Re: Messier Marathon Object Ordering (?)

Hi Stephen,

Stephen Paul wrote:
I've printed out all the Messier objects in Telrad charts and I've fooled around with SkyTools to look at a few different ways to approach the list, including ordering by the last time the object will be visible for the night/morning, and by the optimal time to view. I'm not really sure what's the best approach. It appears to me by either ordering that a huge chunk of the list (maybe a third) is mid evening ~7:30-8:30PM, and another huge chunk (another third) is in the morning ~4:00-5:00AM, with the remaing third of the list being spattered across the remainging hours (obviously this is the most difficult part of the list time-wise).

I'd like to know how best to order the objects, so that I can get them all in one night (or possibly the morning one day, and the following night. Assume a perfect horizon.

It takes some extra effort to plan a marathon with SkyTools because a marathon differers from normal observing in that you are attempting to view deep sky objects when they aren't optimally viewed, such as in twilight or near the horizon (or both). The SkyTools planner is designed to help you *avoid* that sort of thing.

I'm also considering a marathon this year so I recently did this myself. Here's what I did:

Step 1: order the list by optimum time.

Step 2: copy all the objects that appear at the same time in the evening (when twilight ends) to a new observing list (I called mine marathon evening).

Step 3: copy all the objects that appear at the same time in the morning (when twilight begins) to a new observing list (I called mine marathon morning).

Note the copying can be done in mass via the red check mark column.

Step 4: Sort the evening list by magnitude, with the brightest first.

Step 5: Sort the morning list by magnitude, faintest first.

Step 6: Print all three lists.

When you go to observe check the main list for any objects that had optimum times in twilight. Start with those objects first as soon as you can get them.

Then observe the objects on the "evening" list quickly (the order is brightest (Pleiades) to faintest.

Follow the main list until near dawn.

As twilight approaches start in on the morning list. These are ordered faintest to brightest, the idea being to get the fainter ones prior to the onset of twilight and the remaining after twilight starts. There may also be some objects listed at moon rise depending on your date. If so, observe those on magnitude order as well along with the other morning objects.

I planned a marathon like this for the 26th and the rough ones are M74, which will be very low on the western horizon during evening twilight, and M30, which has a similar problem during morning twilight. If you can get those two you should be ok. But all this is very subject to latitude!

Clear skies,
Greg

--
Greg Crinklaw
Astronomical Software Developer
Cloudcroft, New Mexico, USA (33N, 106W, 2700m)

SkyTools: http://www.skyhound.com/cs.html
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