M13 globular cluster was the main target of my recent trip to Negev with the new small and lightweight harmonic drive mount. With some effort it's possible to spot the "propeller" feature in the resulting image. Despite few issues that I had with guiding, the result gave me perfect round stars in 100 out of 101 light frames. The RST-135E is certainly a game changer, being so lightweight makes it a perfect travel mount.
The Great Cluster in the constellation Hercules is the finest and brightest globular cluster in the Northern hemisphere. Like shiny flakes sparkling in a snow globe, over 100,000 stars whirl within the globular cluster M13. Located 25,000 light-years from Earth with an apparent magnitude of 5.8, this glittering metropolis of stars in the constellation Hercules can be spotted with a pair of binoculars most easily in July.
The English astronomer Edmond Halley, best known for recognizing the periodicity of the comet that bears his name, discovered M13 in 1714. When Charles Messier added M13 to his catalog in 1764, he was convinced that the nebulous object did not contain any stars at all. Because they are so densely packed together, the cluster’s individual stars were not resolved until 1779. Near the core of this cluster, the density of the stellar population is about a hundred times greater than the density in the neighborhood of our sun. These stars are so crowded that they can, at times, run into each other and even form a new star. The resulting “blue stragglers” appear to be younger than the other stars in their immediate vicinity and are of great scientific interest to astronomers.
Text source:
https://www.nasa.gov/
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