| Observer: | Tom Campbell |
| Location: | Iola, Kansas (Long: 95 30' W Lat: 37 55' N) |
| Equipment: | Focal 60mm Refractor |
| Eyepieces: | 22mm homemade Kellner, 6mm Ortho, 10mm Plossl |
| Time: | 10:30pm - 11:15pm CST |
| Transparency: | Clear |
| Seeing: | Mostly Stable |
| Weather: | 35F and dropping |
Last night, the sky was clear and transparent, but I was too tired to drag my telescope outside. I hate to miss opportunities such as this, but sometimes it just can't be helped.
Luckily, my skies were blessed with two clear nights in a row. While not quite as many stars were visible as the previous night, I didn't want to push my luck, and grabbed my gear.
Located just below Orion's Belt, this multiple star system is quickly becoming a favorite. At 70x, The A component was bright white, with the slightly fainter E component having a wide separation. A third component, D, was also visible, about a third of the distance from A as the E component is. D is a little fainter than E, and was difficult to detect at 32x. Perhaps because of its faintness, D appeared to have a slightly bluish tint.
Despite trying several different magnifications and eyepiece combinations, I was unable to make out the C component. Perhaps it is beyond the reach of my small telescope.
This is another interesting multiple star system. Because of its proximity to s Ori (in the same field of view at low powers), this system becomes even more beautiful. The A and B components were easily separated (approximately the same distance apart as the A and E components of s Ori). At 70x, the B and C components can be split with averted vision into two faint stars.
At 32x, most of the cluster fits into the field of view. There are literally dozens of stars visible of varying magnitudes. Near the center of the cluster is a house or home-plate shaped asterism of stars. I suppose it could be argued that this asterism is the actual beehive, with the other stars acting the part of bees swarming around it.
One of the points of this pentagon-shaped asterism is a double star and two of the other points are triple stars. One of these triples, comprising the "roof" of the house shape, is a nearly equilateral triangle.
All of the stars appeared to be white in color. Pushing up the magnification revealed even more stars, but the cluster would no longer fit within the field of view and lost some of its beauty.
The primary component of this double is bright and yellowish-gold in color. When looking at the star at low power, it makes a nice wide visual double with the bluish-colored 40 Leo. By bumping up the magnification to 70x, 40 Leo is moved out of the field of view, and the actual secondary component of the system is revealed. The B component is very close to the primary, and appears to be a faint yellow-white in color. It also appears that the second component is slightly dimmer.
While the two stars are similar in color, those colors are so intense that it still makes for a pretty sight. One of the great charms of this double is that it is like getting a present. 40 Leo is a beautiful bow, and as you increase the magnification and peel away the wrappings, the double gift is revealed.
By this time, the temperature was starting to drop quickly, and the finger I had broken a few weeks ago was starting to throb in pain with the cold weather. I took a quick peek at Jupiter, but didn't notice any real detail that I hadn't logged before. So I packed it in for the night.