Planetary Parade the morning of 5 June

[glend (Glen)]

For those who may not know, there is a significant planetary parade happening in the pre-dawn eastern sky on Wednesday the 5th of June. Participants include Jupiter and Mars and a few of the minor planets as well, all accompanied by the sliver of the Moon. I will post the exact times shortly. I have purchased a new Grab and Go visual scope to try out on this event, a simple Meade Polaris 90mm f11 Achro on a manual EQ mount ( which was on sale at Bintel). I have it set up under my carport looking east, for a test tonight, to get some idea of the best EPs to use with this scope on those targets ( and I have not done much visually for years, despite having case of wonderful EPs from my years before imaging or BI.
I didn't want to use the observatory for this, and all of my heavy gear is in winter storage in the house. Besides the carport is elevated at the rear of the property, giving a better vantage point for low elevation eastern targets.


Update on times:

It begins at 4:30am with Saturn at 52 degrees Altitude in the east, all if this takes place along the Celestial equator;
Also at 4:30am you will see Neptune at 42 degrees, and Mars at 17 degrees.
From 5:30am they will be joined by the silver of the Moon, Uranus, and Jupiter and Mercury (very close together).- the brightening sky prior to sunrise may mess up the view but Jupiter should still shine bright.

Of course viewing Uranus, Neptune may require some significant aperture so not everyone may see them. Have fun.

All times From Sky Safari.

[croweater (Richard)]

Hi Glen. Thanks for the heads up. I may try and drag myself out of bed with my little heritage 130(which is actually very good optically). I saw the Meade polaris at Bintel. I think it's f10? Looks a very good deal at $299 down from $499. Had a look on CloudyNights and it gets very decent reviews so I think you're on a winner there. Interested to see how your test goes. Have fun mate,
Cheers, Richard

[glend (Glen)]

So i have just been out looking at how much darkness is available at 5:30 am and am happy to report that the final rising of Jupiter and Mercury should be visible next Wednesday morning. Of course local weather may impact your views, but darkness will not be an issue, and days continue to get shorter in the lead up to 21 June.
I could easily see Saturn and Mars with my naked eye observation, pretty much where they are expected to be next week.

After testing last night with my new grab and go refractor for this event, I am reminded of just how time consuming fiddling around with a manual EQ mount can be, so I am switchng to Plan B and I will be going with my observatory CGX mount, which offers exact Goto aiming and tracking (I have been spoilt by years of taking that for granted). I did get to put first light through the Meade 90mm f11 refractor and it performed well on the double star tests I conducted, with minimal CA evident. So i will stick with that scope for the planetary parade.

[refractordude]

Glend


thanks much

[glend (Glen)]

Bumping this up, as it's happening tomorrow morning, pre-dawn.
The weather looks doubtful for me, but fingers crossed.

[glend (Glen)]

I hope everyone is enjoying the Planetary Parade happening right now. Alas the thin cloud to the east is filtering my view, but at least I can tell it's happening.