Here is the Constellation of Lyras big secret - a beautiful little ring planetary nebula located exactly in the middle of the constellations parallelogram shape. Overshadowed by the more famous M57, a larger and brighter object only a few degrees distant, this completely red ring nebula is a bright 12.8 magnitude, and 36 arcmins in diameter. This nebula has no common name, was discovered in 1946 and the central star has not been studied. There is a tiny little star on the ring at about 10 o'clock.

Instrument:  12.5" f/5 Home made Newtonian
Platform:  Astrophysics 1200 QMD
CCD Camera:  SBIG ST7E w/Enhanced Cooling
Exposure:  LRGB = 60:20:20:20 (Synthetic Luminance)
RGB Combine Ratio:  1: .95: 1.8
Filters:  RGB Tricolor
Location:  Payson, Arizona
Elevation:  5150 ft.
Sky:  Seeing FMHW = 2.5 arcsec, Transparency 8/10
Outside Temperature:  10 C
CCD Temperature:  -25 C
Processing:  Maxim DL, Photoshop, AIP4WIN, PW Pro.

HOME   GALAXIES     EMISSION NEBS     REFLECTION NEBS   COMETS     GLOBULARS     OPEN CLUST     PLANETARIES     LINKS