Using an 82" Light Cup - Part 1

Started by pksamsury, 04/07/2006 11:25PM
Posted 04/07/2006 11:25PM | Edited 04/07/2006 11:34PM Opening Post
I recently returned from a trip to West Texas where 14 folks had the opportunity to view through the 82" Otto Struve Cassegrain at the McDonald Observatory. I must say it was very impressive to see this huge research telescope equipped with a 2" diagonal and eyepiece. Most all the work done today is spectrographic in nature.

We looked at the following DSO's; M42 - The nebular structure was three dimensional in appearance and the six trapezium stars filled the FOV; NGC 2261, Hubble's Variable Nebula' which was clear and seen as in photos; NGC 2506 which filled the FOV with close packed globules; NGC 2392 "Eskimo Nebula" again filling the FOV with the bright 'face' the distinctive ring of gas with a purplish hue and the outer ring; M104 "Sombrero Galaxy" which was edge-to-edge in the eyepiece being split across by the dark dust ring; and M3 a bright GC with only the center core visible.

As we were leaving the dome I noted that we had used 27 mm TelVue and 50 mm Takahashi eyepieces and a 'no name' diagonal. Hey, with 82" of mirror the diagonal performed just fine.
Posted 04/08/2006 09:08AM #1
Hello:
I too remember the time I got to look through a 88" light cup. As you mention, things really do start to look 3D and the colors are not subtle any more. Not only could we resolve M15 to the core, but see the colors in all of the stars. The Cat's Eye nebula was a bright emerald green. After that, my 12.5" just didn't seem the same anymore. Oh, I still enjoy using it very much, but now I know what a big scope can do. I suppose it's not really aperture fever, since this much aperture is impractical and I know something "just a little bigger" won't show me what I saw that night. For the record, we used a televue diagona and 31mm Nagler. We had a 17mm Nagler, but 1300x was a bit much. We did, however use it on Neptune, which showed hints of banding.

Cheers
Mike Connelley