The Leo Trio: M65, M66, NGC3628

“I am using the stock eyepiece of this scope. I haven’t been able to observe galaxies, nebula and star clusters like I would love to. Perhaps I am doing something wrong?”

This is a comment somebody posted under my YouTube video “Omni XLT 150 Setup”

It seems this is a common theme with many people that purchase a new telescope. The problem here is that  if these people don’t find help fast that shiny new telescope will be doomed to the garage and dust for many years before somebody else gives it a shot. That budding astronomer will loose interest and move on to a new hobby. They will miss out on all the joy astronomy brings. We should all know our tiny place in the universe.

In this article I will cover how to get started with a brand new telescope. If you are just getting started in astronomy and need help with the basics make sure you read my article “How to Get Started In Astronomy.”

Well I admit I was one of those put-my-telescope-in-the-garage people, but luckily my persistence paid off. My excuse why I could not find anything was usually related to my location. I live in the city and was always disappointed because I could never find any galaxies. I then pointed the blame to my location for the reason why I was not finding anything. All I could really do was point my telescope at a star “yup another tiny bright dot.” I paid no attention to the fact that I did not know the major stars and constellations. I also had no clue about Messier objects let alone how to find them.

I think my early impressions were that you get a telescope and point it anywhere and you’d be able to see more than just stars. Now that I think about it, that’s pretty ridiculous, but that is how a lot of us start out. I did however manage to find Jupiter and Saturn somehow, and even a comet once!

Okay so now you have a new telescope and you are ready to try it out! Okay, if you really have the need to see something quick and fast look at the moon. It’s funny because the moon is the brightest thing to see in the night sky. You can see tons of detail and it’s the closest thing in the sky to us. But once you are a few months into astronomy chances are you’ll hardly ever really be caught in the dark with a telescope when a bright moon is out.  Why? Because the bright light impedes our view of faint objects.

So what else can you look at? Try to find the planets. Just look along the ecliptic (the path the sun follows in the sky) and look at the brightest things in that path. Chances are if there’s something that’s brighter than most stars, it could be a planet. Chances are that anytime during the year either Venus, Jupiter, Saturn or Mars will be visible in the night sky.

So now that you got too see a few things quick, it’s time to move on and this may take some time.  Perhaps the fastest way to get into the swing of things is to join your local astronomy club. There will be many members there that will be glad to show you what they can see and will even help you get started on your telescope.

But if you are a do it yourself-er like me, or are not so outgoing, you need to learn things on your own. There are several different kinds of telescope mounts and you need to know about and also what you have so you can learn how to set it up to find cool things.

The mount is the part the telescope tube (OTA optical tube assembly) sits on to move around and point to objects. There are basically two main mounts that you need to know.

alt-az mount

The simplest is called an altazimuth or alt-azimuth more commonly an alt-az. With this type of mount you simply setup your tripod and move your telescope in just about any direction. Your telescope moves up and down and from side to side. The big giant tubes that look like they sit of the floor fall in this category (dobsonians). Alt-az mounts are easy to setup. You pretty much plop them down and start viewing the skies.

EQ Mount

The other type of mount is an equatorial mount also know as an EQ mount. This type of mount needs to be setup up a certain way. You need to have the telescope aligned parallel to the Earth’s axis, more commonly know as polar aligned. Yes it sounds crazy and scientific but it’s not really that hard to do. Since this is a beginners guide I wont get too detailed here. First point your telescope North (if you live in the northern hemisphere). If you don’t know where North is get a compass, or just note where the sun set. That will be West for the most part. From there you can find north. There you are now done. Okay, since you are getting into astronomy you probably want more performance and precision than that. Most EQ telescopes will have a polar alignment guide hole in the center of the mount. This is to attach a polar finder scope. To get your scope aligned well enough to do visual astronomy you can simply find Polaris and center it in this hole. If you don’t have a polar finder scope or hole for one simply move our mount and align it by site. Now it’s important to remember here that you are not moving the part of the mount where the telescope attaches to and swings from. You are moving just the base of the mount. This position remains fixed once you put your telescope on here and does not move the rest of the night.

The main differences between the two mounts is that with an alt-az mount you can be setup in minutes and need no power. But with an EQ mount, it takes more time and patience to get going, but you can track objects better and if you have a motor on your mount, the objects will stay centered in the eyepiece without having to move the telescope around.

Now that you have your mount setup and ready to go, you are now ready to start finding galaxies right? Almost, it depends on where you are viewing.

There are several things to consider when trying to find DSOs (Deep Space Objects):

1) Location- where are you viewing, in the city or outside of town. The brighter it is outside the harder it is to find stuff. Although it is possible to see galaxies in the city, most are pretty faint. Try finding M31 Andromedia first as it’s the biggest and brightest galaxy (except our own). A decent sky to view is when you can see the Milk Way. If it’s that dark then you can find most bright messiers (messier objects are a group of 110 deep space objects that were cataloged by Charles Messier- they are probaby the easiest and funnest items to start hunting out).

2) have an idea of what it might look like. Most galaxies are hard to see regardless of what equipment you use. You need to train your eye and get used to seeing faint fuzzies. When we do outreaches with our telescope clubs a lot of the people don’t see the galaxy I have the eyepiece centered on. No it’s not going to be in color and you are not going to see tons of details. But with practice you will start to see more detail (averted vision). They are called faint fuzzies for a reason.

Telrad pointing to Lagoon Nebula (M8)

3) Know where to look. You have to know the major constellations and brightest stars before so you can navigate the Messiers and galaxies. I suggest getting a Telrad finder and find or make some Telrad maps. A Telrad is basically a 1X finder that projects a bull’s eye in the sky. You use these marks to jump from place to place. I can easily navigate with my Telrad and maps, better yet with my iPhone app. This to me is the most important purchase you can make for this and just about any scope!

Okay so now that you have a better understanding of what you can see, it’s time to dust off that scope and get it going once and for all. Yes you may not see colorful galaxies with tons of detail, but you did find it. And that’s something to be proud of. And if that does not impress you, just remember that the light from that galaxy that you are looking at is millions of years old!

Self portrait minutes after I saw the Delta II launch

I’ve always wanted to see the shuttle lift off in Florida, but that will probably never happen.  So this year I’ve been trying to spot a rocket launch here in California.

As you may know Vandenberg AFB is home to NASA’s west coast launch pad. And according to Brian Webb’s website www.spacearchive.info we should be able to see the rocket launches during the twilight and nighttime hours here in Southern California.

Well today I saw it and it was very cool! This was my third attempt at trying to see some artifact from the launch while at home here  in Lake Forest Orange County. There was a big difference this time: the launch was at dawn. All the other times were in the daylight, or at some other ungodly hour. I was not yet committed enough to this quest to justify going out in the middle of night to see something, since I did not even know if it was possible. The last time I tried was during the day, and I saw nothing. However somebody reported that they saw something up in the mountains in Big Bear California.

It was fairly clear with some fog/haze towards the horizon this morning. I started looking right around launch time (6:09 a.m.) and saw nothing as expected. Three  minutes went by and I looked around again and I noticed a faint helicopter looking light flying low from the Northwest area. I almost dismissed it, but I picked up my 10X50 binoculars just in case and pointed them that way. That’s when I saw the FIRE coming out of the ROCKET. Holy smokes it’s the rocket! No I did not see much detail, but I saw a small object with fire shooting out of the back of it. I was shocked. In fact I was not expecting to see that at all. I thought I would only see cool smoke plumes or something like that.

The rocket continued on a low fly by and all of a sudden the smoke plum started to show. The rocket was growing fainter as the smoke plum grew and became brighter. The smoke was totally visible to the naked eye at this time. It looked like a regular cloud as far as brightness, but in shape it was long and swirly. A few seconds later the smoke stopped and I could not really see the fire anymore, the rocket just looked like a satellite at this point. The smoke appeared to stop and then reappeared as another stage of the engine went off. I did not see fire, but saw more smoke. It then faded fast as it got lower to the SouthWest Horizon. It was at that time that I took out my camera and tripod and fired some shots of the smoke (click image below).

Ahhh that was a cool moment: to actually be able to see something lifting off to outer space!  I think what helped inspire me was a few months ago the shuttle was going to land here in the West. I heard or read somewhere that you might be able to hear the sonic boom. I set my watch and went outside. I told my neighboors that if they hear a loud boom that it was the shuttle crossing the sound barrier. They gave me some weird looks, but a few minutes later we all heard the boom and we all were excited.

So get out your binoculars, cameras and ears and do some astronomy. With just my eyes I have (and you can too) see the space station, the shuttle, a rocket launch, and Iridium Flares. Here are some resources that will guide the way:

http://www.spacearchive.info/index.htm

http://www.heavens-above.com/

Smoke from the Delta II launch 12-14-09

That direct quote is from an email forwarded to me today. The sender was asking me if it was true.  I noticed in the email that it was also sent to about two dozen other people. These were all mostly business associates, so these are edjucated people, but the fact is that most people will not take the time to research stuff.

So sorry to disappoint, but Mars will not appear as big as the moon to us. A simple logic test would be to go outside and look at the moon and Mars right now. Is Mars half the size of the moon , now that August 27th is only a few weeks away? Can you even find Mars in the sky right now?

This hoax gets circulated each year, and each year I am asked by my peers if this will happen.  I usually ask them what do they think and why, and am always entertained at their excitement about the event, but lack of fact finding or preparation for such a great celestial event.

According to Snopes.com and Wikipedia this hoax started off in August 2003 when Mars did come to its closet point to Earth in 60,000 years. But Mars comes pretty close to this distance every 15 years.

So for your entertainment and reference here is the famous email hoax below.

HISTORY IN THE MAKING!!!

Wow, if you are out for the new moon in June, you are in for a treat on the morning of June 21, 2009. At 4:00 a.m. you will be able to see a sliver of the moon, Mercury, Venus, Mars, Uranus, Jupiter, and Neptune.

That’s 6 Planets, and if you look straight down at that time you’ll see another planet. Get out your widefields and see what you can grab!

Camping at Afton Canyon Campground was great (April 26, 2009). It’s about 30 miles northeast of Barstow right off the 15 freeway.  It was super easy to find and get to. You pretty much take one turn off of the 15 and drive about 15 minutes and run right into the campground.

Afton has been called California’s Grand Canyon. That’s a pretty bold statement, but it was interesting and nice too see so much variety in a Southern Californian landscape.

Unique to this area is the Mojave river that flows above ground right next to the campground.  You can see the river’s power as it slowly carved its way into the the surrounding hillsides.  A wonderfull sight is to see is the lone headlight of a Southern Pacific Railroad train speeding through the  dessert darkness. Just as soon as it lights up the bridge it will disappear back into the horizon from where it came. It reminds you how Jedediah Smith once crossed these same lands.

Astronomy-wise it was darker than Joshua Tree and the Riverside GMARS site. There were small light domes to the North from Las Vegas and to the Southeast from Barstow, but they were  small and not bothersome at all. It was pretty windy in the day as it was everywhere else the week we stayed there, but we were treated to great weather on our second night as the winds came to a stand still at midnight.

We lucked out and picked the first spot as you enter the campsite. This was a long thought out decision. We figured most campers would want to go deep into the campsite so we stayed on the outside. We were correct since the campsite became about 80% full and our side was the furthest away from campfire lights. There were a couple of campfires, but our site sat a little lower and there were some surrounding bushes (probably a scorpion lair) that protected us from the stray light. Playing 80’s rap music also helped keep people from venturing too close to our site.

Overall it was a great site and we had lots of fun. There were some mishaps, but those all count towards having an advenuture!

*we had to walk back a belligerent drunk to his campsite. Once again proof that not everybody can party like us . . .

Fueling up at the Flying J in Barstow

Getting Close

Afton Road Exit

Going the right way

Looking back towards civilization (the freeway)

The road in

Arrival

The campsite

The traditional drink upon arrival

The bridge over the Mojave River

Getting Dark

Campfires light the Canyon

A nighttime train passes by

Daytime adventure. This road . . .

or this road. This looks safe let's do it!

The end of the road, and begining of our peril.

Cave in the distance

The last thing we looked at before digging out our car for 3 hours!

Image from the trip - M13 Hercules Globular Cluster

Yes it may be super windy, but we will hope for the best as we usually do.  At worst we can work on videos for the website and test out gear. We also plan on going on several photo expeditions during our stay.

If  interested reply to on the comments section and we will contact you.

M57 Ring Nebula

Saturday night we did an outreach for a couple of Girl Scout troops at Caspers Park in Orange County, CA. The girls were excited to view, but we had to explain it needed to get dark before we could show them anything exciting. Most volunteers were still setting up when lines began to form in front of their scopes.

This is a good resource to see what others are photographing and how there processing comes out. And best of all it’s fun.

April 2009 Beginners Challenge:

Bright- Double Stars(submit here http://tinyurl.com/cre435)

Deep Sky Object M13 (submit here http://tinyurl.com/dyenvf)

April 2009 DSLR Challenge:

M106 Spiral Galaxy in Canes Venatici (submit here http://tinyurl.com/cvz7xt)

Expect to see 10-20 meteors per hour in darker skies. To best view the show just look straight up while reclining in a chair. Typically the earlier dark sky is the best time to view.

I used a super long 60mm Tasco with a webcam mounted to it. It worked okay, but it wasn’t working so great with the clouds, and it did not help that I was imaging near the zenith. That meant that the webcam was near the ground. I spent so much time laying in the dirt that night that I had to come up better solution.

With a little online research on forums (www.cloudynights.com) I started reading about people using their finderscope as a guidescope with good results. This appealed to me because of its small size, wider field, and its easy mounting. Since I had all the necessary parts already, I decided to give it a try.

I had an 8X50 right angle Zhummel finderscope so I decided to give it a try. I was able to unscrew the mirror portion off of the finder, and also the piece that attaches that to the tube.

I had to figure out how to mount the webcam to the finderscope. I attached a .965 eyepiece barrell onto the webcam (from a Tasco-originally to use in a Tasco 60mm). It simply screwed on the existing webcam lens assembly. I added some epoxy to hold things down nice and tight.

I was able to unscrew the right angle mirror and viewfinder. Luckily the crosshairs are attached to this part.

I was trying to go as low budget as possible so I went to Home Depot and picked up two PVC parts. One piece fits snug inside the finderscope tube. The other piece fits snug inside of that and has an opening that a .965 eyepiece barrel fits into perfectly. I first did dry runs of everything.

Camera to adapter

Camera and adapter to sleeve

Now that I knew how I was going to mount everything I now could figure out where the webcam focused and position the webcam accordingly. Since I am able to adjust the objective lens by screwing it in and out, I will have some working room for focus. I wanted to position the webcam in the middle of where the objective lens would focus.

I had to sand down some edges to get the parts to fit perfectly. I like to take off as little material as possible. You can’t add material once you’ve gone too far. I sanded and tested, sanded and tested. It did not take too long since PVC sands easily.

Before I glued everything, I made sure I was able to focus. I also took a took a few shoots with the webcam to make sure the focus was right on.

After the glue dried I painted everything flat black with spray paint.

I took the oportunity here to make sure everything was clean before I did an instal. And since my tolarances were so tight, I had to do a little sanding after the paint dried. I was able to press fit the PVC adapter into the finderscope tube without having to add screws to hold it into place. No slop here!

Here’s the unit all together. A 1.25″ eyepiece cap fit the finderscope adapter perfectly.

Here is the completed product. I threaded three screws to really hold down the webcam. I also removed the plastic screws in the finder mount and changed them with metal ones. I also added a third screw next to the spring push to tighten everything down once a guide star is found.

Remember to get everything nice and tight, you want to rule out any slop (flexure) that can a ruin your guide setup.

On my first attempt a couple of weeks ago, I could not get it working. The calibration failed. I later realized that the telecope would have to move more when guiding because of the short focal ratio of the guidescope. A simple tweek in PHD from 750 to 1000 for the calibration step size was all that was needed to get this working.

Now I have a small light weight easy to setup guidescope! And it all fits in my Fat Max toolbox. No more laying on the ground trying to get a guide star.

This weekend I tested it again and I was always able to find a guidestar within the adjustments of the finder.

M44 Behive Cluster. 10 minute guided shot with a 8X40 finderscope and webcam.