Sess#295 9-12pm lm=5.1 s= ranged 4-8 clear fairly windy
Tired from teaching, I decided to observe from the back yard this
evening. Wind gusts did not prevent me from doing a decent polar
alignment (using a kind of mini drift method - 10 minutes) - stars at
a magnification of 534X stayed close to the centre of F.O.V. for 20
minutes while I prepared other equipment.
Later, when the winds would calm for a few seconds, I managed to touch
up the collimation at that high magnification.
Eta Bootis - Binary. Sep=2.9". One brighter yellow primary and a
much fainter blue/green secondary star. More challenging than stars
of even brightness.
M3 - Seeing temporarily got quite good ( 8/10 )at about 10pm, so
observed M3 using 3x barlow and 18mm ep for magnification of 333X.
Many stars resolved - more than I could count. The very central core
is still a jumble of light with tiny pinpoints coming in and out of
focus.
Occultations - 4 stars observed getting occulted by the moon's
earthshine illuminated limb between 10:17pm and 10:32pm. Propus got
occulted at 9:32pm DST.
Winds calmed down a bit after 10:30pm.
Iota Leonis - Binary. Sep=1.7" Nearly three magnitudes difference
between this close pair. Whitish primary and blueish secondary
located close and easy to miss. Required 333X to confirm.
M13 - Good to see it from b.y. again this year. Spend a while
admiring. Looked in vain for nearby small galaxy from my mag 5.1 light
polluted yard.
M92 - An easy find using the combination of Telrad and finderscope. I
did not realize how easily you could see this in the finder, even
under less than ideal skies. If not for M13 this would be a very
popular object. The shape of this one is what I like.
Epsilon Lyr - The double-double, at 11:45pm was just high enough from
the horizon, given the now deteriorated seeing, to be able to split
both pairs. Usually a very easy split when much higher up.
PhotonMan
