Observing Report 02/22/04
Equipment: Heep ('umble 4.5" DS Newtonian on EQ mount, 900mm, f/8)
Eyepeices: 20mm, 10mm, 6.7mm Meade Plossls
Location: Aurora, Ont. (approx. 44n, 79w)
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The occasion was a couple of in-law's birthdays: My wife's mother and her oldest brother. He lives in a semi-rural location on about a four-acre spread. The evening promised to be clear, so I brought Heep to give the assembled guests a good view of sights they would never see in the city forty or so miles south. This site suffers from very little light pollution, and skies are much darker than my suburban location fifteen miles north.
Started the evening by tuning up on Venus and an almost-new moon. The moon was unimpressive, but as the evening sky grew darker, the unlit side of the moon began to show detail as it was illuminated from earthshine. Want to see an interesting effect? At low power just after sunset when the moon is quite new, focus on the moon, then move the sunlit part right out of the eyepeice. The remainder looks like a spooky grey ghost planet.
Venus was as sharp as I've ever seen it. Generally it requires a moon filter or it's just a bright boiling flame. This evening, at 135x, it was a tiny, perfect gibbous moon, indicating that seeing would be quite good.
I went in for a while to let the scope cool and the night deepen. Returned outside to check out M42. In spite of the dark skies, it was not the best view, with little hint of the sinuous detail seen on other occasions. So I figured I'd concentrate on the planets. They're always a bigger draw anyway.
I got Saturn in the eyepeice and was rewarded with one of the best views I've ever had. At 90x, even my in-laws could easily detect the Cassini Division. I pushed it up to 135x, and noticed significant detail: At least three bands, a lightening in the centre of the SPC, making the feature resemble a doughnut, and the C ring was quite obvious, almost all the way around the planet. Also: I noticed in the big fat ring inside the Cassini (not the skinny darker one outside - not sure which is the A ring and which is the B), there was a brightening just inside the Cassini. Almost as though the edge was turned up, reflecting the sunlight directly. Gave the whole ring an eerie 3-D effect. Spooky.
(cont'd)
Equipment: Heep ('umble 4.5" DS Newtonian on EQ mount, 900mm, f/8)
Eyepeices: 20mm, 10mm, 6.7mm Meade Plossls
Location: Aurora, Ont. (approx. 44n, 79w)
=======================================================
The occasion was a couple of in-law's birthdays: My wife's mother and her oldest brother. He lives in a semi-rural location on about a four-acre spread. The evening promised to be clear, so I brought Heep to give the assembled guests a good view of sights they would never see in the city forty or so miles south. This site suffers from very little light pollution, and skies are much darker than my suburban location fifteen miles north.
Started the evening by tuning up on Venus and an almost-new moon. The moon was unimpressive, but as the evening sky grew darker, the unlit side of the moon began to show detail as it was illuminated from earthshine. Want to see an interesting effect? At low power just after sunset when the moon is quite new, focus on the moon, then move the sunlit part right out of the eyepeice. The remainder looks like a spooky grey ghost planet.
Venus was as sharp as I've ever seen it. Generally it requires a moon filter or it's just a bright boiling flame. This evening, at 135x, it was a tiny, perfect gibbous moon, indicating that seeing would be quite good.
I went in for a while to let the scope cool and the night deepen. Returned outside to check out M42. In spite of the dark skies, it was not the best view, with little hint of the sinuous detail seen on other occasions. So I figured I'd concentrate on the planets. They're always a bigger draw anyway.
I got Saturn in the eyepeice and was rewarded with one of the best views I've ever had. At 90x, even my in-laws could easily detect the Cassini Division. I pushed it up to 135x, and noticed significant detail: At least three bands, a lightening in the centre of the SPC, making the feature resemble a doughnut, and the C ring was quite obvious, almost all the way around the planet. Also: I noticed in the big fat ring inside the Cassini (not the skinny darker one outside - not sure which is the A ring and which is the B), there was a brightening just inside the Cassini. Almost as though the edge was turned up, reflecting the sunlight directly. Gave the whole ring an eerie 3-D effect. Spooky.
(cont'd)
