Hard way to add an addition to the house!!!

WOW What an image, Ballard!!! It does help to have buku millimeters in the scope! Nice equipment, too. RFB

thank you for the advice I know i need more subs, but time was not on my side. RFB

thanks all

I have a history of this particular target. Many years ago when I was about 12 years old, I saw a black and white astrophotograph of this image in a local library. This image at that time was named Madonna and Child instead of the current Cone Nebula. I was so enthralled with this image that it was the impetus for my love of Astronomy. As I have stated, I have an obsession for this target and I finally got it. It could be better and I am all ears to better the image quality, but not with expensive post-processing software that the learning curves are almost vertical. Lets keep it simple and away from Pixinsight or Photoshop. I have Gimp and Lightroom to play with. Now the geeky stuff:
Mount - Ioptron CEM 40
Camera - ZWO 071 MC Pro Cooled Color camera
Guide camera - ZWO 120 MC using a 9 x 50 mm guide scope
Main scope - Ioptron 8 inch RC reflector
26 exposures at 6 minute duration.
Stacked in DSS with no calibration images
All this was controlled by a ASIAIR Plus Little Red Box (highly recommended).

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Thanks, Ballard. Looking at your astro results and how good they are makes me feel good having a compliment like yours.

I was finally able to image Thor's Helmet Nebula last Saturday in the local desert between Las Vegas and Pahrump. We call it our undisclosed location. It's at about Bortle 3 to 4 and cold!!! 30°F cold. I was able to obtain 36 five minute exposures with a meridian flip about an hour into the run. I used an ASIAIR Plus for all the control functions from PA to plate solving, meridian flip to actual imagining. I highly endorse this red box. Now for the geeky things: Mount - Ioptron CEM 40 mount, OTA - 8 inch Ioptron Richey-Chretien f8 scope, a ZWO 071 MC Pro APS-C cooled camera and the ASIAIR Plus red box. I also used a ZWO dual narrow band filter with the camera.

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Good thing considering the Beetlejuice's surface would be out to, at least, the orbit of the asteroid belt!

Too bad this locomotive is in such sad shape. It will never be able to move on its own without the connecting rods attached to the driving cylinder. Canadian National locomotive Hudson Type.

I am using a CEM40 mount by Ioptron, an 8 inch RC reflector telescope and a ZWO 071 APS-C color camera. I took the bubble nebula using the mount without any guiding. I took 20 exposures for 300 seconds each. I used the ASI Studio for data gathering. I stacked the twenty imaged with Deep Sky Stacker and post-processed them in Gimp. The Salt and Pepper star cluster was done the same way except only 14 images at 180 seconds. I was running out of time and freezing my you know what off. They say that Las Vegas is in the desert, but few know that it gets very cold out there especially at the higher altitudes. In the Mojave Preserve, I observed temps down to 17° F at night. RFB

HAve you ever reached a point when you just want to put all your equipment up onto Ebay and go back to sewing? I was almost to this point last night. Very frustrating, too. I leveled and PA my mount. I set up my IPolar and found the NCP. So far, so good. Well, this is where the bovine excrement strikes the air handler! I tried the two star alignment and wound up about 5° off bubble. I could not get it to play fair. So I went back to completely restart my PA with the three position setting. After the movements, my cross is now in the center of the screen and I was able to find my two star alignment and Jupiter. Well, with this new-found ability, it is off to my selected target: the Bubble Nebula. It came in perfectly and, as a bonus, I was also able to image the Salt and Pepper Star Cluster. I am really pleased with the results. Just look->

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You got the double cluster in Perseus, too. Close to the double cluster is the Heart and Soul Nebula, but it is tough to see without longer exposures and a relatively high ISO.

Yes you did: 302 Chevy Z 28

A point should be considered; the exoplanets are viewed by the stars they are orbiting. We depend on the light from these stare to analyze the composition of these exoplanets' atmospheres. However, there is no magnetometer sensitive enough to measure a magnetic field. Besides, in order to measure a magnetic field, one must negate the present field. Its like taring an empty container in order to weigh the contents of material contained within. Just my thought. Exoplanetologists have many tools in their tool bag, but measuring a planet's magnetic field at that distance just does not exist and may never. RFB

What awes me is the the lava flow stops right at the road! Amazing!!!