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Narrowband

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All comming together :)

At last, without a doubt, all is comming together, the dome works well, rain yesterday failed to penetrate, the new layout of the OTAs worked well allowing me to see the same view through all three OTAs. The only problem I have is Ascom, installed it yesterday with the hope of using the laptop for guiding but it failed and I had to remove it, not the first time this has happened. I am looking at getting a guiding setup but have been looking at direct guide rather then from laptop because of th

The Sailor

The Sailor

The Last Few Days :)

What a week it's been, from being deluged with rain to wall to wall sun, I took every opportunity to get work done on the obsy and whatever was required in the garden. During the week I realised that after one night out the obsy needed to be sorted to make more room, this was done the next day I now have a much easier time. The nights have been kind and I have spent every clear night out and have relearnt how to use my cameras, plenty of photos taken but few have made it into an album, being fun

The Sailor

The Sailor

At Last!!

At last, the observatory is almost finished, the only thing to do is reroute all the cables but that will have to wait till clear weather appears again. With the sun out today it was all go and ended with the mount and telescopes back in place, tonight is clear so will be out to see if all works. I was going to get the roof fibreglassed but the weather held this up too much so went and replaced all the wood and waterproofed it, will be interesting to see if all has worked by tomorrow evening whe

The Sailor

The Sailor

Disasters all round :(

Try to get back into observing has not been easy, disasters all round. After setting up the equipment in the observatory I turned my attention to all the flight cases of gear I had not opened in almost a year. Silly me had left a number of items with batteries installed and these had leaked, so the last few weeks have been a recovery effort and that is going well but the worst part was not the cases but the observatory. I don't know what has happened but I have more rain inside than outside,

The Sailor

The Sailor

The Return

Almost nine months has passed since I was last on here, falling down the stairs and breaking my replacement knee put me in hospital. The knee was not so much the problem as what else they found at the hospital, heart, kidney and postrate problems all came along at the same time and I also picked up an infection from the hospital!! So, all in all I was in and out of the place and not expecting to get back to sky watching again, but here I am :hello2: and a lot to learn all over again :). Befo

The Sailor

The Sailor

Sun 26th Jun 11

The last couple of weeks I have been going to the obsy each morning, opening up and switching everything on. A twofold operation, one is to check that noting is amiss as far as security is concerned and two is to get the equipment working. I leave it then till the evening in the hope of clear skies but till now it has only been a couple of night with clear skies. Sunday looked to be one of the best nights, clear skies all round, the afternoon brought a change, a sea mist was rolling up from t

The Sailor

The Sailor

Sun 19th Jun 11

Night started well, a little cloud drifting east so decided to get out and play. Opened the obsy at 2330 hrs and got all ready, done my first star align and lo and behold, the sky filled with clouds. Abandoning the alignment I decided that whatever star was available I would use that as a guide star and play with the webcamss to see how tracking was holding. Using both the Meade LPI and the modded SPC900NC I spent the next hour hopping from gap to gap and checking all types of configurations, al

The Sailor

The Sailor

Fri 10th Jun 11

Been a week since I wrote and it has been a busy one, decided to get myself a replacement laptop for the obsy, the orignal was falling over, steam driven!! I decided to get a secondhand one, same type as I am on now, knew it worked all the gear in the obsy so got it nice and cheap on fleabay. Just spent the last few days getting everything working, two mounts, cameras, webcams and extra monitor. So far all is well, remoting from the house went well but something I will keep to a minumum as I

The Sailor

The Sailor

Fri 3rd Jun 11

What a night, just hope I don't have another like it, if I did not bump into the eyepiece I bumped into the balance weights. At one time I knocked myself so silly I thought about packing it in for the night. Don't know what was going on, know I am getting on but I seemed to act like a bull in a chinashop all the time, no damage to the gear but my head feels like I have done ten rounds in the ring, maybe I should get myself a hard hat!!! I seen some people have been complaining about the how litt

The Sailor

The Sailor

Thu 2nd Jun 11

A lovely clear day, opened the obsy and decided as there were some sunspots I would see what I could do. The sunspots and a blemish :( came out well, they are as follows, 1225,26,27,28 29 and 1231. Jim

The Sailor

The Sailor

Tue 31st May 11

With a large cloud covering comming from the west I went out last night expecting just an hour or two of gazing, well had to stop after five hours of it, bed was beckoning my tired old bones :). A wonderful night, a bit of cloud which did not affect seeing so it was wonderful to sweep the skies. Found a couple more messiers, each time I used them as a focal point and took in the area round them. Tried out the CV-M50 camera, was good, gave good definition on stars but was not able to use it on

The Sailor

The Sailor

Sat 28th May 11

My experimentation continues, now that I have the mobile power sorted I decided to get another project I had on the backburner up and running. I seen a camera on eBay last year, a bargin at £20, it is a JAI CV-M50, a mono 1/2" CCD, been lying around since then, had tested it and knew it worked. The only problem I had with it was the power cable, well yesterday I got someone to fix a power/video cable to the plug and tested it with the power pack this morning, a fantastic bit of kit. To see what

The Sailor

The Sailor

Fri 27th May 11

With little clear sky the last few nights my thoughts turned to portable power. Although I have been using 12v in the observatory it was a fixed option but now I have decided to use my CG-5GT as a Grab n Go it will need power. I bought a power pack off eBay and modified it by taking the compresser attachment off the back, this allowed it to fit perfectly into a flight case. I had a load of electrical pieces from my sailing days so these have been installed and tested okay. Last night I done a te

The Sailor

The Sailor

Tue 24th May 11

Came out this evening, a nice clear sky and next to no wind, a big difference from last night :). Thanks to Astroboot I was able to get my guider attached with the rings during the day and after an alignment I was able to calibrate everything. After a good look round the sky I attached the guide cam, a Meade LPI and checked if the work I had do so far was okay. I sent the mount to Vega, spot on in the eyepiece, turning round it was with satisfaction I seen Vega on the cam screen on the laptop, g

The Sailor

The Sailor

Sat 21th May 11

Spent the day playing about in the obsy and garden, worked on the composting in the garden :D, and in the obsy I worked on what to do with my spare mount. Was not able to sell it so I have decided to use it in two ways, the head will be used in the obsy with a camera on it, already tested and both mounts work together in Stellarium at the same time :). The other use will be as a Grab n Go, bought a 12v pack for this at knockdown price so happy there. It's been a clear sky today so looking forwar

The Sailor

The Sailor

Fri 20th May 11

Setup just after dusk and alignment went well, up to now have added two more Messiers to the list. Been quite an enjoyable night so far, no wind and the temp is nice, the clouds that threathened earlier never got to me so been clear so far :). At the moment I am using the refractor for the Messiers and the SCT for wandering around, just looking and taking it all in, no cameras or webcams, plenty of time later. Right, coffee break over, back out :). Well I got just under another two hours out of

The Sailor

The Sailor

Sat 14th May 11

Over the last few months I have found that Stellarium has been so power hungry that I could not get any other programme to work on the obsy laptop whilst it was running, one of the reasons which I did not do much remoting. This week I decided to reinstall XP and see if I could change anything, but no, still the same. After a bit of thought I decided to see if I could run the hub direct from the house, installing the wi-fi on the laptop gave me a spare cable, so putting USB boosters on the cable

The Sailor

The Sailor

Thu 12th May 11

The night started out with rain in the air but turned out okay and so opened up and aligned. It was great to have the 2" barlow, thank you Sy, was a great purchase, the Messiers were wonderful to see and wandering round the sky was a dream. Cloud cover beat me in the end and ended the night on a good note.

The Sailor

The Sailor

Tue 10th May 11

Been a good day, after making the new solar filter for the Evostar 80 left the mount on solar tracking for the rest of the day, all went well and then closed down for the evening. The local club is having a lecture, off to that and if the clouds stay away will return to the fight :). The night is warm, no breeze so will be staying out as long as possible. Have been going through a list of targets, all Messiers and all going well. With the night as it is I have decided to stay up and hopefully ge

The Sailor

The Sailor

Viewing - Thu 05th May 11

Decided to check out my Grab n Go gear and done some sun spotting. This is the first time for using it and it proved simple to setup, no leccy or any cables, just plonked it on the ground and a manual search for the sun. Turned out well for it's simplicity, a Meade Telestar RB60 on an EQ3, end shield off and a solar filter on, only problem is keeping track of the sun, no nipping indoors for a cuppa :) so SWMBO done the catering :). Just looking at the cloud cover on the net, doubt if there wil

The Sailor

The Sailor

Viewing - Tue 03th May 11

Not so much gazing at the sky last night, spent most of the time gazing at the handset!! With the wind playing about the last week I spent the time fixing all the cables in the obsy, bundling them neatly and moving them so not in the way during observing. Well whatever I done had a disasterous effect on last nights viewing. Each time I got align done for some reason I lost power to the handset, there was a loose connection and this caused restets. The serial connection seems to be the culprit at

The Sailor

The Sailor

Viewing - Sun 24th Apr 11

Did not get out last night, too tired after a day with the outlaws, also old bones are giving out :( . Today I decided, a lovely day, done a bit of solar, just a couple of shots and a bit of play with them, here is what I am keeping: Will now keep myself in readiness for this evening, hoping for a clear night :). The evening went well, of course the ISS was part of it, nice and bright, tried to photograph it but a complete failure, too fast on the shutter. I have now put a warning label at the

The Sailor

The Sailor

Viewing - Fri 22th Apr 11

The evening started with a rerun of the previous night, an alignment from the idiots guide. I decided on this course of action to see what was going wrong, needless to say it was again a disaster and by 2330 hrs I decided to return to the old way of point, polar align and 3 star align, straight away I seen results in the handling. I put Saturn in the frame and left it for 30 min and it was still there when I came back. During the day I had a play with a remote timer and had set it up for the eve

The Sailor

The Sailor

Viewing - Thu 21th Apr 11

Last night was a complete disaster, for some reason I decided to follow the instructions in the idiots guide regarding polar alignment, from that moment on it all went to pot. Not one target was achieved within the finder let alone the eyepiece, and to make matters worse light pollution was horrendous. Although I took some photos I am not holding out too much on them being any good :(. I accept that this is all part of package, good nights and bad nights but will plow on and hope to achieve

The Sailor

The Sailor

Viewing - Wed 20th Apr 11

A lovely day today and was looking forward to tonight but just remembered that we have a group talk at the local library, so have closed the obsy for the moment and will get back to it later :) Well got home from the local group meet and got straight down to stargazing. Had worked out the problem with the camera attached to the refracter earlier so went straight into checking if all was well. Aligned and then set the camera up, got focused and with a list of messiers I set off, a 60 sec shot of

The Sailor

The Sailor

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