M 29

Messier 29 (also known as M 29 or NGC 6913) is an open cluster in the Cygnus constellation. It was discovered by Charles Messier in 1764, and can be seen from Earth by using binoculars.

The star cluster is situated in the highly crowded area of Milky Way near Gamma Cygni, at a distance of 7,200 (most sources including Mallas/Kreimer and Burnham, and agreeing with early estimates or R.J. Trumpler 1930) or 4,000 light years (the latter from Kenneth Glyn Jones and the Sky Catalogue 2000.0). The Night Sky Observer's Guide by Kepple and Sanner gives a deviating value of 6,000 light years – the uncertainty due to inaccurately known absorption of the cluster's light.

According to the Sky Catalog 2000, M29 is included in the Cygnus OB1 association, and approaching us at 28 km/s. Its age is estimated at 10 million years, as its five hottest stars are all giants of spectral class B0. The Night Sky Observer's Guide gives the apparent brightness of the brightest star as 8.59 visual magnitudes. The absolute magnitude may be an impressive -8.2 mag, or a luminosity of 160,000 Suns. The linear diameter was estimated at only 11 light years. Its Trumpler class is III,3,p,n (as it is associated with nebulosity), although Götz gives, differently, II,3,m, and Kepple/Sanner gives I,2,m,n. The Sky Catalogue 2000.0 lists it with 50 member stars; earlier Becvar gave only the number of 20 members.

R = 11 * 600 sec. bin1, G = 11 * 690 sec. bin1, B = 11 * 780 sec. bin1, Ha = 23 * 1800 sec. bin1.

Total exposition - 17.8 hours.

Pixinsight 1.8, Lightroom.

M 29