dweller25

Hello, have you used that to power your Vixen GPDX ?

Sold mine to a happy SGL customer - but I always liked them 👍 There is always the SW GOTO for the EQ5 to consider…

I think you are thinking of the Tal 125 which is a refractor. The Tal 120 is a reflector 👍

For the planets a tracking mount in my opinion is essential as it allows you to watch the planet without distraction.

Great sketch and well done for being awake so early 👍 I so want to do this too but I need my sleep 😱 so will wait a bit……

It will be a little better than a Tal 1 and probably for not much money, the reports suggest they do have nice optics, so perhaps it’s worth a go ?

It may be a Loupe - a magnifying glass ?

21st May 2022 - Mars at x380 - Takahashi FC100DZ - 22:00BST I just had a look at the 4.9 arc second Martian “disk” and to my surprise kept glimpsing the north polar cap and a slightly easier Mare Acidalium just below and to the side of it. The equatorial region was clearly brighter than the pole regions. The low thin crescent Moon was a great site too - very sharp and contrasty

Actually @ollypenrice you are just as likely to win the lottery as you are to get struck by lightening twice - which would hurt, so maybe best to get a ticket asap 🤣

15th May 22:00 BST - Mars is now just 5 arc seconds in diameter but turned the Mewlon 180 onto it to see how it looked. The atmosphere was not steady but I occasionally glimpsed the North polar cap, with a darker feature to the right of it and a dark feature at the south pole - all at x380 and the disk was still small !

News travels fast 🤣

That looks to be in excellent condition Stu, the views are very, very good 😁

Even Mrs Dweller25 watches Ed Ting videos 🙂

Utterly awesome 👍

I did have to collimate my Mewlon two years ago when it arrived, the procedure is the same as an SCT - - you just use small tweaks, recenter the star and repeat until finished, once done it stays put 👍 Cooldown has been a bigger issue for me as I store the scope indoors. Initially I put a USB fan on the front spider and blew air onto the primary, that was OK but occasionally you could see little air tremors at high power - this was warm air bleeding from the mirror to the primary baffle and then into the light path. So now I have rigged up an additional fan for the baffle, this is just a 2” extension tube with a 40mm USB fan that pulls air through the baffle, cooling it and the central core of the mirror at the same time. Once fully cooled the Mewlon is almost refractor sharp with surprisingly high contrast - it is quite a sight.

If I bring the M180 out of a 20’C house temp out into a 5’C garden temp, the scope - with active cooling - takes a good hour to cool before I can do high power planetary.

Hello @Paz You have probably realised your true 5” Goldilocks scope does not exist ☹️ The closest would be a Skywatcher 120ED The Takahashi TSA120 would be a little heavier but it does have a very good reputation 🙂 As mentioned above, Borg have a very light 125mm that’s due out soon, but I suspect it will be VERY expensive.

Hello @nikooo and welcome to SGL. Your choice of a dobsonian is a good decision. I have had both the 8” and 10” Skywatcher Dobsonians, the 10” gave better views but it was too heavy for my bad back so I sold it. To help choose what size suits you I would suggest you physically see one by either going to a shop or your local astronomy club. Hope that helps.

I use the SW 6x30 RACI finder on my 4” refractor as it’s nice and light and easy on my neck/back.

@Stu I have already seen it when it was being assembled. Did not look through it, but I’m sure the views will be as good as it looks 👍

Did you finish with all screws tight ? If not you could loose collimation.

I was looking at Castor 90 minutes ago, a truly glorious sight 🙂 Mars was not so glorious though ☹️

How well does oil spacing work in your chilly climate Jerry ?

The telescope I desire is a 6” F/6 fluorite APO that weighs 5kgs (including rings and finder) But it would need to be made of unobtanium 🤣🤣🤣🤣🤣

I would suggest a 5mm Pentax XW giving x172 in your scope.