Well If it is there I might as well take a picture of it.

 Well it is here again above us for another week or so rising right between all these faint galaxies that need imaging. So I might as well take a few pics of it. 

My ZWO ASI 2600mm is not a planetary camera it records an not very impressive 6 frames per second however a couple of minutes of capture and a quick Autostakkert later. The ASIair software allows captures at various resolutions from 1920 all the way down to 240. I have attempted a couple of captures at this setting but the images are so pixelated it is not worth displaying. Working at a longer focal length now I need to capture a 2 pane mosaic to capture the full lunation.

Mare Serenitatis or the “Sea of Serenity” is a lunar Mare. A Mare is a large Basalt plain formed by ancient asteroid impacts on the far side of the moon that have triggered volcanic eruptions on the opposite near side some 3 billion years ago. The word Maria is latin for sea as to early astronomers these dark areas look like seas.

Ancient asteroid impacts on the far side of the moon nearly 4 billion years sent shockwaves through the moon causing volcanic eruptions on the opposite side or the nearside leaving huge Basalt lava basins. Known today as Mare these darker plains looked just like seas to the ancient astronomers and so they now bear their Latin name of Mare. Mare Serenitatis or the “Sea of Serenity” has not changed for billions of years. It has a diameter of 674km and has plenty of features. First we have the crater Posidonius a 95km impact crater located at the north east in this view. The rim of the crater is very shallow a clear indication of its age as it was filled by lava flows giving it almost an appearance of being slowly washed away. Just south of the centre we have a much smaller 16km impact crater called Bessell, circular in shape is an indicator of an impact from directly above as opposed to at an oblique angle creating ejecta in the surround area. The mountain range running north to south at the left edge is part of the Appenine range running nearly 600 km in length. Finally we have the locations of the landing sites of Apollo 15 & 17.

The top most crater of three central craters in the picture below. is Theophilus together with Cyrillus and Catharina they form a prominent group of craters. Theophilus rim rises about 4200m above its floor. It was created in the Eratosthenian period, so it is pretty old. Its central mountain is 1400m high and has four summits. Both Cyrillus and Catharina are much older craters – it can be easily seen how these craters overlap each other.

Messier 63

Over recent weeks I have been looking at NINA, a freeware program for the control of our telescopes and connected equipment. I have watched lots of YouTube videos and felt I would give it a try. A very complex programme capable of lots of fantastic features, too many to list off the top of my head, all backed up by a large community of users and a host of additional plugins to create a truly customisable experience. Perhaps it is my impatience speaking here as I am now the proud owner of the new Altair 130 EDT scope and the need for collecting some photons is perhaps leading my frustrations. 

I have been now the user of the ASIair pro for several years and have been more than pleased with it's simplicity and ease of use. A clean user interface and an uncomplicated processes leads to the quick set up and start of imaging. So I thought a new challenge was needed....

When building the observatory I ran a powered USB extension into the house as well as a wired internet to allow the flexibility of future connectivity for wired and wireless To set NINA up I rerouted all data cables via my new powered USB hub and through to the extension cable to inside. Connectivity to NINA was simple opening up EQ Mod and PHD2 all stable with no dropouts to the laptop. Using the sky atlas selecting a target was easy and sending it to the framing tool prepares you for the imaging process. From there is where I found some issues, I ran the Hocus focus plugin a number of times but struggled to achieve focus using a number of filters. Making numerous adjustments to the focus steps in the attempt to replicate the demonstrated parabolic curve. Mine looked more like a top hat with odd dips and jumps. I am sure it is just settings but the frustrations exist that following the videos made no difference I just could not replicate anything resembling a good focus. It has also been a long while since I used PHD 2 and encountered similar issues with guiding calibration and not enough star movements. Aghhhhhh. I don't think it helps that I also feel awful, a really bad cough and cold. So for now I have reconnected everything back to the ASIAir, programmed an autorun sequence on M63, Auto focus has achieved and guiding is currently running at .45 RMS Perfectly acceptable. So for tonight anyway I will enjoy the clear sky and continue with this short run of subs. As of this minute I am at 26 from 40 x 5 minutes frames in LRGB. 

The following night was not so great with 95% humidity. So I have ended up with 19 x 5 minute subs in RGB, the Luminance data was for me too blown out so not used.

The Sunflower Galaxy, also known as Messier 63 or M63 and designated as NGC 5055 in the New General Catalogue, is a spiral galaxy located in the northern constellation Canes Venatici. It lies roughly 37 million light years from Earth and has an apparent magnitude of 9.3.

The galaxy is enormous in size, with an apparent size of 12′.6 × 7′.2. This makes it roughly the same size as the Milky Way galaxy, and it has a mass 140 billion times that of the Sun. It is also believed to have a supermassive black hole with a mass of up to 30 million Suns.

There are a number of fainter PGC galaxies here most of which are a hundred times or more further away. A Pixinsight annotation shows their locations.

A new beginning.

It is with a heavy heart I say goodbye to my trusted Esprit ED100, my workhorse for the last couple of years. I do know though it has gone to a good home, Living it's life now on the Kent coast to a lovely chap called Tony who came up this morning with his wife to view and make a purchase. I hope they enjoyed their time here and after seeing my advert on UK astrobuyandsell. I hope the scope gives him the same enjoyment as it has done for me for many years to come.

So for me an unexpected deal has presented itself. My good friend Richard from our society has made a life changing decision and emigrated to Brazil. I happened to mention a few weeks ago I was looking to upgrade to a longer focal length, with that was the offer of his Altair Astro 130EDT triplet refractor. A fantastic scope that has given Richard some wonderful images. Richard was kind enough to offer me the scope to try as I was unsure if it would fit inside my modest dome. My initial set up left me disappointed as there was not a great deal of room as the scope moved around with USB cables brushing the walls, so from there I initially said thanks but no thanks. I think the plan for him was to make a quick sale on UK astrobuyandsell as he did not want to take the scope with him. So I took the plunge and said yes I will have it and make it fit. I have spent the last few days positioning the scope in the rings and finally achieved great balance with a little more headroom than before. So I think this will work well for me.

Side by side they are worlds apart in size. When I built the observatory at the time I never thought any upgrade would be this big. I imagined a 115mm would suffice.

 

It fits.

Luckily for me too there was a couple of hours reasonably clear before the fog and cloud ruined the remainder of the evening. I opted for a target that was past the meridian and nice and high over the house so M1 the Crab nebula was my first light target.

All I could manage was 5 x 5 minutes in RGB using the ZWO filters. A rough and quick process in Pixinsight with no calibration frames and what is a huge crop. I am very pleased and happy with this initial first light image of 724mm focal length. Initial results in guiding also good with an average RMS of just over .6

The Astrogeek is one happy chappy.