Steep

Excellent Rob, I'm glad it's been of use.

Glad it worked Greg, the eyepiece is too good to throw away.

The click comes from a tiny ball bearing on a spring in the body of the eyepiece, mine popped out and disappeared when I took it apart.

Immediately below the collar you just got off, the main body has a narrow grip round it with a bevelled edge, the bevel and the grip sections are screwed together so you have to hold each one and twist them to undo the thread. Once the bevelled piece comes free the grip section will slide down the main body revealing 3 grub screws. Loosen these and the inner workings should be free to slide out of the body.

Disclaimer - this is from memory so might not be totally accurate, take it easy and you should be fine.

On mine that sheath comes off quite easily Greg, it's just a thin aluminium (aluminum to you? ) cover basically for the inner section and isn't fixed in place at all. If you hold the main body and the sheath and rotate the two you should be able to rotate it off.

Thanks to FLO for superb service, ordered a polarscope yesterday and had it delivered this morning first thing.

That's exactly what mine was doing Moonshane, it just went against my Scottish nature to leave it there

To my mind the eyepiece was already a dead loss so even if I'd ruined it I would have been no worse off.

From what I can see in the photos, it appears that there is a component held in place by the small brass screw. If so, then this is probably a slider that locates in the helical slot. If it is removed, then the brass screw becomes the locater and the extra clearance may lead to backlash in the zoom operation.

I've been thinking about that today Peter and you're probably right, the nylon bearing/spacer/bush thing fits snugly in the helical channel, without it there is some play in the forward element set. It will do the job though until I can find something suitable to replace the damaged one.

Chris do you mean these?

Heh! only one Ed, there's a tiny ball bearing on a spring that acts as the 'click stop' I didn't refit that.

Cheers Steve and rowan that would suit me fine, Baader didn't even acknowledge me when I wrote to them about the problem.

If anyone needs to do it I can write up some instructions for a complete teardown of the ep though I most likely went about it in a cack handed way.

For those others who have experienced the same seizing of the Baader Clickstop Zoom MkIII I've managed to repair mine and it's a 'relatively' easy fix.

The fault is indeed the grease used, somehow I suspect the cold affects the grease used by the manufacturer such that it becomes more like a glue.

To access this part of the eyepiece you need first to remove whichever nose piece you're using, the narrow section you then see has a thin plastic shroud which in my case just pulled off with a bit of effort (see below), it's not fixed in place, just a snug fit. Once removed you should see a brass screw inside a nylon spacer. The spacer on mine was badly damaged probably by me trying to force the zoom ring round over time. Anyway, remove this screw and using a small screwdriver try to gently slide the inner section out through the top. This is where it gets interesting the grease on the surface of this is the cause of the seizing and it might not be easy to remove the assembly. I actually completely stripped the ep down before finding that this was where the problem lay and I found it easier to slide the assembly down the other way to remove it but try it this way first as it's a lot quicker and easier.

Once out I cleaned the surfaces with a baby wipe to get the old tacky grease off and replaced that with a very small amount of molyslip (molybdinum grease). I suspect that any light grease will do but be very sparing with it. Once cleaned and regreased the assembly slides in and out of the ep body very easily. You can see in the picture below I've replaced the screw without the spacer, it seems to work well for now and will do until I can find a suitable replacement.

I've got one of these for mine :-)

http://cpc.farnell.c...atured Products

Helen

The CPC price for that case is very good.

TS do an EQ platform for about £250 which will carry 50kg (easily a 12") I've only had a couple of chances to use mine but it makes all the difference when following a target.

Worth the twelve quid just for the box

I've had the same problem a couple of times, I sometimes forget that I've tightened the screw to keep focus and wonder why I can't adjust it again.

I've bought two packs of Haribo from Teleskop Service http://www.teleskop-express.de/shop/index.php/language/en this last month. First came with a free GSO 10" Dob and the second came with a Televue Bandmate OIII filter. On both occasions the service was superb, dispatch and delivery was fast (I chose UPS each time*) and tracked so I could see exactly where my sweeties were at all times. TS emailed to say order accepted and when dispatched the next day with the tracking numbers. Prices for the kit were very good, especially their delivery charges. Where so many UK companies insist that the Highlands are not on the mainland and so incur excess charges that can more than double the initial delivery fees, TS were incredibly reasonable at just 21.90 Euros for the two packages the Dob came in, from Germany to Inverness in 3 days.

* Only one slight reservation about UPS, delivery was very fast as I said above but I was out when the scope was delivered and the driver left it in the open garage. I'm glad in a way that he did as I was never going to fit it in the back of a Fiat Panda but still concerned that it 'might' have gone missing before I got home.

Thanks for the pictures Lenny, the straps look like the perfect solution.

I saw that as well, my ota is almost a metre round and even at 126cm there's not going to be a lot of Velcro left over to grip itself. The one(s) I've ordered are 180cm long so will probably need to be cut down, they're also 5cm wide for the best possible grip.

That's pretty much what I've ordered Steve and Lenny. I'd be a bit dubious about drilling the ota and fitting a hard handle in case the tube distorts under its own weight, I'm a lot happier with the wrap around Velcro idea.

Cheers Astrobits, it seems such an obvious thing to do I don't understand why handles are not standard on all dobs. I've ordered a set of the Velcro strap handles that I linked to above, I think they will do the job.

Spotted this, I think it or something like it would be ideal.

http://www.amazon.co.uk/TESA-Velcro-Fasteners-Carry-Strap/dp/B001BVT7ME/ref=sr_1_12?ie=UTF8&qid=1359064571&sr=8-12

Thanks for that, I don't think there's a shop like that near me. I'll have a search through the forum though in case he/she posted pics.

Has anyone successfully made a carrying handle for a mid sized Dob tube? I took delivery of my first ever Dobsonian yesterday, the ota is awkward to hold on to and I'm terrified of dropping it while transporting in and out of the house.

I'm thinking a removable strap arrangement or possible using rings permanently fitted above and below the balance point?

I like the roofing material there, gives me ideas about replacing the wooden roof on my own (it sags a but under it's own weight).