[Chaos-l] Friday Observing report, Farrington point

[Kumar Pandya]

I arrived around 8.00 pm at Farrington Point.  There
was only one car in the parking lot.  The skies were
cloudless and clear, transparent, seeing poor
(skyclock: 2/5), Milky was visible overhead. 
Temperatures were moderately cool. A slight downside
was that it was a bit windy, with occasional gusts
that swayed the scope.

I recently acquired some very inexpensive eyepieces
and wanted to try them out.  For my low powers I
already have celestron 32 mm plossl and 2-inch 32 mm
Rini (60 deg AFOV, which I love).  I have a preference
for the Rini, but find it a hassle to change the
adaptors (all the other eyepieces are 1.25 inch), but
the wide AFOV is worth it. Recently, I came across a
1.25 inch 30mm rini (advertised at 60* AFOV), and
bought it on a whim for $20.  
I also bought a knight owl superwide 9mm 68*afov
(clones of Orion Expanse).  So far I have been using a
2x barlow with a 20mm bino-lite (it’s a 3-element
kellner with a surprising 60 * AFOV) for my high mags.

I usually begin at the western treeline and work my
way up to the east. I find globulars to be those
objects that look very nice at different mags. Since I
was interested in testing the different eyepieces,
they were good candidates.

I observed M13, M11, M15, and M57.  All these objects
look pleasing at different magnifications, and it was
fun to go back and forth.  Of course, the higher mags
resolved the stars (and the ring) rather pleasingly.  

For a change I also looked at some doubles.  Alberio
was delightful as always; but the poor seeing hampered
a good view of gamma Andromeda.

Around 9.00 p I was joined by Cameron and his 4-inch
refractor.  We compared the views through our scopes
(mine is an 8 inch F5, and his is a 4 inch F8).  The
whopping 3-degree view of the double cluster through
his scope was delightful.  He had bagged 37 Messiers
in only his 2nd outing (at MASP?) with his scope: Very
impressive!!

I had a quick look at M45, which is one of my fav
objects.  At my lowest power-widest field (1.8 deg) it
was just in the field of view.  The 7 sisters and the
innumerable cousins were all dazzling.

I ended with the crown jewel: Comet Holmes. It was
very easy to locate, and looked non stellar with the
naked eye.  This looks great at low as well as high
powers.  AT 30x, it looked like a celestial cotton
ball floating in a black velvet background.  I could
discern two variations in the hue: a dense interior,
and a diffuse halo.  At 100x, I could detect a
distinct bright point off center in the dense
interior.  I could not detect any color.  This is my
first comet, and a very impressive one at that.  

A note on the eyepiece performance.  The 30mm 1.25
inch eyepiece is NOT 60* AFOV (consistent with
theoretical limits that should require a 2-inch field
stop), so I shall retain my 2-inch 32mm.  The 9 mm
eyepiece was a sure winner, and provided delightfully
sharp views all the way to the edge (I estimate abt
80%).  It also barlowed well.  I have bought a used
power wheel multi mag Barlow that provides 3 mag at
the twist of a wheel.  It should arrive soon.

All in all, it was a very pleasant night.