Glorious M15 & Zeta Aquarii

It was great to be back observing with my Williams Optics FLT 158 6.2" apochromatic refractor. I equaled my previous record of 40 nights in one year last night. One more night and I will have broken my 2002 record!!
The dew was very strong after all the early evening rain which nearly prevented me from having a time of observing! However after dinner, Valerie and I set up the scope for 1.5 hours.
We first observed Enif (Epsilon Pegasi) -lovely orange star with its slightly faint blue optical companion.
And then, I was amazed I could see M15 the globular star cluster in Pegasus in the guidescope at a mere 11X. I could fit both in the same field of view 4 degrees apart.
So I increased the magnification to over 100X, and I could see individual stars around the edges. The sky was getting very clear in south Dublin, so further magnification was most inviting. And I ended up going all the way to 374X!
At this power, M15 was huge, easily filling a quarter of the field of view! There were literally 1000's of stars.
Next up was Zeta Aquarii -a double star with no name (strangely).
At 112X, it was a delicate figure 8, but at 140X, it was cleanly split, and I thought it was very similar to Porrima (Gamma Virginis). The 2 stars are almost perfectly north -south divided.
Finally, I did try to hunt down Neptune, and I was successfully star hopping to its location, but our neighbours' house got in the way. And it was time to bring in the telescope before the dew got unto the optics.
Thank you for reading this report. Please feel free to make any comments.

Aubrey.

Nice one Aubrey.

Friday night down at Trooperstown dew was also a problem, but my scope and eyepieces dewed up, and it effectively shuts down observing.

I can't remember if I observed zeta Aquarii in the past, must check the records. Not sure my 110mm can do the job as it might require more magnification than I can handle.

Good grab with Neptune, was the colour obvious?

Paul

Sorry Paul, but I couldn't observe Neptune. My neighbours' house is very tall. The roof got in the way. I will have wait for another opportunity.
I definitely think you scope should split it about 150X to 200X. It is central to the Y in Aquarius.
It is a pity we refractor owners constantly have to cope with due problems. There is no problem cleaning eyepieces, but apochromatic refractors are a completely different problem. I have just checked the main scope and its guidescope -both are fine and clean. But anything longer than 2 hours would have been real trouble.

Aubrey.

Sorry Paul, but I couldn't observe Neptune. My neighbours' house is very tall

Just goes to show, I might have read the post, but I wasn't paying complete attention. :blush:

I might have to invest in a dew heater of some description, the frustration is terrible.

Paul

Dew heaters are one of the more straightforward electronics projects one can undertake:

www.astro.uwo.ca/~rasc/HEATER.pdf

Have a look - might save you a lot of money as well.

Hello Aubrey,
Zeta aquarii is a beautiful double I would agree with you
it is very like Porrima. It took 200x to split with the
80mm Zeiss so it should be no problem for the 110mm Paul.

Pat.