10th October 2010 - Report

Dry weather at last but the air quality is very poor with a thick haze and a muggy feel when outside. Still though, it was a clear night, warm and I was in the mood for observing so I got all set up and got stuck into double stars once again.
It's all I could do with the terrible sky quality but double stars never get boring to me so I was happy enough. Especially so when the night was very mild. In fact I spent the whole session observing in my bed clothes. So a light fleece, a pair of cotton sports bottoms and my comfy slippers was more than enough to keep me warm.

Seeing - 2
Trans - 1

Equipment = EQ6 Pro, 10" Newt and laptop.

Location = Home

Start Time = 20:50

M57 = I choose this to start with so I could determine the observing conditions and make final decision on what I will observe. The view was better than I expected.

NGC 7331 = Again a test object to see how galaxies would hold up under the conditions. The result, very badly. A very poor view with only the bright core to be seen. So it was back to double star observing for sure now.

Matar = The star itself is yellowish with the secondary a pale white/blue shade with a large separation.

M15 = This was really showing up well in the muggy sky. Stars resolved well, only the overall brightness was affected.

32 Pegasi = A white coloured primary star with a rather faint secondary star, I could not pick up any hints of colour.

33 Pegasi = The primary star is orange/red in colour with the secondary nicely seperated, about a magnitude fainter and displaying a pale white/blue colour.

HIP108119 = A nice double. Very much like a smaller version of Albireo in Cygnus, colours were very much the same.

HIP114183 = Not much to look at with this double. The secondary star was very hard to see due to the conditions.

HIP115417 = This is a nice beauty of a double. Both stars a deep reddish shade with the secondary very close and very faint but a very fun and challenging to see.

HIP116961 = Another lovely pair with the primary being a deep red with the secondary nice separated and appearing very faint and blue in colour.

HIP115800 = A delightful little pair. So small and so close together it would be easy to mistake this pair as one star under low or medium power. I found that 175x gave the most pleasing view.

Comet Hartley (130R) I am not much of a comet observer or fan but of all the comets I've looked at over the last 10 years this feels as the most disappointing. I think most of the disappointment comes purely from the silly hype it is getting on Sky at Night and other astro websites.
All I could see was the bright core surrounding the nebulous and a hazy cloud around it. You'd think it was a faint galaxy if you didn't know there was a comet there.

Finish Time = 22:07