Observations of The Small Magellanic Cloud (SMC)

Kron 28

Andrew Murrell

The definitive "Murrell object" discovered on photographic plates taken by Harvard's "ADH" Baker-Schmidt telescope in South Africa, in 1956.

This is a small cluster about 1½-arc minutes in diameter with a regular round shape. There is no central condensation so the cluster has a very even surface brightness. No stars are resolved in or around the cluster except for a 10.5 magnitude star that lie right on the western edge of the cluster. The difficult part about observing this cluster is it's extremely low surface brightness, estimated to be about 15th magnitude. I would only recommend this object to observers using 16 inch and larger scopes from a very good sky as good contrast is definitely required. The Matti Morels charts show the bright star on the edge of the cluster as being variable. I have yet, been able to detect the variability of this star, but perhaps some of the people in the society who are interested in variable stars may be able to shed some light.

Max Gardner

Observed with an 18" ƒ/4.5 NGT. The cluster appeared as an oval haze that just starts to show resolution.