Tampines Industrial Ave 2 Observation Session - 2nd May 2014

[bornfree]

Well, first and fore most, I have do deeply apologise for the heavy rain that happened about 2 weeks ago. This is because this little baby arrived. Reise 250D. will post a topic on unboxing this little baby in abit, but here is the obs session.

A 9pm, Rai drove Junwei to my block and Alvin made his way with his gf to my block and then on route to Tampines Industrial Ave 2. A location recce by Rai and I last Sat. Upon arrive, we doused all exposed skin with a generous amount of insect repellent, or at least i did, as the place was beside a forested area. the sky condition was very good. the area is dark, we could see crux, centaur, jupiter, mars and saturn rising, also Sirius, canopus, etc.

Rai setup his C6 on a nexstar while i assembled my reise, as it came in an assortment of parts and a whole bunch of screws, with everyone's help. i am surprised for once, the collimation held quite well. with about 1-2mm off, i am not too nit-pick about getting it into perfection. and we were all ready in about 10 mins.

First item we tried to hunt for is jupiter before it is setting. due to the spring that acts as the tension, it was hard to keep the Reise to point at too low an angle and the spring keeps lifting the scope.

Next we tried for the Eta Carina, but to no avail. Sg is just too bright, but we saw an open cluster that is near it. On Rai nexstar, we tried to track to the nebular but it was no use. it just cant be resolved.

Moving on, we tried the Omega Centauri globular cluster. At first it was a large fuzzy patch to me. after staring at it long enough, the against a greyish ball, the tiny stars started to be visible and for once i could see the tiny stars of the globular.. it was awesome!!

Since we are pointing south, how can we forget the jewel box? in the 42mm, it was a very tiny like an island in the middle of a lake, then changed to a 20mm, the cluster was nicely framed and it is indeed a view to really enjoy. why did we forget about the southern pleaides? there is a chance to capture them again. soon i hope.

have you seen Saturn so closely, the bands on the planets are very visible? i did, and it is really breathtaking.. not only can i see the cassini division so clearly seen, even the colour variation of the rings are quite striking as well.. we did a barlow of 2.5 on a 6mm, even without the barlow it is awesome to view. although the drift is fastm but we could still have a good 6 secs or so view before needing to move the mount to bring it back to the top and let it drift down.

Next was to view Mars. Although its opposition is over, it is still very close to us.the dark region of Mars is visible, and can see the polar ice caps as well.

This trip is mainly about first lighting my Reise and i can proudly say i am very happy with this scope. Thinking about what this 10" can do in Mersing.

[Gary]

Nice scope and report! Another dob in Singapore!

[Airconvent]

Congrats on your new scope! Looks like another winner. 10" is really a very good size for Singapore skies. Have fun ahead!

[antares2063]

very nice and compact design...thanks for sharing the first light Saturn was superb. Omega Cent is nicely resolved although dim compared to its true self

[bornfree]

well, still much better than my view from the 6". an increase of 4" really makes a difference. from the 6" it is just a fuzzy patch. if tried the 6" in mersing, i believe it wont lose to what i see in the field with the 10"