M51, I think...

"bwhiting" wrote in message
...
Actually Allison, I completely agree with you....but BV is a newbie,
and the 81, 82 combo is a pain in the butt to locate, even for an
experienced observer....in fact, tonight I tried to hit on those
for 5 minutes and gave up...Yes, I used the diagonal thru the
bowl of the dipper, but then what? There are just no bright guide
stars around to hone off on....so you search and search...sometimes
you hit it lucky...sometimes you don't....those have to be, by far,
the *toughest* of the Messier objects to locate just by eyeball (telrad)
'sighting'. I hate them. But love to see them, especially 82
at ultra high powers.
Someone once told me there is a little triangle of faint stars near
the duo...but I have yet to find it, or see it. Plus you probably
need 6.5 mag skies to see the stupid triangle.
If anyone has any easy way of sighting in on this duo, I would certainly
appreciate any help in this regard.
Clear Skies,
Tom W.


This is a star hop I found that gets me two these two fairly quickly. I'm
using a 50 mm finder and I doubt this would be much help with a telrad
since my main pointer is made up of stars all in the Mag 6-7+ range.

In any case, I start at 23 UMa, then move approximately 2 degrees toward
Dubhe and 2 degrees North (roughly perpendicular to the line between Dubhe
and 23 UMa), total distance is about 2 1/2 degrees. In this area there is
a house shaped asterism, four stars in a box and one (mag 7.8) a degree
north of the others that forms the peak. Follow the "direction" that the
roof points right between M81 and M82, it's a bit of a jump from that tip
star, nearly three degrees, but using an EP with a one degree FOV I usually
get there on the first try. I've found it helpful to step through it with
binoculars just to get an idea of what I'm looking for, without having
directions reversed.

If it's not clear, I'd be happy to take another shot at explaining. If you
do try it, I'd like to hear what your results are.

Rich

Ok Rich, I'll give that method a try on our next outing,
which looks like Friday night at CSSP this weekend.
Gotta try something as that is the only M that I can't
hit on within 30 seconds, because I have no plan of attack.
Geez....even the star S Cephei and 6543 have a way
to attack them with a telrad. But not M81/82.
Thanks for the info. I'll try it.
Clear skies,
Tom W.




RichO wrote:
"bwhiting" wrote in message
...

Actually Allison, I completely agree with you....but BV is a newbie,
and the 81, 82 combo is a pain in the butt to locate, even for an
experienced observer....in fact, tonight I tried to hit on those
for 5 minutes and gave up...Yes, I used the diagonal thru the
bowl of the dipper, but then what? There are just no bright guide
stars around to hone off on....so you search and search...sometimes
you hit it lucky...sometimes you don't....those have to be, by far,
the *toughest* of the Messier objects to locate just by eyeball (telrad)
'sighting'. I hate them. But love to see them, especially 82
at ultra high powers.
Someone once told me there is a little triangle of faint stars near
the duo...but I have yet to find it, or see it. Plus you probably
need 6.5 mag skies to see the stupid triangle.
If anyone has any easy way of sighting in on this duo, I would certainly
appreciate any help in this regard.
Clear Skies,
Tom W.



This is a star hop I found that gets me two these two fairly quickly. I'm
using a 50 mm finder and I doubt this would be much help with a telrad
since my main pointer is made up of stars all in the Mag 6-7+ range.

In any case, I start at 23 UMa, then move approximately 2 degrees toward
Dubhe and 2 degrees North (roughly perpendicular to the line between Dubhe
and 23 UMa), total distance is about 2 1/2 degrees. In this area there is
a house shaped asterism, four stars in a box and one (mag 7.8) a degree
north of the others that forms the peak. Follow the "direction" that the
roof points right between M81 and M82, it's a bit of a jump from that tip
star, nearly three degrees, but using an EP with a one degree FOV I usually
get there on the first try. I've found it helpful to step through it with
binoculars just to get an idea of what I'm looking for, without having
directions reversed.

If it's not clear, I'd be happy to take another shot at explaining. If you
do try it, I'd like to hear what your results are.

Rich