My Light Cup and I have always fancied starting the tour of the NGC catalog with NGC 1. For the past two years and disappointment after disappointment trying to bag this mag 13 galaxy from my 4" TV-102 Light Cup from my backyard had turned NGC 1 into "Nemesis 1" ;-).
Well last night around 11:30pm, I finally caught it; alas not with the Light Cup but with my 8" Discovery light bucket Dob ;-). And that was quite tough under the LM of 5.8 even with extra 4-inch of extraneous aperture ;-)! No way, no how could I have seen it with my 4" from my backyard. The experience was near the limit similar to nearing the limit of my 4-incher with brighter galaxies. In fact, Mars' "high caloric magnification" diet has made me so out of "DSO shape" and it took me quite a while :-(. It formed a triangle with the star GSC 1735:1856 and GSC 1735:1840. Not seen at 40x, detected with a 12mm TV Radian (101x) but best view with the 8mm Radian (152x) (averted vision showed better). Extremely faint fuzzy, no core seen
but brightening against the background sky was definite. Consulting with Luginbuhl and Skiff Observing Handbook, NGC 1 has a surface brightnes of a grueling 13.9.
Umm, maybe the Light Cup might be able get this one with that 6000-ft "tripod" of mine reaching up to that dark mountain sky ;-).
Ron B[ee]
Well last night around 11:30pm, I finally caught it; alas not with the Light Cup but with my 8" Discovery light bucket Dob ;-). And that was quite tough under the LM of 5.8 even with extra 4-inch of extraneous aperture ;-)! No way, no how could I have seen it with my 4" from my backyard. The experience was near the limit similar to nearing the limit of my 4-incher with brighter galaxies. In fact, Mars' "high caloric magnification" diet has made me so out of "DSO shape" and it took me quite a while :-(. It formed a triangle with the star GSC 1735:1856 and GSC 1735:1840. Not seen at 40x, detected with a 12mm TV Radian (101x) but best view with the 8mm Radian (152x) (averted vision showed better). Extremely faint fuzzy, no core seen
but brightening against the background sky was definite. Consulting with Luginbuhl and Skiff Observing Handbook, NGC 1 has a surface brightnes of a grueling 13.9.
Umm, maybe the Light Cup might be able get this one with that 6000-ft "tripod" of mine reaching up to that dark mountain sky ;-).
Ron B[ee]
