Sounds like my last experience! Heh...VinSnr wrote:haha....good to hear that.rlow wrote:. Those people who were there that night are indeed very fortunate.
My best memories of Mersing is not those clear nites (got experience quite a few already), but it is those little weird things that we do that. Like a group of us eating food under one torch light (dun even know what I am eating) and even once when we faced a terrible thunderstorm. The rain and wind was so heavy that the coconuts trees were like collapsing. Then 10 of us inside one tent together with scopes, bags and all hoping the tent don't give way...haha
Maybe one day I should go back.
Mersing Trip: 29th July
[80% Steve, 20% Alfred] ------- Probability of Clear Skies = (Age of newest equipment in days) / [(Number of observers) * (Total Aperture of all telescopes present in mm)]
Hi Nebman, it's actually WINSON, not Vincent.Thanks to Chris, Rich, David and Sinhoe who helped organise the trip and "educated" the police. My special thanks to Vincent (am I right?), his gf (?), Weixing and his gf (?) who provided great help to my wife.
Both Winson and Ashley are non-members. They are my old old old friends and "passport" to overseas trips. NO, they are not a couple neither. If they read this, they are both gonna die laughing manz...
and if Klutz's husband read this, she is gonna die on spot... (x_x)
You know dat children are growing up when they start asking questions that have answers...
This is my first time seeing the beautifully long Milky Way...Though I have been observing at than two dozen oversea dark skies in the last decade or so, this is only the third time I have seen the night sky was so clear that we can see the Milky Way stretching over the whole sky from Scorpius at the western horizon to Cygnus at the Eastern horizon. It is indeed the biggest 'M' object best seen with the naked eye, the most impressive sight of all Deep Sky Objects, and this alone already makes the whole Mersing trip so worthwhile.
wished we could take picture of the whole wide stretch of sky and let the others see for themselves...You know dat children are growing up when they start asking questions that have answers...
Since he doesn't approve of me getting a scope, and that I'm a direction-dummy, I SHOULD have a human GOTO! And unfortunately for WX, he lives the nearest to me... The most within-reach GOTO!Haha!... so does it mean that he won't mind that she got an exclusive... "My personal GOTO" ?
You know dat children are growing up when they start asking questions that have answers...
Ok now, some people have been asking for the results to...
THE 8-INCH SCOPE SHOWDOWN: CELESTRON-8 VS PORTABALL-8 VS MEWLON-8
For some time, a few of us have been wondering how would these three scopes fare when compared together. Finally after waiting for more than six months, here is a great opportunity to put these three great scopes together under great skies to compare! At Mersing on 29 Jul 06, we have the following setup:
First and foremost, we have Clement's Celestron C8 a Schmidt Cassegraine telescope with "diffraction-limited optics, XLT coatings". It was mounted on the Astroslew mount & Velbon tripod...
secondly, we have Mooey's Portaball 8", the Newtonian telescope with the legendary Carl Zambuto mirror "acclaimed to achieve at least 50x per inch or more" combined with Peter Smitka's great design of the curry-pot...
and third but not the least, we have David Lian's Takahashi Mewlon 210, a modified Dall Kirkham Cassegraine telescope whose optics are said to have been figured to 1/20th wave. This was mounted on the one-and-only prototype Astroslew mount & Manfrotto 475 tripod.
I didn't take a photo to show (anyone has?), but I can't help noticing that all three scopes are set up next to each other in a very straight line... seems like the three owners are really "geared up" for the shootdown!
At about 12 midnight, almost two hours after the scopes were set up and had enough time to 'cool-down', we got all three scopes simultaneously pointing at M17 The Swan Nebula using premium eyepieces giving about 80x magnification and all without any filter. A few of us took turns to observe through each scope a few rounds. Here's what I observe...
C8: great sharp view of the Swan, shape and nebulosity is distinct even without filter, sky background is a bit bright.
P8: sharper than C8, slightly brighter nebulosity, slightly darker background, as compared to C8.
M8: sharper than C8 and similar to the P8, great contrast with much darker background than P8, nebulosity seems brighter than C8 & P8, edge of nebulosity is distinct from the dark background.
The difference in contrast between the Mewlon and the other two scopes is analogous to the effect seen with and without a Oxygen-III filter but without the penalty of having dimmer green stars.
I have to say my prefered view is through the Mewlon, although all three scopes give very good views. Perhaps others may like to give their comments too?
We didn't have much chance to test further then as the local police suddenly blitz into the area with Operation "Bright Lights" after that...
THE 8-INCH SCOPE SHOWDOWN: CELESTRON-8 VS PORTABALL-8 VS MEWLON-8
For some time, a few of us have been wondering how would these three scopes fare when compared together. Finally after waiting for more than six months, here is a great opportunity to put these three great scopes together under great skies to compare! At Mersing on 29 Jul 06, we have the following setup:
First and foremost, we have Clement's Celestron C8 a Schmidt Cassegraine telescope with "diffraction-limited optics, XLT coatings". It was mounted on the Astroslew mount & Velbon tripod...
secondly, we have Mooey's Portaball 8", the Newtonian telescope with the legendary Carl Zambuto mirror "acclaimed to achieve at least 50x per inch or more" combined with Peter Smitka's great design of the curry-pot...
and third but not the least, we have David Lian's Takahashi Mewlon 210, a modified Dall Kirkham Cassegraine telescope whose optics are said to have been figured to 1/20th wave. This was mounted on the one-and-only prototype Astroslew mount & Manfrotto 475 tripod.
I didn't take a photo to show (anyone has?), but I can't help noticing that all three scopes are set up next to each other in a very straight line... seems like the three owners are really "geared up" for the shootdown!
At about 12 midnight, almost two hours after the scopes were set up and had enough time to 'cool-down', we got all three scopes simultaneously pointing at M17 The Swan Nebula using premium eyepieces giving about 80x magnification and all without any filter. A few of us took turns to observe through each scope a few rounds. Here's what I observe...
C8: great sharp view of the Swan, shape and nebulosity is distinct even without filter, sky background is a bit bright.
P8: sharper than C8, slightly brighter nebulosity, slightly darker background, as compared to C8.
M8: sharper than C8 and similar to the P8, great contrast with much darker background than P8, nebulosity seems brighter than C8 & P8, edge of nebulosity is distinct from the dark background.
The difference in contrast between the Mewlon and the other two scopes is analogous to the effect seen with and without a Oxygen-III filter but without the penalty of having dimmer green stars.
I have to say my prefered view is through the Mewlon, although all three scopes give very good views. Perhaps others may like to give their comments too?
We didn't have much chance to test further then as the local police suddenly blitz into the area with Operation "Bright Lights" after that...
Last edited by rlow on Thu Aug 03, 2006 6:12 pm, edited 1 time in total.
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Canopus Lim
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Yup it will be interesting to compare all the scopes with same true FOV which would mean the Mewlon and C8 having lower magnification than the P8. Since the P8 will have larger exit pupil than the Mewlon and C8 at same magnification, it would be interesting to compare for same exit pupil on the objects too.
AstroDuck