MarkLB57
M42_FalseLumRGB_19-01-2024
***This image is dedicated to my mother Marie Blundell who passed away at the age of 96 on the 21st November 2023. A loving mother a talented artist and author of Lindfield in Watercolour***
Managed to get my RGB on the last possible night before the moon was a problem. Saying that the moon still affected the images and had to restrict my subs to 3min. Because of this I didn’t get as much of the fainter detail as I wanted.
I had two terrible nights before this, not only was I battling poor seeing but Dec guiding was terrible. I found that the Dec axis was not running as freely as it should and was slightly sticking at certain points. I removed the Dec shaft and found there was pitting on one of the two spacer plates either side of one of the bearings at the clutch end. I clean these up as best I could with some wet and dry paper and re-grease the bearing. I’m pleased to say that it runs more Smoothly and seems to have sort that problem. There was one other unexpected problem, my Laptop went into hibernation mode even though it was connected to the mains, unplugging it and plugging it back in solved that. Due to this I only managed 50 subs on the final night but managed to salvage 14 from the previous two nights, so got there in the end.
Object Description:-
M42 Orion Nebula & Trapezium. This is a very bright diffuse nebula visible to the naked eye in the night sky in the constellation of Orion situated south of Orion's Belt. M42 is located at a distance of 1,344 light years and is the closest region of massive star formation to Earth. The M42 nebula is estimated to be 24 light years across and is also home to a very young open cluster, known as the Trapezium.
EQUIPMENT:-
Explore Scientific 102mm F7 APO Carbon
Explore Scientific 0.7 Focal Reducer
Skywatcher AZ-EQ6 GT
Explore Scientific 16mp cooled OSC
Orion Mini Auto Guide
Chip Temp Cooled to -12 degC
IMAGING DETAILS:-
M42 Orion Nebula
Gain 500 (Unit Gain) in APT
Dithering
64 RGB subs@180 (3h 12min)
16 RGB subs@10sec (2min 40sec)
20 Darks
25 Flats
PROCESSING/GUIDING SOFTWARE:-
APT "Astro Photograph Tools"
DSS
Siril
PS CS2
M42_FalseLumRGB_19-01-2024
***This image is dedicated to my mother Marie Blundell who passed away at the age of 96 on the 21st November 2023. A loving mother a talented artist and author of Lindfield in Watercolour***
Managed to get my RGB on the last possible night before the moon was a problem. Saying that the moon still affected the images and had to restrict my subs to 3min. Because of this I didn’t get as much of the fainter detail as I wanted.
I had two terrible nights before this, not only was I battling poor seeing but Dec guiding was terrible. I found that the Dec axis was not running as freely as it should and was slightly sticking at certain points. I removed the Dec shaft and found there was pitting on one of the two spacer plates either side of one of the bearings at the clutch end. I clean these up as best I could with some wet and dry paper and re-grease the bearing. I’m pleased to say that it runs more Smoothly and seems to have sort that problem. There was one other unexpected problem, my Laptop went into hibernation mode even though it was connected to the mains, unplugging it and plugging it back in solved that. Due to this I only managed 50 subs on the final night but managed to salvage 14 from the previous two nights, so got there in the end.
Object Description:-
M42 Orion Nebula & Trapezium. This is a very bright diffuse nebula visible to the naked eye in the night sky in the constellation of Orion situated south of Orion's Belt. M42 is located at a distance of 1,344 light years and is the closest region of massive star formation to Earth. The M42 nebula is estimated to be 24 light years across and is also home to a very young open cluster, known as the Trapezium.
EQUIPMENT:-
Explore Scientific 102mm F7 APO Carbon
Explore Scientific 0.7 Focal Reducer
Skywatcher AZ-EQ6 GT
Explore Scientific 16mp cooled OSC
Orion Mini Auto Guide
Chip Temp Cooled to -12 degC
IMAGING DETAILS:-
M42 Orion Nebula
Gain 500 (Unit Gain) in APT
Dithering
64 RGB subs@180 (3h 12min)
16 RGB subs@10sec (2min 40sec)
20 Darks
25 Flats
PROCESSING/GUIDING SOFTWARE:-
APT "Astro Photograph Tools"
DSS
Siril
PS CS2