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Astronomik Profi UHC first impression, Bertold Fuchs, 10.09.2000, taken
from www.astronomie.de
" Hello Night- Owls !
The Wetter finally cleared up and if even it is possible to read the manual
without an extra light on the terrace - the UHC filter has arrived and is
waiting in his white little plastic box to be tested.
The city shines bright. Stars more faint than 4mag are not to be seen without
any helping equipment (moonlight). The Sky is clear and the air is a bit
moist. Position 50.08N 8.028O.
The filter lies heavy in the hand - almost like a slice of metal and reflects
the incident light. When I hold it against the window, everything appears
blue- green through the filter. When I hold it slanting, it turns loud violet,
more tilt it looses the unusual colours. The filter is easily screwed into
LV- Eyepieces.
Well, to the telescope! I watch with a 7"- Mak- Newton. At first M57 (ring
nebula in the Lyra). The known diffuse little ring (flying Doughnut) is without
UHC with 262x wonderful big. With UHC much more clear ! (Think of the bright
sky and the lights from the city.) M57 did not turn much darker - but what
a contrast !!! The whole in the middle is black, M57 falls apart in a double
ring structure- using averted vision the structures are a bit visible. I
have never seen M57 like that! I regret the bright sky. But wait- new moon
can come! Stars close to M57 stay nicely sharp and help to focus. Next object
is of a totally different kind epsilon lyrae: Without UHC it is possible
to distinguish E1 and E2 from 126times on - with UHC already with 87,5times,
because there are no diffraction rings and stars are shown very sharp and
point shaped! So the UHC filter also does a good job at double stars. Last
try with Saturn: Without UHC one can see very good the Cassini division of
the known main belts and the three little Moons (where was Titan?). With
UHC- terrible! A blue- green faded Saturn without Cassini division and without
the band of cloud! I do not know what I expected - I just tried it…
So nothing for planets!If I had thought about it, it would have been clear
- what should a OIII and H beta, H alpha- filter do to a planet ??
Result: A super thing the Astronomik UHC - now I am going to chase deep-
sky- objects.
Clear skies!
Berthold"
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Subject: Re: UHC- Lumicon/ Astronomik, N.N., 2001, taken from
www.astronomie.de
"Hi Norbert !
I can only - as I said- tell my impression, because I have no comparison
to Lumicon and OIII- filters. I observed M57,M27 and of course the Orion
nebula. You get the best result with a large aperture (unfortunately), because
the UHC takes away of course some light of the planetary nebula, you want
to observe. Observers with not obstructed optics below 3 inch could be a
bit disappointed, that the object they want to see turns out to be very dark.
With optics above 6 inch it will give you a kick in the head: M57 as a double
ring - very plastic before a black background even with tiny razor-sharp
stars to focus. Dumbbell nebula with perfect ears like in a textbook (only
without colour - of course!). And the Orion nebula with veeeeeery finest
filaments, black bays, wings with stars in storage, filigree works of art,
that put your eyes under water! Further I use the filter a bit unusually
and misappropriated to separate double stars, because it reduces the image
of the star down to a tiny fine spot. Galaxies send light in the whole spectral
range - do not get better - get even worse. But, contact a amateur astronomer
nearby and have a look through a UHC (one with >8 inch Dobs) at M57 -
then decide on your own.
Clear Skies!"
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Subject: Don't let others make you tame: UHC Lumicon or Astronomik?,
Randolf, 2001, taken from
www.astronomie.de
"I compared my old Lumicon (about 4 years old) directly with a relative
new ( 1 year??) Astronomik UHC and thought that the Lumicon was so bad, that
I sold it last week for a few D-Mark. Sorry, but can not find anything positive
at this American thing:
With the Atronomik, the stars focus to little spots, the Lumicon hindered
sharp pictures of stars… it was hard to focus, the focus changes due
to the extra way through the glass…
The Astronomik- filter is much brighter, I think because of the high
transmission.
The Astronomik has more contrast, somehow e.g. M17 or M27 or M57 are much
clearer in the comparison. This could be because of the soft, sensitive coat
of the Lumicon, that was obviously damaged during the years, because of cleaning
some fingerprints off… noticed in all scopes: 93mm refractor, 150mm
Newton, 10 inch Newton… (the "german" is much more easy- care..) The
Astronomik- thread fits in more… no problems at all my oculars…Yes!!
That's my opinion and my experience concerning this subject. That's it.
Randolf"
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First Light UHC, Michael Leckel, 10.09.200, taken from
www.astronomie.de
"Hello,
in the little package with the UHC must have been nice weather with a certain
delaying effect inside, because right at the weekend a deep blue sky spread
out over the corner of Germany where I live. The only existing clouds sat
over the cooling towers of the near nuclear power plant.
The first half of the night I pottered about a bit aimless in my garden.
About one o'clock, I left to my usual little place in the Odenwald at the
edge of the plain of the Rhine, taking the 30x77 Miyauchi and the 12,5" Heavily-
Modified- formerly- Discovery- Dobs with me.
After I had arrived and had packed out and put up the whole stuff, the old
light polluter also disappeared right on time behind the next hill and half
an hour later the Milky Way was visible in her full richness over my head.
I have to admit, that I spent 15 Minutes with annoying magnitude- measuring,
but it was surely for this place an optimal night. In the east and the south-
east, also in the zenith it was only 6mag, only in the south- west and in
the west one was a bit disturbed by the light globes of the conurbations
of the Rhine- Neckar- Area.
Due to the UHC I took at first a look at M57 and M27, both already a bit
in the light polluted (and because of the moon still additional slightly
brightened) area of the sky. The filter had no specific effect at the ring
nebula, but even more at the dumbbell nebula. Where one could see a light
grey faded spot on a dark grey background before, the object became very
good visible, like I know it without filter under optimal conditions: In
the typical shape with the still visible outer parts or rather
"ears".
But right on with the objects in Cygnus. Until now I have had no real
success at catching the cirrus nebula. After searching a bit around, I could
see clearly the eastern part (NGC 6992) already in the 10x40, but even now,
with the Dobs and the 31mm Nagler everything remained a shapeless and - forgive
me the term- "sausage- shaped" thing. Also right next to 52 Cygni one could
see something without the filters, that suspiciously looked like a nebula
(it would have been just enough to mark the object as "seen" in the Karkoschka).
So I screwed the UHC onto the 26mm Meade (even if that - concerning the contour
sharpness- usually makes no fun with the Dobs) und took a look through it:
WOW! The formerly compact "sausage" (NGC 6992) dissolved into fine nebula
fibres, that wanted to be covered in detail. And the suspicious something
right next to 52 Cyg produced a effect of reunion, because it looked exactly
like on the common pictures (surely everyone knows this common picture with
the bright star in the foreground and the nebula stripe, that drifts along).
Also between the two main parts one could see a lot of "Cirrus" (intellectuals
would say: "Pickering´s Triangular Wisp"), but the Plössl with
its for the object too high magnification and the comparatively small FOV
was not the ideal solution.
It can be true that here an OIII- filter would have got out more, but after
this sight for me the acquisition of the 2"- version of the UHC sooner or
later a definite thing. The filter makes in this case the difference between
an object one can mark as "seen" and a region, that one can look at for many
hours with different enlargements.
Next was the North America- nebula: The filter effected also here a lot,
but due to the Plössl one could differentiate just between a "region
with a nebula" and a "region without a nebula". The whole nebula became no
"face". The impression was much less impressive than the net like structures
in the cirrus nebula. I think, that the best impression would be under absolute
dark sky with a pair of binoculars and even then one is miles away from
photography, because the hazy shine of the emission nebula contrasts not
impressive enough to the also shining Milky Way in this area.
Towards morning the rosette nebula has risen enough, to examine him with
and without filter. And also here this little piece made the difference between
a "rosette open cluster" (how I saw it since now in the Alps with a 6- inch)
and one of the showpieces of the winter sky. Also here the wish of the 2"-version
came up.
Bottom line to the UHC: Notice that I nor know the OIII- filter neither do
I know the products of other manufactures. Because of that, this what I write
here, should not be seen as an comparative test, only as an progress report,
how it worked with an until now "naked viewer" with using the filters. That,
what I saw yesterday, was quite impressive. Objects, that are hard to find
or rather that, if one finally found them, look like nothing, become with
the filter really interesting - see cirrus nebula. At wide spread planetary
nebula (example M27) the UHC can selective keep down the background brightness
and help the display. The Object is although without the filters equally
good or rather quite better, if one has the luck to observe under a really
dark sky. At comparatively little PNs (ring nebula, Cat's Eye nebula, Saturn
nebula) it is because of the high surface brightness possible to magnify
so much, that the nebula is clearly also without the filter. Here one does
not necessarily need the UHC. At other nebulas (Orion nebula, NGC 1931 in
Aur) the UHC does not work because of its selectivity or it even harms -
is not an "all- purpose solution". But I would suggest rather the UHC instead
of the purchase of the tenth ocular in line.
Of course there was much more to observe until five o'clock in the morning,
but I do not know, how much space I have to write, so I will take it short.
Only one more "tasty titbit": After the sky has really reached his maximum
at about four o'clock in the morning, I took a closer look - more just for
fun - at an usually rather boring "standard object", M33. I was pretty much
surprised, as I saw, not as usually a spread out faint spot, separate the
galaxy - similar to the picture in the "night Observers´ Guide" - began
to take shape and one could just make out the spiral structure with singular
HII- areas (specially to mention NGC 604) ! (Of course without using the
filter, not to give any misunderstanding an occasion.) After that, slewing
quickly to M31 and also this well- known object showed up like it never did
before: With a directly visible dust band , bright shining central region
and such a wide spread out, that even in the Miyauchi the edges were cut
off at both ends. So it was surely one of the best nights of the year and
so the UHC had best start conditions.
So far for a satisfaction of a general thirst for knowledge, apart from that,
I'll be working on it in the next days and will complete every other seen
objects (M1, M35, M74, M77, NGC 281, NGC 404, NGC 891, NGC 1535, NGC 1647,
NGC 2174, NGC 2301, IC 1396 and of course Jupiter and Saturn) and put them
on my homepage (link will follow). By the way, to my statement in the section
"telescopes for beginners": All objects with a Telrad, without any "forbidden
help" searched and found ;-).
Clear skies, Michael"
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