Time Travel Research Center

NGC 891

Andromeda - Spiral Galaxy - Magnitude 9.9

NGC 891 - The Outer Limits Galaxy

Stephen James O'Meara, in his book titled The Messier Objects, points out that this edge-on spiral galaxy in Andromeda was used in the closing of the classic television show, "The Outer Limts." Likewise, I have chosen to use the same name in reference to this excellent galaxy. Similar to NGC 4565, the other well known edge-on spiral in the northern sky, the Outer Limits Galaxy displays a dark lane of dust through the length of its edge. The center of the galaxy bulges out from underneath this lane of dust. The galaxy is rather small, just bigger than 10 arc minutes in length, not filling an eyepiece like the aforementioned NGC 4565. However, it does appear as a fine object in medium to large aperture scopes in dark skies. By the way, did you notice the smaller and similar galaxy in the upper left hand corner? That is NGC 898, a 13.84 magnitude edge-on spiral galaxy!

Location: Ballauer Observatory in Azle, Texas
Seeing: 8/10 (1.2 FWHM)
Transparency: 4/10
Date and Time: November 29, 2003 @ 11:00PM
Equipment: Tak FSQ-106 @ f/5 and Celestron CGE mount
Camera: SBIG ST-7E with CFW-8a filter wheel, standard SBIG filters
Exposure Info: LRGB image (4 x 10 min L, 3 x 5 min R, 3 x 5 min G, 4 x 5 min B) all binned 1x1
Processing Information: MaxIm (Gradient removal, dark subtract, align and combine), Photoshop 7 (Levels, Curves, Blur/sharpen, and final composite)

Exposure Notes: I've always loved this object! It's a bit small through the Tak at f/5, but I'd like to try it with the Extender-Q at f/8 or with the 10" SCT.

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