Has anyone seen Pluto?

[jrkirkham]

I'm just curious. Has anyone on the forum observed Pluto? If so how? What size of scope did you use? Did you image it or see it visually?

[bladekeeper]

I caught it late last summer with my 12" dob. It was rough. Details here: http://www.astronomyforum.net/astronomy ... vable.html

[notFritzArgelander]

I saw it (I think, pretty sure, but maybe not depending on your criteria) with a 16" classical Cassegrain pointed in the direction of the Coma Cluster in 1972 as I recall. I identified it from a carefully prepared finder chart but did not track its motion, though. Some folks have beat me up on that. Apparently a good finder chart is insufficient and I should have tracked its motion.

[Lady Fraktor]

In 2010 with confirmation viewing 3 nights later using a 20" Obsession reflector.

[sdbodin]

Seen it with my 16", imaged it with a 4".

Steve

[Sky]

The last time I observed and photographed Pluto was way back on July 12, 2002. I first visually located Pluto using a 12" SCT and then imaged it using the same scope. The field of view is approximately 19x19 arc-minutes and Pluto was at 13.88 magnitude. Definitely brighter then it is today.

[Bigzmey]

I observed Pluto visually with 8" SCT in fall 2018. I resolved it as very faint averted vision star using BCO 10mm (203x). At that time it was 14.3mag and 15'' from a 11.6 mag field star, which made it easier to identify.

[jrkirkham]

Wow, that was some tough viewing with serious glass. I wonder if many have identified it with an 8" SCT? My biggest light bucket is a 10" dob, but I've never seen Pluto.

[Bigzmey]

Wow, that was some tough viewing with serious glass. I wonder if many have identified it with an 8" SCT? My biggest light bucket is a 10" dob, but I've never seen Pluto.

It is a tough target and requires good viewing conditions, but I would certainly give it a shot with your DOB or SCT (or both ) when it will be in opposition in July 2020.

[Arsene37]

The only Pluto I ever have seen is :

Arsène

P.S. I wonder I'm the first for this poor joke !

[notFritzArgelander]

Wow, that was some tough viewing with serious glass. I wonder if many have identified it with an 8" SCT? My biggest light bucket is a 10" dob, but I've never seen Pluto.

It is a tough target and requires good viewing conditions, but I would certainly give it a shot with your DOB or SCT (or both ) when it will be in opposition in July 2020.

Good seeing helps so that you get a true Airy disk from the stars and not a washed out smudge from poor seeing.