2023-01-08
15:30-16:20 CST (
The weather was perfect, clear, calm, and 62 F. I brought out my small Astro-Tech AT80ED,
I mainly used my Astro-Tech 12 mm (46.7x) eyepiece. I counted at least five large regions of sunspots and and a great many individual spots. Seeing conditions over the warm rooftops was probably about 2/5. I also saw regions of plage. I also tried my 13 mm Plossl (43x) eyepiece. Both are ideal for the sun with the AT80ED.
I observed for a while because at intermittent times of good seeing I could see remarkable detail in the larger sunspot regions. I didn’t try to document everything I could see though I did capture a few images on my phone just for the record.
As the sun became quite low, I quit but left the telescope out for the night.
18:05-18:45
I came back out after solar observing and turned to Jupiter in the twilight sky. The temperature was now 57 F and dropping and seeing had improved to nearly 5/5. Jupiter being high in the sky helped too.
With my 5 mm (112x) eyepiece, I could see the four Galilean moons, the two main belts on Jupiter, and some darkened structure near both poles. I tried various combinations of eyepieces and Barlow lens but tonight the 5 mm alone worked the best.
Next, I star hopped to nearby Neptune with my 32 mm (17.5x) eyepiece. It was easy to find starting from Jupiter, though it was faint as usual. I put in my 5 mm and I could clearly see Neptune as just a slightly blue spec of light. I wouldn’t not have known it from another star if were not for me “plate solving” in my head against the star catalogues in SkySafari Pro and Stellarium.
19:05-19:27
Again, starting from Jupiter and moving north with my 25 mm (22.4x) eyepiece, I came upon the distinctly red carbon star, TX Piscium (19 Piscium). It stood out amongst the other stars so I zoomed in on it with the 5 mm. I saw a clear red-orange Airy disk with clean diffraction rings. I put the 25 mm back in and a slowly spinning satellite passed slowly to the west of the star on a descending orbit.
20:15-21:20
It was now 51 F and I was back out after supper to find a pre-selected target, Alrischa (Alpha Piscium, α Piscium), a double star in Pisces. I found it with my 22.4X and then with the 112X it looked two stars stuck together. With the addition of the 2X Barlow (224x), I could clearly separate them. They were two distinct Airy disks with space in between them. Each had its own diffraction ring that did overlap each other. The more northern star was slightly fainter. At 1.8” apart, this should still be within the Rayleigh Limit of the resolving power of this telescope. It is a good double star to test your optics on.
I hopped over to the double star Omicron Piscium (ο Piscium) but I could not split it. The pair was reported by SkySafari Pro to be 0.0” apart but I was hoping that was a typo. Apparently, it was not.
I then hopped to the beautiful double star Mesarthim, or γ Arietis. I could split the pair with my 25 mm eyepiece but at 5 mm the identical white pair of stars looked like a pair of eyes starring back at me! I’m sure that I’ve seen this unforgettable pair before.
Since Uranus was in the vicinity, I star hopped my way over to it with the 25 mm eyepiece. I observed it as a pale blue disk slightly larger than a bright star with my 5 mm and 2X Barlow. However, I could not see any moons. The slight diffraction ring that I was seeing at 224x may have been obscuring them or my 80 mm telescope simply cannot resolve them.
The bright Moon was rising over my rooftop to the east, thin clouds were moving in, and I had to go to work in the morning after a long holiday break so I brought everything in for the night. It was now 47 F. I don’t know why, but I feel colder in the 40’s and 50’s than I do in freezing weather.
