having a second look – 3 February 2009

Location: at home in Tomball, TX
Cloud cover: none
Transparency: excellent (5/5)
Seeing: average (3/5)
Darkness: bright quarter moon
Wind: none
Humidity: 25%-30%
Temperature: 50’s
Start Time: 7:45 pm CST
End Time: 9:15pm CST
OTA: 8″ SC

Venus half-illuminated, very bright even with ND filter. Lots of atmospheric turbulence.

Luna brilliant, just over half illuminated. Mons Piton and Mons Pico cast long black triangles toward the dark side. Occasional turbulence visible. Subtle “fractal” texture visible on the surface of Mare Imbrium. Pulled ep and diagonal then projected image onto white paper to see entire moon in FOV. Did not try to locate Pleiades nearby.

M42 nice with 12.5mm, less detail visible than two weeks ago due to moonlight. Noticed Trapezium E for the first time, a very faint mag 10.3 star between A and B, just outside the trapezoid. Observed a pair of mag 7 or 8 stars near the mouth, and another mag 8 or 9 that formed a nearly equilateral triangle with the two stars near theta2 orionis.

Beta Mon very cool, primary slightly brighter than two companions. Close triple, clean separation in the new 12.5mm ep. Open angle about 140°-150°.

M50 appeared to consist of an isoceles triangle, pinched at the narrow vertex, with stars dotting the edges. A smaller triangle inscribed the larger, fainter stars everywhere.

NGC2264 appeared like the outline of a large arrow pointing “this way up”.

Open Clusters, Doubles, & Saturn – March 04, 2008

temp: 53F-46F
humidity: 37%-70%
transparency: 4/5 – 5/5
seeing: average 3/5

Attempted M1 (Crab Nebula) with 25mm, 32mm, 10mm, could not discern any nebulosity
using 25mm
M35 – dozens of stars, many bright – bow shape in center
M36 – moderately bright cluster, some linear patterns
M37 – faint cluster, few lines, bright center star
M38 – odd abstract bilateral symmetry of four rays (two short, two long), center star

M41 – behind a tree
M42 – observed to test dark adaptation of my eyes after failing to see M1. region is impressive as a cluster

M46 – wide cluster in 32mm, celestron controller indicated nebula in field of view, but I could not discern any
M47 – several bright stars, prominent lines, one tight pair of similar magnitude
M48 – dozens of similar magnitude stars, no prominent lines, many “wide” pairs
M50 – sparse cluster, wide magnitude range
M67 – dim cluster with pleasing random arrangement

Rigel – companion much fainter, 9.5″ separation
lambda orionis – similar magnitude companion 4″ separation, very close in 10mm but distinct during moments of good seeing
sirius – could not discern companion

Saturn was bright, Titan clear. Dione was dim but distinct. Rhea was very faint, disappearing at times with poorer seeing.