Recent Tempel Observations?

I failed to find Tempel last night, using the Sky and Telescope finder chart. A 9th or 10th magnitude comet shouldn't be that difficult to find, and I otherwise managed to track down tons of stuff, including small faint planetaries (the Bug in Scorpius, NGC 6781 in Aquila), so conditions must have been sufficient.

Was this just a momentary lapse of observing skill, or is it actually more difficult than I thought? Using a 6inch f/8 dob, 50x.

Hi Jim

I observed the comet at a fairly dark site about a week ago with my 20". It looked like a large, dim, face-on galaxy. My friend with a 12.5" couldn't see it. This one isn't easy!

Clear skies
Bill

Jim, Tempel1 is an extremely difficult target right now, because it is so diffuse. I was just able to see it on the edge of visibility in my 13” from mag 6.0 skies Friday. Could not see it Saturday night in the same scope but only mag 5.8 skies.

Keep in mind that for extended objects integrated magnitude is meaningless, but surface brightness and sky darkness is everything.

Doug

Hello:
I found the comet Satuday night from 9,300ft.on Mauna Kea with an 11", but it took a while and wasn't trivial. The comet appears to have returned to its pre-impact state. Less than an hour after the impact, the comet looked more or less as it did pre-impact (i.e. faint fuzzy ball) but appeared to have a 11-12th magnitude stellar core. I did not see that Saturday. I also looked at the Bug Nebula, and found it much easier to locate than the comet.

Cheers
Mike Connelley

My friend Tony Donnangelo and I may, and I stress may, have seen the comet on Saturday night at the Green Bank Star Quest II using his 14.5" Starmaster.

Dave Mitsky