Saturn and Jupiter observing

Finally last night I had good views of Saturn and early in the morning, Jupiter. Previous nights I had been fooled by clouds, dew and bad collimation.

I think now that my Celestron 8SE is collimated OK.

I saw Saturn and the moons Dione, Rhea, Iapetus and Titan and there was one near the rings, which I later checked and believed to be Tethys.

I have not been able to see any surface colours nor the Cassini division. I think this is not possible at the moment because of the angle of the rings as we view them. Can anyone confirm that please?

Later on I saw the amazing sight of Jupiter and the moons Callisto, Europa and Ganymede all in a line. Io was just going behind Jupiter too. It was amazing but as it had just come above the horizon, I could not see any features on Jupiter itself. I am putting that down to the low position in the sky. Would that be the case?

I am using EPs from the Celestron kit. 9mm is the best I found last night, with 2X barlow for Saturn.

Any guidance would be great.

Thanks

I'm not at all surprised that an 8" was unable to resolve the Cassini division at the current ring tilt. It should be easy, however, once they open up a bit.

Jupiter's low position will do two things: it will mean that you're looking through a lot more air (and the humid air we get blocks more light), and also that you're going to be suffering more atmospheric refraction (which is going to displace the red parts of Jupiter more than the blue, making detail harder to see).

Last night up in Louth we had Pickering 6 skies. That seeing scale runs from 1 to 10, but conditions in Ireland are usually between 4 and 7, and almost always between 3 and 9. So the seeing was decent, but not great. Your 9mm gives 220X, which seems reasonable for your scope and those conditions. The 9mm with 2X Barlow gives 450X, which seems a bit high for Pickering 6 skies. Your scope should top out at 400X or so, but I'd only go there with Pickering 8 or 9 skies. In "normal" conditions, I'd say 7.5mm is about where you'd want to be at the high end. (A 15mm in your 2X Barlow would achieve that as well.)

Keep in mind that those are guidelines. In general, indifferent seeing will make high powers blur more. However, if you're trying to eek out detail from a dim planetary nebula, or trying to see a very dim and small galaxy, then image scale can sometimes account for more than crisp views. So don't be afraid to experiment with different combinations, even if the magnification seems "over the top".

Cheers,
-- Jeff.

Hi Mullins.
Ya Saturn has its rings facin almost head on at the moment so
seeing the Cassini division is a tall order unless
you have a big scope and even then you will be luck just to
make out the devision at the sides where it curves around the planet.
It's a pain as they were spectaclar a few years back as they were
face on.

Hey Frank & all after a long time!
Two weeks ago we were under the amazing sky of Mt.Parnon for once more
A team of six guys you know worked together on that:



It was really a fantastic night!

WOW!
wonderful work there.
That must have been awesome to have witnessed in such an amazing location also.

The heavens in motion!:woohoo:

I bet your mate Vangelis picked 'Vangelis' for the soundtrack :laugh: