Messier Marathon - the Agony of the Realm

After last Sat and my 6th attempt at the Messier marathon, I've concluded that I just have to get something better for the Realm. Mind you, I'm a pretty good star hopper. I reached 109 in a marathon a few years back, and usually get over 100. But the method I'm using for the Realm (an old S&T article that star hops you through Virgo) failed me the past two times (probably because I didn't re-read it completely or practice with it beforehand). As a result I ended up spending way too much time in the Realm, to the point that I skipped some and moved on.

Anyhow, I'm wondering what other people use for the Realm. The thing for me, is I want absolute confirmation that what I'm looking at is the target M-object and not a nearby NGC. I know some people use a very wide field eyepiece, get to the right field, and then just take credit for all the M's in that field without picking out each one individually. That is not valid in my mind. I have pictures that help to some degree. But what I'm thinking would be great is a series of one degree circular charts to match the eyepiece view. These should overlap (very important) and move progressively through the Realm, with all objects accurately labelled of course. Does anybody know of such a chart set?

I have been using printed charts from the Tasco Sky Watch program and I find them quite suitable. You can draw your own circles if you wish by scaling the chart. This has worked for me in the past. Last saturday I got the first 77 M objects before we cashed it in due to the requirement of a long drive home. Toughest were M74 and M110 which required bumping the tube to make them appear.

Could you tell me more about what the S&T article says, or point me to any other websites that could tell me how to treat the Virgo/Coma bunch?

Alex

Paul,

In the back of O'Meara's "Deep Sky Companion - The Messier Objects" is a good plan to find the Virgo galaxies.

I follow this plan - roughly:

I find rho Vir first. It is in a kind of arrow-like asterism. If you follow the arrow north, you will find M58. Move left and down a bit to find M59 and M60, and up and right to find M87, then further to M84 and M86.

Back to M58 and up and around to M88, M90, M91, M89. it makes a sort of coat hanger galaxy-ism.

There is a large T-shaped group of stars "past" M84 and M86. M98 and M100 are off the ends of the T, and M99 is in the middle.

Now, the top left star of the T is the bottom of a long, diamond shaped group of four stars. Move left of the top brightest star to M85.

M29 and M61 are a little further away to the west and south of rho. M104 is way south, above Corvus.

How many is that? Seventeen. Not bad for a few minutes.

I have a smallish scope, perhaps the little NGCs are not so obvious and in the way. I can see them.

I hope you can follow this tour of the Realm of galaxies. Best of luck in your Marathon.

Rick Wiseman

Paul....we used these charts and verbal directions(2 files) that Rob Hawley provided on his site. We used a 10" f-4.5 dob and didn't have any problems.
http://www.robhawley.net/mm/

Here's one I use from Tony Cecce

http://www.seds.org/messier/xtra/12months/m-jun.html

One trick from there is a telrad shot half way between epsilon Virgo (brighter star near Rho) and Denebola (bright tail of Leo)lands on M84/M86 every time.

Lots of good general advice as well.

PS the monthly list is helpful in general.

Mike