NGC 2362 - THE MEXICAN JUMPING STAR CLUSTER

CANIS MAJOR

 (ra: 07.18,8/ dec -24:57)

January 2010, Home Backyard in Buenos Aires, Argentina

DATA

TYPE: Open Cluster

Visual Brightness: 4.1

Apparent Diameter: 8 arc minutes

DISTANCE: 5000 lights years

IMAGE INFORMATION

SCOPE: Celestron C8 SCT working at f5.1

CAMERA: SXVF H9

GUIDING: William Optics Zenithstar 66 with WO 0.8 x fr/ff

IMAGE ACQUISITION: AstroArt 3.0 - Control Interface 3.72 plug in

FILTERS: Astronomik Type II - Atik Filter Wheel

SKY CONDITIONS: urban skies - transparency bad - almost full Moon

EXPOSURES: LRGB (20,20,20,20) - Maximum subs posible: 2 minutes

PROCESSING: Images Plus, CCD Sharp, Photoshop CS2

OBJECT DESCRIPTION AND IMAGE SESSION

Also known as the Tau Canis Majoris cluster, because its bright central star Tau Canis Majoris (4.39) which contains from 40 to 50 solar masses. The star is a luminous supergiant. The cluster contains about 60 stars and it is 25 millions old in age. A sweet visual target, even from urban skies, however because of its small size long focal length are required.

The night was very bright with almost full moon. (same night as NGC 2169). There should be some emission nebulosity in the background, but considering the sky conditions not much was revealed.