Ob @ Turf City on 25/5 (Friday) @ 10pm

[Clifford60]

Lim Chu Kang lane 1a is certainly darker...but for city location, turf club is a more convenient....

When there is NO moon and the light is off, it will be better than LCK. Plus LCK has a lot of commando mosquitoes.

Will arrange another ob @ car park on either 8 or 9 June when the moon is turn OFF during the ob hours. Will start another post when it get nearer.

[Airconvent]

Was quite an interesting find. Thanks to new BukitTimah CSN Leader Clifford who seemed to have developed a new technique to suck the Toa Payoh CSN leader Zong and Dempsey CSN Chief CC to the new place!
Finding the place in the dark was a little challenging but worth effort.

A note about the grounds :
1. Its dark! But largely unobstructed.
2. Wear long pants due to mosquitoes and sandflies.
3. You need to go against the flow of traffic according to the arrow on the road to reach there.
4. Midway, the road tapers into a single lane, so parking of cars is first in last out! Trying to figure if we can use the dark car park next to the road.
5. Its not a come-as-you-like venue. We were checked by the local caretaker but luckily Clifford had sought permission to use the place earlier.
6. No toilets and no food/drinks being sold after 11pm.

The night was relatively free of clouds but inspite of this, seeing is nowhere near Mersing. Omega was quite dim actually. If not for the "human goto" rlow, we may have missed quite a few objects. Thanks to him, we manage to see M4, M22, M62, M80, M8, M57, M104, M19 (I think) and a few personal favourite globulars of his. peering through the red dot finder, I could see no stars that can be used as reference, yet he managed to pick them out! Many of the open clusters were a little disappointing. The jewel box, M6, M7 and even the wild duck cluster simply is not Mersing!

We also had a peek at Jupiter and saw its moon move infront of Jupiter..wow!
Chee Chien tried his hand at the whirlpool although I was never sure if he succeeded. By the time I left at 0000 hrs, rlow was trying to zoom to the swan. Overall the site looks promising though and the night would probably had been much better if not for the "moon" pollution.
The moon is expected to grow bigger as its in the waxing gibbous state now but I need to check if its setting later or earlier each passing day...

rich1

[Canopus Lim]

Ok sounds like it is quite a viable place for extended observation. Will the scope be setup beside the cars? Lim Chu Kang is rather blocked by trees and has many mossies....

[Airconvent]

Ok sounds like it is quite a viable place for extended observation. Will the scope be setup beside the cars? Lim Chu Kang is rather blocked by trees and has many mossies....

Nope. You set up on the field on a long path with no grass. The path appeared to be made of some sort of canvas material instead of concrete but it did the job well..

[kered]

Hello everyone.

I went to the yellow area of the picture at around 12am last night, but couldn't find anyone. I drove along that road until I was stopped by two cars which were parked on it.

The site was really dark and I didn't think it was possible to see that many stars in Singapore. It should be even better without the moon. It was a bit eerie though, and me and my friend felt as if someone else was watching us in our backseat. Hope to see you guys in your next ob session.

[Airconvent]

Hello everyone.

I went to the yellow area of the picture at around 12am last night, but couldn't find anyone. I drove along that road until I was stopped by two cars which were parked on it.

The site was really dark and I didn't think it was possible to see that many stars in Singapore. It should be even better without the moon. It was a bit eerie though, and me and my friend felt as if someone else was watching us in our backseat. Hope to see you guys in your next ob session.

You should have called Clifford....I left around 12am but I think the rest left around 12.30am also...

[zong]

The jewel box, M6, M7 and even the wild duck cluster simply is not Mersing!

Rich, you need to adjust your mindset!! This is Singapore, however good it can get, of course it will not reach mersing standard.. You probably were too wowed away by last week. Earth calling Rich, come back to singapore!

Kered, yea, you could have gotten Clifford or my number, to call us next time you are there. But next time, the ob should be in a more accessible place so you should be able to find it anyway. Hope to see you next time

[Clifford60]

Hi Guys, the next ob (2 weeks time) WILL NOT be at the field, we will be going back to the CARPARK, the viewing angle will be as good as the field and it is much easier to get there (very near the Turf City Arch, see pic). Since it is a carpark, you can set up your scope just next to your car. The only thing is that the ob has to start after 11pm because the flood light in the carpark will go off around 11.15pm.

There will be some mossies, but no sandflies (no sand there lah). Anyway, will bring mossies coils to protect the parameter. Well, long pant will still be good to prevent you from the "cold".

For toilet, I've yet to find out if they lock the building @ our ob hours. What I know is that @ 10.45pm, the side door near the carpark is still open. Otherwise, the race track is where you go for when nature call.

The blue marker in the pic is where the feeder bus stop (for Ang Mo Kio and Toa Payoh) and the side door located. The last feeder bus will leave AMK & TP at 9.00pm.

For food, we may have to buy some @ Giant before it closes for the day. May be we can have seafood dinner (Friday 50% off) before the ob. For supper, we need to drive to Adam Rd Food Centre which is not very far away before we leave for home.

Note, this is S'pore, so if we can see a faint Milkyway when there is NO moon, we can consider it is a very good place.

[rlow]

Here's a list of some objects that we managed to observe that night in the 12.5" Portaball & 10" Skywatcher dob:

Moon, Saturn, Jupiter
Messiers: M4, 6 (Butterfly Clsuter), 7, 8 (Lagoon Nebula), 11 (Wild Duck Cluster), 13, 16 (Swan Nebula), 19, 21, 22, 24, 25, 28, 57 (Ring Nebula), 62, 80, 104 (Sombero Galaxy)
NGC 4755 (Jewel Box Cluster), 5139 (Omega Centauri), 5286, 5460, 6231, 6302 (Bug Nebula), 6441
Collinder 399 (Coathanger)
Double stars: Rigil Kentaurus, Acrux, Antares, Albireo

[acc]

Chee Chien tried his hand at the whirlpool although I was never sure if he succeeded.

Nope I never did succeed. The sky was probably brighter than the galaxy itself...