dark lane on the west side.  Diffuse halo is elliptical, NW-SE.  11' to SE near edge of FOV is UGC 7189, 14.8 b mag, a small faint oval patch with brighter core NNW-SSE

NGC 4236, Gx in Dra: Large, long maybe 6:1 NNW-SSE elongation, low surface brightness halo with a gradually brightening core and a sudden sharp stellar nucleus (which could be a fortuitously placed foreground star). Several foreground stars and perhaps fainter non-stellar patches on the SSE tip. Detected with AV and then can hold in DV, there is a bulge in the halo on the SW facing side of the NNW tip.  The "bulge" I find in Aladin using the NED filter are identified as HII regions (the brighter being HK83 16, 17, & 18). One of the brighter "non-stellar patches" on the SSE tip (it is in line with the major axis of the halo) Aladin has as VII Zw 446, mis-identified by Zwicky as a separate compact blue galaxy.

NGC 4250, Gx in Dra: Stellar nucleus, bright oval core NNW-SSE.  Very diffuse roundish halo.  AV widens and lengthens the amount of halo seen.  It is a barred spiral seen face on.

NGC 4256, Gx in Dra: Beautiful, bright long edge on.  Stellar nucleus and tight round core which floats on the long halo, gradually fading to its tips.  Extends 2/3rds the FOV, 5:1 NE-SW.

NGC 4291, Gx in Dra: Bright round core, round faint halo; slight mottling in outer edges of core.  Lies as one corner of a rectangle with three foreground stars.  With 4319 and 4386 in view.

NGC 4319, Gx in Dra: Fainter than 4291, has an elongated rice grain shape N-S core and a faint roundish halo.  Markarian 205 quasar is a stellar point just S of core, 1 billion light years away!  To the north on edge of FOV is NGC 4386: Bright round core with elongated halo piercing it, NW-SE 3:2.
Abell 2151, the Hercules Galaxy Cluster: Observed near zenith.  I started out with the string of galaxies comprised of 6040A/B, 6041A/B, and 6042. It was easy to find and brighter than I recall at Fremont Peak. The A/B pairs were more clearly split, and IC 1170 popped out consistently with AV, and I could barely hold it DV. I used this group as my home base as I searched around the area – I could find it easily enough. Letting the sky drift a little to the east, I could easily make out NGC 6045 following a wedge of stars, the two ends of which were hazy patches NGC 6043 and NGC 6047, respectively. 6045 had a very slightly brighter elongated core and very faint halo; stare as I might I could not see the small 6045B attached to the following tip, however I glimpsed it very briefly in Steve’s 24-inch scope.  I could see much more definite splits of all the A/B pairs in Steve's scope.  Back to my scope: NGC 6050A followed this group and appeared as a small round mist with a pretty bright core; 6050B (IC 1179) appeared as a small bulge to 6050A’s halo. NGC 6054 was very faint & small, with a NE-SW elongation just detectable. IC 1182 and 1184 following it were faint small non-stellar patches, forming a triangle with 6054. IC 1178 and 1181 appeared as a slightly larger than small irregularly round haze with two very hazy slightly brighter areas for their cores. NGC 6044 was very faint, small, round. I missed more galaxies, some of the ICs and PGCs. I felt I was straining a bit to detect the very faint small glows about – I have to get more used to viewing these very faint objects.

NGC 6026, Planetary Nebula in Lupis: Central star seen easily.  Faint small round shell.  OIII makes shell disappear at first but can bring it back with more contrast by blinking.  Inner part of shell is brighter, with a thin diffuse haze around it.  OIII loses the CS

NGC 5986, Globular Cluster in Lup: Bright, pretty large; string of resolved stars runs E-W along the northern half.  Bright star at NE edge.  Highly concentrated and compact.  About 50 resolved stars in front of grey mass.

NGC 6072, PN in Scorpius: Pretty bright, brighter central glow; overall diffuse and round.  Ill defined edges; greenish color.  OIII enhances view and reveals mottling in the shell and an inner ring structure.

HP 1, GC in Ophiuchus:  Haute-Provence 1, mag. 12.1, size 1.2'.  According to one "Dennis" who posted his image of the object in IceInSpace: "Discovered by Dufay, Berthier and Morignat in 1954. Independently rediscovered by van den Bergh and Hagen in 1975. Globular Cluster HP 1 was discovered by Dufay et.al. (1954), and sometimes referred to as "HP" for the Haute-Provence Observatory where the discovery occurred (e.g., Sawyer Hogg 1959). This designation was mutated to HP 1 as more globular clusters were discovered at that observatory in the 1960s by Terzan.  Until recently, it was thought that HP 1 is situated close to the Galactic Center, but recent estimates have put it as far as about 20,000 light years beyond, to a total distance of 46,000 light years from us."  In my scope it appeared as a very faint, small irregular splotch at the western rim of a shallow upturned arc of 5 stars.  The greyishness began to turn grainy with AV, hinting of some resolved stars

At this point I was too tired to focus on chasing particular targets, though the sky was chock full of them.  I put in my lowest power eyepiece (1 degree TFOV) for some sweeping through the Milky Way.  The grey sky background became grainy with resolving stars.  Dark cracks appeared in the graininess, dark nebulae or just gaps in stars.  Then, a giant globular cluster came to view, bright, concentrated, and well resolved, with streamers of stars radiating out into that dense grainy Milky Way field.  A sight I hope not to forget.

Tuesday, June 7, 2016

surprise transit

Last Tuesday night I had a nice night in the back yard with the 12.5-inch.  I was expecting to see two Galilean moons come out of eclipse from Jupiter's shadow, one a half hour from the other.  Instead I saw a bright disk just beginning a transit.  I must've hit a wrong key on the S&T Jupiter app and have pulled up the wrong day's events.  It was Europa, which begin its transit at 9:00pm just as I started observing.  It was contrasted with the North Equatorial Belt.  Seeing was quite good and there was a slight haze in the sky; using 340x I saw some light purple festoons sweeping into the Equatorial region from the NEB.  The North Polar region was a light brown and pretty solid all the way to the NEB.  The South Polar region was a darker brown and had a gap between it and the SEB.  There was a long wispy streak running nearly the width of the planet in the SEB, close to the gap just mentioned.  Two large dark barges in the NEB. 

The moons displayed colors: Io was yellowish, Calisto was smallest and a deep orange, Ganymede was the largest and a nice orange color; it showed the most albedo variation, with the southern half showing a darker orange than the northern. 

I moved on to some double star splitting in the area, and came back to Jupiter an hour later.  By this time I could still see Europa in transit because it was still contrasted with the NEB.  It was not a little more than halfway across and was at the root of the largest festoon.  I waited longer to see if I could witness the shadow egress...but as of 10:37 it still hadn't started, and I needed to go inside.  I found out later I would have needed to wait until 11:34pm.

Here's a summary of the double star splitting, same magnification:

STF1536: Quite close; very bright yellow white A and brownish B, split in A's diffraction ring.  Last separation was 2.1". 

STF1540: Yellow A and reddish B; wide separation.  A 3rd star about 3x distant related?  [not].  28.2" sep.

STFA19: Bright yellow A, bluish B, very widely separated (89.4")

75 Leonis: Red in finder, orange in scope (this was a carbon star diversion)

65 Leonis: Thought this might be a quadruple but seems it is not.  Brighter yellow A and a blue B, widely separated.  -- Seems I did not split this!  Checking current separation, it would be a very close pair at 2.7". 

55 Leonis: Not split or a very wide pair.  -- Not split; current separation 1.1"

S 617: Yellow A, blue B, wide separation (35.2")

STF1476 (in Sextans): Tight white of equal brightness; low in the sky seeing a bit poor.  (2.3", 7.08 and 7.82 mags)

STF1527: Not split (2012 separation is 0.3".  Interesting, since 1822 measure was 3.7" -- must have highly elliptical orbit.  Should be one to watch over the years, increase in separation.

STF1547: Bright yellow A, 3x fainter red B.  Wide separation. 

88 Leonis: A favorite!  Yellow and blue pair.  A has to spectroscopic pairs

h4433 / 81 Leonis:  Bright yellowish A, very faint bluish B, wide separation (55.1"; 5.6m / 10.8m)

β1282: very bright A, several stars around it; which is the pair?

STF1517: Very tight, hair split small orange stars of equal magnitude.  Wow!  (Stelle Doppie says current separation is 0.7", A mag 7.54, B 8.02; so I must've hit it on a good night.)

Friday, June 3, 2016

fremont peak night of May 29

I went up to Fremont Peak the night of the 29th, where I met Peter N. and Dave C. We were very fortunate the weather turned in our favor. The marine layer and good seeing combined to make the trip up the Peak totally worth the effort. Sky was about 21.30 SQML.

All three of us watched Io start to transit Jupiter, its bright disk still visible contrasted against the North Equatorial Belt. It was a fun way to spend the time until it grew fully dark. Peter pointed out how one could tell the relative size of the moons from their disk sizes, which I hadn’t noticed before. 
I continued through my AL H2 and PN lists. Despite darkness coming so late in the evening, I made many observations which I am still sorting through. Here’s some of the more striking, all in my 20-inch:

NGC 5850, barred spiral galaxy in Virgo, 205x: Lies at the eastern end of an east to west row of four galaxies in the field. Pretty large, with a brighter round core and a very faint round halo with extensions seen sweeping from the eastern end headed northwest, and from the western end headed southeast. Elliptical NGC 5846 is next in line to the west, with a bright round core but a very diffuse halo, with extensions which seem to sweep from the east and west sides to the north; 5846A appears as a nonstellar patch involved in the southern rim of 5846’s halo. NGC 5845 is a very small faint elliptical patch further west. SO galaxy NGC 5849 is on the far west of the field, and has a stellar nucleus with a small, very faint halo. 

Globular cluster NGC 5053 in Coma Berenices, at 205x appeared as a large grey cloud of unresolved stars, very much like the smoke from a spent firework. Resolved stars are in a loose concentration generally radiating from the center. The grey arms spread in all directions but are longer and denser east to west.

Elliptical NGC 5129 was small, with a stellar nucleus and a bright core, elongated 3:2 north to south. Barred spiral NGC 5132 was to the north-northeast, fainter, small, stellar nucleus and a round halo with a slightly brighter bar appearing as a NE-SW condensation within the halo. Elliptical NGC 5136 was to the southeast edge of the field, very faint, averted vision needed to clearly discern 3:2 W-E elongated halo and to brighten the core. Three excessively faint nonstellar patches surrounding a star just southeast of NGC 5129 I find today are 13th magnitude 2MASS designated galaxies.

Sc Spiral NGC 5523 was very striking: Pretty large, low surface brightness halo, 5:1 west to east elongation inclined spiral, with a slightly brighter core. Some mottling noticed in the halo, hints of spiral structure. 

NGC 5529 was a pleasant surprise: A lovely long Sc spiral seen nearly edge on, 6:1 or more WNW-ESE. Long core is brighter on the southern edge (dark lane across the north?). Halo fades imperceptibly to the tips.

NGC 6210, “Turtle” Planetary Nebula in Hercules was visible in my 80mm finder as a rather bright star. At 333x the inner shell is bright green, slightly oval shape NW-SE, with a diffuse edge. With averted vision, a fainter larger rectangular outer nebula becomes apparent. More time with averted vision brought out very faint extensions to the corners of the rectangle, two tending north and two tending south, which are the Turtle’s “legs”. No head, though.... OIII seemed to enhance these extensions. Without filter, the central star shown through the inner shell very briefly with averted vision as a bright button, just following the geometric center—held about 20% of the time. 533x revealed some additional mottling in the shell but oddly I could not see the central star – must have lost the seeing.

When Peter mentioned he was looking at the Hercules Cluster (Abell 2151) it reminded me I had planned to look at it too. I used a finder printed from Paul Alsing’s website. Suffice to say all were near threshold objects, and took all my concentration to see at all. The finder helped me confirm the star fields and then observe the objects. Using 333x, I saw NGC 6040 as a very faint longish streak with 6039 as a extremely faint condensation at its tip. NGC 6041 barely split from 6041A; IC 1170 was not seen. NGC 6042 was relatively easy as a very faint patch. Nudging the scope a little east, NGC 6045 appeared as an extremely faint streak; but MAC 1605+1745 was not seen. NGC 6043A was a very faint patch, as was NGC 6047. NGC 6050 was an excessively faint slightly larger than a patch haze, and 6054 were excessively faint very small haze. This was the hardest I’ve worked for an observation yet. 

From around 2am I spent time in M101 and found all the objects noted in Howard Banich’s S&T article “The Determined Observer’s Guide to M101,” with the exception of SN 2011fe. It was wonderful to explore this amazing object.

I spent the rest of the night viewing galaxies in Ursa Major’s handle until finally I had enough. Last looks at Mars and Saturn, then a little rest in my car before dawn broke and it was time to head home.

The above is what I posted at TAC. Following are the rest of the observations, mostly at 205x:

NGC 4271, Gx in UMa: Small, faint. Brighter round core and stellar nucleus. Very faint round halo. One foreground star NE and another WNW hear halo's edge.

NGC 4290, Gx in UMa: Galaxy near miserable old M40. Bright core, bar NE-SW, with a round faint diffuse halo; overall small. NGC 4284 to W in FOV, stellar nucleus, small brighter halo, ESE-WNW 3:1, very faint halo need AV to see better.

NGC 4605, Gx in UMa: Pretty large and fairly bright. Core is very large with mottling and knots, a couple of dark lanes. Small kernel of nucleus. Very faint halo, wider at tips, 3:1 NW-SE

NGC 5007: to the SW of a bright field star, best to keep it out of view. 5007 is small and faint, round halo with a bright core. There are three galaxies in view arranged in an arc around the star (HD 114504), NGC 5007 to the SW, UGC 8234 (13.8B) to the NE, and UGC 8237 (13.7B) to the NNE.

NGC 5020, Gx in Virgo: Bright stellar nucleus with fairly bright elongated core NE-SW. Surrounded by round diffuse halo.

NGC 5129, Gx in Virgo: Stellar nucleus + bright core, 3:2 elongated N-S. AV shows more halo. 5132 barred spiral to NNE is fainter, small, 4:1 bar seen with stellar nucleus, and hint of round halo. 5136 to SE edge of FOV very faint, AV only, diffuse 3:2 halo W-E, brightened core.

NGC 5204 Gx in UMa: Large, diffuse glow, rather peanut shaped, 4:3 N-S. Much mottling and many condensations or knots. Diffuse edges to halo, can't tell where it stops.

NGC 5308, Gx in UMa: Small bright round core with sharply bright nucleus, pierced by long thin halo. Small but very pretty. 4:1 NE-SW

NGC 5430, Gx in UMa: Stellar nucleus and brighter core, which is small and elongated NE-SW, with a round, irregularly bright halo. Barred spiral.

NGC 5440, Gx in CVn: Bright elongated core, oval shaped NE-SW, 3:1. Diffuse halo needs AV to bright out distinctly. Foreground star on SW tip.

NGC 5443, Gx in UMa: A 4:1 nearly edge on spiral, NE-SW, with a bright core and rather bright halo of uneven brightness -- I seem to see a dark lane or cut-off along the NW side. Two pairs of foreground stars at each tip.

NGC 5444, Gx in CVn: Round, small, bright core with a faint diffuse halo. 6.5" SSE is 5445, and 2.78' SE is 2MASXJ14031472+3505520 (16.2 mag) a small very faint round patch with faintly stellar nucleus.

NGC 5445, Gx in CVn: Bright, small, 3:1 elongation NNE-SSE, stellar nucleus and faint diffuse halo.

NGC 5447, KNT in M101: An oval glow at the SW tip of M101's spiral, orientated NW-SE.

NGC 5462, KNT in M101: A condensed oval brightening on the far tip of the E arm of M101. Also saw all objects (except SN 2011fe) on Howard Bainach's "Determined Observer's Guide to M101"

NGC 5490, Gx in Boo: Stellar nucleus, bright core, slightly elongated N-S faint halo defined. Small. Fainter M+03-36-064 to the NW, brighter center with AV. NGC 5490A = Arp 79 to NE, stellar nucleus with faint small round halo, little detail

NGC 5523, Gx in Boo: Pretty large low surface brightness halo, long, 5:1 W-E, slightly brighter core. Large diffuse halo. Some mottling noticed in halo, hints of spiral structure. Three foreground stars trail off to the east from the eastern tip

NGC 5533 Gx in Boo: Stellar nucleus and small bright oval core, with very diffuse halo. NNW-SSE elongation

NGC 5548, Gx in Boo: Bright small round core but not stellar. Very faint diffuse round halo, can't tell any edge.

NGC 5585, Gx in UMa: Pretty large, diffuse halo with ill-defined edges. A brighter core and a small bright nucleus. 4:3 NNE-SSW with a foreground star just at the SSW of the E tip of halo, and another at the NE tip. Some mottling of halo suggests structure

NGC 5590, Gx in Boo: Round, small, stellar nucleus and bright core, faint round halo. NGC 5588 is to the NW, and a fainter twin of 5590

NGC 5600 Gx in Boo: Stellar nucleus, bright disturbed core -- bean shaped with round edge to the NE; faint round halo with mottling and brighter arc seen with AV on NE rim. Halo fairly well defined. In triangle of stars

NGC 5687 Gx in Boo: Small. Small oval bright core, diffuse halo, also oval. 4:3 E-W. Three foreground stars in a row N-S, two of which are superimposed on the W halo.

NGC 5831, Gx in Virgo: Fairly bright, stellar nucleus, fairly bright core with diffuse round halo. Small.

NGC 5838, Gx in Virgo: Stellar nucleus, bright core, elongated 5:1 NE-SW, diffuse halo gradually fades. Bright star to S; helps to keep it out of the field. Stars at either tip of halo.

NGC 5854, Gx in Virgo: Very similar appearance to 5864. 3:1 elongated NE-SW with bright core and some knots in it. Thin halo fades gradually to edges.

NGC 5864, Gx in Virgo: Long bright core 4:1 NE-SW, just stellar nucleus, thin but well defined halo. Nice with AV. Two foreground stars involved on southern rim

NGC 5879, Gx in Draco: Bright, pretty large 3:1 N-S. Stellar nucleus and bright extended core. Halo expands with AV, no defined edge or tip. Foreground star superimposed on NW edge of halo

NGC 5970, Gx in Serpens: Bright core, stellar nucleus, 3:2 E-W, pretty bright and large halo, some knots / concentrations. Bright field star to NNE, and a row of 7 stars between it and 5970. IC 1131 is 8' to SE; bright small core with very faint thin halo, 2:1 NW-SE.

Picot 1, Open Cluster in Boo: 7 bright stars, four of which are in a line W-E and two more to the north, with three more fainter. Supposed to look like Napoleon's hat. Sort of, with imagination…

NGC 5080, Gx: Small, round, fairly faint diffuse halo, brighter core with AV

NGC 5907, Splinter Galaxy. Wow! Halo nearly the length of field; edge on spiral. The bright round core seems to float in the middle of its swirling halo; the halo on the near side has a dark lane the length of the major axis which adds to this effect.

Wednesday, June 1, 2016

session from last week

I wanted to catch up a bit on a back yard session last Thursday night 5/26.  I started with some astrometric calibration, which I haven't been able to do much of because of a long streak of poor conditions.  I worked on 24 Coma Berenices, which is a pretty orange and blue pair, much like Alberio, and 90 Leonis, My separation measures seem to be ok but my position angle is off by 10 or 20 degrees -- the readings are not consistent.  I must reread how to set up the scale and the pointer, maybe change it to something stiffer. 

I then did some double star wandering, one of my favorite things to do, going double to double in my atlas:

17 Virginis, widely separated, large magnitude difference, with a yellow-white A and a ruddy / brownish B

Anonymous near tip of triangle of stars to the east of Theta Virginis: A line of three stars, could be triple?  The magnitudes progress from brightest A to medium B to faint C -- a Goldilocks triple?

Anon west of Theta Virginis: another wide separation, orange A and 1-2 magnitude less bright blue B

SS Virginis: Nice to see this in better conditions.  Red in finder while centered on Zaniah.  Bright orange in the scope.  Big difference without the moon and in decent transparency.

M61: Bright nucleus, but rest is a haze, just a hint of a round faint glow. 

I ended the night on Jupiter, which was lovely.  Both NEB and SEB had darker barges -- the NEB's were more elongated, the SEB's were oval.  The Southern polar region is darker than the northern, but the northern is more uniform and comes right to the edge of the NEB.  There is a cream-colored gap between the S polar region and the SEB.