Esprit150 – IMT3b Observatory

Viewing Report 20th July 2026

23:11 – 03:03

So opened the dome to cool down however there was cloud early evening and it took int 11pm to clear. I was due to image M107 however I found out that the new setup has a much shorter mount than my previous ME II and therefore the scope cannot see the object due to being obscured by the bottom of the dome. So I will have to image the objects below 30 degrees South with the mobile 100 Esprit setup. So for now I have decided to go after M102 which is a galaxy in Draco to the North West and much higher, Albeit a small galaxy for my 6” scope.

I have a problem with the dome rotation which means I either get dome runaway or the dome slips and does not move. I need to revisit the tension on the dome motor and subsequent rollers to see if I can fix this. Meanwhile I managed to grab 45 x 300s on M102.

Viewing Report 17th July 2026

22:33 – 03:00

Once again I will be using the Esprit 150 this evening. The sky is very milky so there may be some cloud around. M29 is the next Messier on my list to go after, I took a single shot some 4 or so years ago with the 12″ but only a single 2min tester. I will use 120s tonight and attempt to capture 4 hours of data.

Viewing Report 16th July 2026

23:00 – 03:33

After a day out it is unexpectedly clear. So after being notified as such from some friends at Basingstoke Astronomical Society, I opened the dome and uncovered the 22″.

I set the 150 Esprit in the dome running on M57 again to grab some more data as the night before. I do like to have at least 4 hours on each object now.

I then started cooling down the 22″ for the specific purpose of viewing Saturn at around 2:30am.

At 2:30am I started viewing Saturn.

I needed to move the scope back away from its usual place away from the Workshop as Saturn was behind the roof. I used the 31mm Nagler to start with, Saturn was fairly small but crisp in the FoV. I then swapped to the 13mm Ethos, refocused and Saturn appeared much larger, however the detail came and went with the seeing. Saturn was pretty low at this point, only 23º above the horizon. The rings were clear and obvious, the Cassini division easily seen between the A and B rings. I could not make out any surface detail. I spent about 20mins observing with my observing chair which was very pleasant on this summers night at 14º.

I finally looked at Neptune at 3:20am. I star hoped from Omega Pisces down towards Neptune.

I could just make out Omega Pisces in the night sky due to the approaching dawn. Neptune was extremely small but an obvious planet rather than a star.

Finally here is a crop of M57 and the galaxy IC 1296

Viewing Report 15th July 2026

22:40 – 02:20

This evening I have chosen another Messier object as I try to completed my list. M57. The Ring nebula is very small and as such appears small in the Espirt. I did want to get this with the 12” before I sold it but never got around to taking a great photo. Instead I will image with the 6” and zoom in.

The Seestar is also out, this time I have removed the tripod and thus it allowed me to perform a mosaic of the Milky Way. It is not immediately or at all obvious how to decide which bit of the Milky Way to mosaic, however I will go off and find a YouTube view. Meanwhile I have started the mosaic based on a random placement of it. I found the outcome to underwhelming to say the least. The total exposure for each frame in the mosaic was 10s of seconds and I could not seem to find a way to increase the total exposure or frame count.

Viewing Report 14th July 2026

22:00 – 03:00

Tonight I have the 150 Esprit in operation and the Seestar S30 Pro. I am imaging M56 again with the Esprit to gather an additional 1.5 hours of data.

On the S30 Pro I started with a Milky Way shot, It was meant to be the mosaic, however the scope was on the wedge and the mosaic only works when not using the wedge. So instead I went for a single image. Clearly seen is the cloud in the distance.

Once this was completed I went to image the Lobster but landed up on the Bubble instead. So I imaged that until 3am at the end of darkness as it is.

Viewing Report 12th July 2026

22:00 – 03:24

Tonight was about using both the 150 Esprit from the observatory and the Sky-Watcher 180 Mak outside. I setup before darkness fell and then proceeded to send the 150 Esprit to image M56, one of the Messier objects I had still not imaged. I decided on 120s exposures and in the end took 90 of them, with a handful or so having to deleted due to movement issues, probably when I stood next to the pier.

The dome would not rotate at sidereal tonight. Every time I set it to 1x sidereal it would after a while run away and just keep turning. This meant I had to manually move the dome every 15mins or so during imaging.

With the Sky-Watcher 180 Mak I imaged Saturn. This time I caught it before 3am, but I also managed to work out how to use the ADC and apply colour channel shift before saving the image.

Whilst I had a lot of frames and the colour shift is much better than the other night, the seeing was not as good tonight. The Jet stream is still out of the way, however the air was very turbulent, thus the gap in the ring cannot be seen as well tonight.

Viewing Report 24th June 2026

22:50 – 03:05

I setup with the 150 Esprit in the dome and both the Seestar S30 Pro and the S50.

I set about using the S30 Pro to capture M16 and M17 in a single frame. This was really my first time using the smart scope in earnest.

Meanwhile I setup the 150 Esprit to capture M13.

I stayed with this until the light started to increase and then went to bed. The final unprocessed image straight from the S30 Pro is below.

Once I had processed using PixInsight from the S30 Pro it looked so much better.

On the S50 I took some data on IC 1284.

S50 stacked image of IC 1284 processed in PI

Viewing Report 9th June 2026

11pm – 01:53

I opened the dome tonight and looked to image something with the Esprit 150. I quickly found a Lynds Dark Nebula in the Milky Way just rising, LDN 621

This was particularly low down when I started imaging at 23º altitude. The sky was still rather bright as we were approaching the Summer Solstice in the Northern Hemisphere on 21st June. There is definitely some interesting structure within this part of the sky, I will surely revisit once astronomical darkness returns and the altitude is higher.