Good evening, all. These are some of the other observations I had on Monday 14th March after observing the Moon for about an hour. I am using a 158 mm apo. My north is up and my east is to the right.
1. 20 Geminorum. This is a charming double star north of Gamma Geminorum (Alhena). When seen at low power, say 11X, it is lovely and tight. I used my 70 mm apo to split it before looking at it in the main scope at 40X. Both components are yellow / white. The separation is almost 20 arc seconds. A is 6.3, B is 6.9. The PA is 211 degrees.
2. Mebsuta (Epsilon Geminorum). The primary is yellow and bright at 3.1; the secondary is 9.6. 40X is sufficient to see both stars. The separation is 110 arc seconds and the PA is 94 degrees.
3. Nearby is the challenging binary Eta Geminorum. Guide 8 calls this double star Praepes and not Propus. That is saved for the neighbouring star 1 Geminorum. I have split Eta before; I did require 225X to pair it apart. But last night for some reason, I only needed 167X -the sky must have been very pristine. A is 3.5, B is 6.2. The separation is 1.6 arc seconds. The PA is 252 degrees. That is 8 o'clock in my scope. The primary is quite a strong orange / red which should enable double star observers when looking for it. I was amazed by its beauty. Why not give it a try? Some of us have in the past.
4. I hunted down Herschel 48 which is a triple star in that open star cluster NGC 2129 that Paul sketched for us last month. The open cluster is small and faint alright; I counted only 9 stars. I should have counted more but for light pollution. Anyway, H 48 is a nice triple star split at 40X and 112X. The magnitudes are 8.3, 10.7 and 10.8. The separations are 6 and 31 arc seconds. It has been many years since I last saw NGC 2129. I was pleased to have found it. My thanks to Paul for highlighting it.
5. Up I went to 26 Aurigae which is a fine triple star. There is no B star -it is too close to A. But there are C and D stars. A is yellow at mag 5.5. C is blue at mag 8.4, and D is a very faint 11.5 and I did see it. All 3 were visible st 112X and 140X. The separations are 12 and 35 arc seconds.
6. Nearby is STT 117 which is nice and easy to split. Only 40X is required. A is 7.1, B is 10. The separation is 11 arc seconds. The PA is 31 degrees. The primary is orange.
7. FU Aurigae is a nice deep orange carbon star directly north of STT 117.
8. Last night I estimated the carbon star TU Tauri at magnitude 8.3. It too is a strong orange.
Thank you for reading,
Aubrey.
  