SK Astro
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Stephen Kirk

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Galaxies

Abell 2151 – The Hercules Cluster

LRGB Abell2151

Abell 2151 is a cluster of galaxies about 500 million light years away in the constellation of Hercules. There are a total of about 300-400 galaxies in this image. I am especially interested in these remote galaxy clusters and it is sobering to think how many planets and civilisations must exist amidst this vastness. Countless trillions. Abell 2151 – The Hercules Cluster Image Technical Data Technical Details Imaged from my backyard in Nottingham over four nights in late April and May 2020, during the Coronavirus lockdown. We had some superb clear skies over the UK during this period with very good visibility and seeing – highly unusual for the UK. I used my TEC 140 refactor at its native focal length of F7 and Atik 460 cooled CCD camera with Astrodon LRGB filters. The telescope was mounted on my MESU 200 mount and guided with OAG. All data is binned…

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Galaxies

Quasar 3C273 in Virgo

3C273 RGB

3C273 3C273 Annotated Not the most exciting of images but significant for what is actually shown here. Just looking at the photo on the above left, you’d be forgiven for thinking this was just an image of a star field, a boring one at that. However, this is a picture of the Quasar 3C273 in Virgo, one of the most distant objects possible for an amateur astronomer with instruments available to the average amateur to see. Light left this object two billion years ago! 3C273 is the 273rd object in the Third Cambridge University catalogue of radio objects. It was discovered as an extremely bright source of radio waves long before it was identified visually. It was the first ever quasar to be discovered in 1959. It represents an extremely active core of a very distant galaxy, so distant that we only see the core and not the outer parts…

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Telescopes

Meade 14″ ACF

Meade_TEC_SBS_Corrector

I bought the 14″ ACF SCT Optical Tube Assembly (OTA) telescope in excellent condition in April 2019 second hand. These ACF (Advanced Coma Free) SCT scopes from Meade have an excellent flat field and my intention upon purchasing this scope was to use it for lunar and planetary visual work and also for some astrophotography. Meade 14″ ACF The SCT telescopes increase in size and weight is almost exponential with their increasing aperture. This scope is VERY heavy at almost 27kg and I had it mounted side-by-side with my [also heavy] TEC140. I needed almost 40kg of weights to balance this combination. It was very close to the MESU200’s maximum weight carrying ability and caused the mount to shiver for a few moments after any physical touch of the mounted telescopes. I originally intended a three scope combination with the Meade 14″, TEC140 and my FSQ85, the latter two attached…

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Galaxies

Virgo Cluster in Wide Field Setting

Virgo in Widefield

This is the Virgo Cluster of galaxies presented in a wide field setting. The cluster is a popular area for amateur astronomers and professionals alike and contains some very important galaxies, the most important of which is M87, the supergiant elliptical galaxy and one of the largest galaxies in the local universe. You can see Markarian’s Chain demonstrated at an unfamiliar angle in this picture. The picture is comprised from data captured during late March 2020 and I used my Samyang 135mm DSLR lens connected to G2-8300 cooled CCD camera from Moravian Instruments and Astrodon RGB filters. The picture is comprised of 70 minutes (of five minute exposures binned 1×1) in each of the red, green and blue filters to give a total integration time of three hours and thirty minutes. The data was developed with PixInsight and Photoshop. The Virgo Galaxy Cluster The Virgo Galaxy Cluster Inverted The Virgo…

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