I’m starting to get a bit down about the lack of stargazing opportunities lately. It’s been ages since I spent any time at the eyepiece, what with the cloudy weather and/or the full moon. It’s currently looking like it might have to wait until the next New Moon in late March before there’s another opportunity to observe on a clear and moonless night!
Hey-ho. So, what is there to do in the meantime? Well, there’s perusing Stellarium on the computer, reading forum posts on Stargazerslounge.com, idly scanning eBay for the elusive bargain, or, of course, gear maintenance.
I’ve been doing a fair bit of the latter recently. First off, I bought a bottle of something called ‘Baader Wonder Fluid’, and the recommended microfibre cloth to go with it. My eyepieces and binocular lenses haven’t been this clean since they were new! You have to be very careful when it comes to cleaning optical equipment. The use of a dust blower is usually all that’s recommended, and you must never, ever, rub the glass surfaces in case you scratch the delicate coatings, but the Baader Wonder Fluid in combination with the special cloth is the exception to this rule.
I recently purchased a secondhand Baader Mk3 laser collimator for my large scope. Collimation refers to the correct alignment of the primary and secondary mirrors with the focuser tube. A correctly collimated scope will give much better views than a poorly collimated one. I have to say, I’m very pleased with the laser collimator; it seems to do a great job, and is recommended.
A lot of Newtonian owners fear collimating their telescopes (and, indeed, the online descriptions do make it sound a little daunting), but it makes such an improvement to the views (assuming collimation is out in the first place), that it’s well worth getting to grips with.
Another task I undertook recently was in an attempt to fix what was diagnosed as ‘pinched optics’ on my large Newtonian. This term refers to something that occurs when the clips retaining the primary mirror are unevenly tight, I guess resulting in a very slight twisting of the primary. Anyway, when I tried slackening some of the screws they snapped off! In the end I had to take the mirror cell to an engineering company to have the screw stubs removed and the threads cleaned out! It was all worth it in the end – the new stainless steel screws look great, and the visual distortion is gone, but it was all a bit alarming for a while there, when I’d thought I’d wrecked the scope!
So, I’m all dressed up, but have nowhere to go, as it were … so what else is there to do? Well, in my case not a lot really. I’ve already flocked the inside of the telescope tube. I’ve made up all the dew shields I need. I could have a go at making some dew heaters, but that’s not a priority right now, so, I guess, perusing Stellarium it is!
What’s up?
We’ve got the New Moon on the 26th of Feb, so there’s still a chance of getting some dark sky observing done over the next week or so, and the next full Moon is on March the 12th.
Venus is well worth a look at the moment, its slender crescent phase is big, very bright, and stunning! I have managed a few glimpses of Venus recently in the early evenings, and it is fantastic. There’s something about seeing the planet illuminated from the side that gives a wonderful sense of the three-dimensionality of the solar system. I know it’s obvious really, but when you actually see it it’s very impressive.
Jupiter clears the eastern horizon by about 10.30pm, and is still big and bright in the pre-dawn sky. I’m really looking forward to checking it out again this year.
Hercules rises around 10.30pm, in the northeast, and that means that the great globular cluster M13 is visible again. Well worth a look. In fact, there are several globulars on show at the moment: M3, 53, 92,
I’m hoping to revisit the Cat’s Eye planetary nebula in Draco (ideally placed to the north by about 10pm. I’ve seen this several times already, but not for over a year or so. If you can muster magnifications of around x50 and up, it’s a must see.
The main highlight of the night sky at the moment is, of course, the Coma/Virgo galaxy cluster (ideally placed in the east from about 10pm) … this cloud cover is driving me mad!
Clear skies!
Kevin Quinn is an amateur astronomer based in Piddletrenthide. He is the proud owner of a ten-inch reflector, a small refractor, a case of eyepieces, and a couple of pairs of binoculars. He tweets via @CerneAstro, and blogs (occasionally) via theastroguy.wordpress.com.
©Kevin Quinn
