MooEy's guide to M36/38

[MooEy]

M36 and M38 are 2 open cluster in Auriga. Many amateur did not bother to find them due to their magnitude. M36 is a mag 6.5 object and M38 is a mag 7 object. But both objects are easily visible thru a 3" under SG skies. Thus for that reason, I will include a guide here for easy hunting of those 2 M objects.

Firstly, start off by locating Capella in the north. Capella is a mag 0.06 star, which should be one of the brightest in the skies. It is slighty reddish in colour.

If you have difficulty, you can start off with Aldebaren. If you choose to start off with Aldebaren, move downwards. It's around 8 o'clock.

Once you have located Capella, try to locate Elnath somewhere in between Aldebaren and Capella. It's somewhere off the center of Aldebaren and Capella. Elnath is roughly 1.6 mag, shouldn't be too hard to spot.

[MooEy]

Now that you have located Capella and Elnath, look thru your finderscope and find a bunch of orange looking stars in between Capella and Elnath.

The bunch of stars is separated into 2 portions, the top and the bottom. The top portion looks like a triangle with a parrellogram below it. The bottom portion looks like an arc.

What we need is the bottom bunch of stars below. At the tail of the arcs, on the left side(might be right side thru a scope with a diagonal in place), you will find M38.

After taking down M38 and having some fun with it, go to M36, it's just right side of the bunch of orangy stars.

~MooEy~

[fizzy123]

Good deep sky pointers. 8) By the way wat is the planetarium software? :idea:

[MooEy]

an outdated software, starry night pro 3.12. most of the markings are added in paint.

~MooEy~