Last new moon, I tried to observe WDHS 1 (Weinberger, Dengel, Hartl, Sabaddin 1) or WeDe 1 in Orion, one of the largest known PNe (22'). This is a tough object and I had tried to observe it before with negative results. Coordinates are 05 59 24 +10 41 40, size is 22'x17'

Here is a DSS image of the PN
WDHS-1.jpg

Here is an inverted image


After some time at the eyepiece of my 22" with 7mm exit pupil and OIII (the red color is mostly NII), I suspected an extremely slight brightening at the location of the PN. At the nortern edge, the faint glow appeared round, though there is one of these deceiving star chains that make you believe everything :-). I would have thought that this is mostly averted imagination, but the southern edge appeared to be straight at times, like an oval with a cut off end. The other day, I looked at a recent image by Stephane Zoll, that showed a somewhat similar structure.

Andru, a co-observer, was quite unconvinced of seeing anything at the location, so I am quite uncertain about this observation. From my memory, I would put it in the same ball park as PuWe 1, maybe a tad more difficult (skies were about 6m5 this night and a bit better when I observed PuWe1).

Has anybody of you observed or tried to observe this large PN? Maybe someone can even compare it to one of the other large PNe?