We were looking at the helix up at Lick w/ the 15x50s.
It is fairly faint, large, with low surface brightness.
Not much detail visually... the challenge is to see it.
Its interesting to compare views of these "on-the-edge"
objects from various sites. E.g. also at lick someone
asked to see M51 in the 15"... at a dark site it is
fairly spectacular, but at Lick, with the light pollution
to the north, and with M51 fairly low, there was just a
faint outline of the outer arms. This was with the 15".
----- Original Message -----
From: "Szaki" <szaki10@comcast.net>
To: "TAC" <sf-bay-tac@seds.org>
Sent: Monday, August 30, 2004 10:29 AM
Subject: [TAC] (no subject)
>
> This year while watching the Perseid meteor shower from MB
> open space I found the Helix Nebula with my 8x42 Leica BN
> binocular. This was about 2 am when the Helix was in the southwest
> where the sky is a little darker at MB, but MB is not what I would
> call a dark sky site. This was without a filter. Just the bino and my
> eyes.
>
> Clear skies,
> Rich
>
> Well, you must have one heck of a 42mm bino, Rich. Me and my friend
> observed at MB last year, 12.5" DOB and I had a 8" LX-200 and had a hard
> time to find and see the Helix nebula.
> Friend asked me to point the GOTO to the Helix, since he had a hard time to
> find it with his DOB. I did, but it was hard to see in the 8" SCT. With the
> LP filter it was better.
> I also have a 100x25 bino, very good for DSO's from a dark site.
>
> Julius
>
>
> Some official coment on the Helix:
> <" It is also one of the apparently largest planetaries known: Its apparent
> size covers an area of 16 arc minutes diameter, more than half of that of
> the full moon; it halo extends even further to 28 arc minutes or almost the
> moon's apparent diameter (These dimensions were taken from Stephen J. Hynes
> who quotes AAT and ESO photos). Although the nebula is quite bright, its
> light is spread over this large area so that it is not an easy object for
> visual observing; the Herschels have apparently never cataloged or observed
> it. ">
>
Received on Mon Aug 30 10:51:53 2004