Date:  Feb 9, 2013

Location: Nevada City at 2512 feet

NELM: 6.0 – 6.2  (zenith)

Transparency: 3/5

Seeing: 2/5

Telescope: 22” f/4.0 reflector sitting on an equatorial platform

Eyepieces:  24mm Panoptic (finder eyepiece), 10 and 6mm ZAO-II’s, 10 and 6mm Delos and TMB 1.8x ED barlow

About 10 of us met at a site near Nevada City (2512 feet).  The skies are not too bad especially that sites near home during the winder are slim pickings.  I live right on the western slope of the Sierras, so once I head due east...in just 40 minutes I'm already in the snow and the sky glow is still pretty bad.  So this site is NE by 1:15 distance from home.  A neighbor about 200 yards away turned the lights on about 2 hours into the night, pretty much ruined the rest of the night.  Observed 4 new trios and some old favorites.

Note:  These notes are very raw as I was socializing most of the night while observing.  I will enhance them when I get the chance.

All object parameters in parenthesis are listed in RA and Dec without commas.

Images are from the Sloan Digital Sky Survey - DR8 or the Digital Sky Survey (POSS-II)

NGC 1472 trio  (03 53 57.6  -08 33 51)

22” f/4 (230 and 383x) –   

NGC 1472  (0.7 x 0.7’  15.4) –  Considerably faint round even surface brightness glow.  Defined edges.  0.3’ across  mag 13.8 star 1.1’ ESE

NGC 1477  (0.6 x 0.6’  15.8)  – Very faint round even surface brightness glow.  Slightly diffuse edges.  0.3’ across.  A mag 15.4 star a third of the distance between NGC 1477 and NGC 1478

NGC 1478  (0.6 x 0.3’  16.5) – Considerably faint slightly elongated even surface brightness glow  0.2’ long and PA = 45.   A mag 16 star is just off the south edge

NGC 1721 trio  (04 59 22.9  -11 07 18)

22” f/4 (230 and 383x) –  Compact bright trio of NGC galaxies.

NGC 1721  (2.5 x 1.6’  13.1) – Considerably bright 2:1 elongated glow with a much brighter round center.  Diffuse edges.  1.2 x 0.5’ and PA = 135.  A mag 14.4 star lies 0.9’ ENE from core.  Two mag 15 stars; 0.4’ SW and 0.7’ S from the core.

NGC 1725  (1.9 x 1.2’  13.1) – Considerably bright glow with a gradually brighter round center.  Defined edges.  0.6’ across

NGC 1728  (2.0 x 0.4’  13.7) – Considerably bright 3:1 elongated glow with a gradually brighter center.  PA = 0 and 1.1’ long.  A mag 13 star is on the south tip.

UGC 3532 trio – KTG 12 (06 46 13.3  +43 49 28)

22” f/4 (230 and 383x) –   Triangle of galaxies is a very star rich field.

UGC 3532  (1.4 x 0.5’  15.0p) – Considerably faint 2:1 even surface brightness  glow.  Defined edges.0.3’ long and PA = 90. 

UGC 3535  (1.2 x 0.8’  14.5p) – Considerably faint round even surface brightness glow with defined edges.  0.2’ across.  A mag 11.9 star lies 1.5 due north.

CGCG 204-13  (0.4 x 0.2’  15.9) – Very faint, very small round even surface brightness glow.   0.1 across

UGC 3615 trio  (06 58 10.4  +35 47 15)

22” f/4 (230 and 383x) –  Three galaxies in a star rich region

UGC 3615  (1.4 x 0.2’  15.3p) – Very faint 3:1 even surface brightness glow with very defined edges.  0.4’ long and PA = 30

CGCG 176-3  (1.0 x 0.7’  14.7) – Considerably faint round even surface brightness glow with diffuse edges  0.3’ across.  A mag 11.5 star lies 0.9’ NNE.

MAC 0658+3545  (0.5 x 0.3’  16.0) – Extremely faint soft very low surface brightness round glow.  Very diffuse.  About 0.1’ across.  A mag 14.5 star just off east edge, about 0.2’ away.