Doasqa

On 15/02/2022 at 16:00, devdusty said:

Hello. I have recently purchased the Sky Watcher Mercury 705 refractor on an AZ3 mount. The azimuth adjustment knob seems to be under the tripod head, but it is almost impossible to access.     Also there looks like no way to move the telescope in altitude. Would be grateful for any advice / information to sort out these things..

Thanks. Chris

I sold my skywatcher 100ed telescope in favor of a Oberwerk BT-100 binocular telescope. When I had the telescope I bought a skywatcher AZ5 with the tripod. I never liked it. As you point out the fine tune knobs are difficult to get to. I would struggle with that nightly and also it vibrated at high magnification so much that I couldn’t get it focused. I considered buying the SkyTee 2 and recommend you do the same. There are a few others but can’t remember but the SkyTee looked pretty solid. You can sell your mount and use the tripod. Sorry to not offer a solution for what you have. 

6 minutes ago, jjohnson3803 said:

About 24 inches including the diagonal IIRC and 11 pounds with an 8x50 finder.

Mine is lighter but 34” long. The length is the problem from my observation. 

12 minutes ago, LDW1 said:

You aren't comparing the az3 vs the az5 for performance are you ? Really ?

Oops I meant AZ5

1 hour ago, Doasqa said:

How long and what is the weight of you’re telescope?

If it will work, I could sell you the AZ5 and get something more heavy duty. Although I would sell the head only and keep my tripod. It just might do for because you’re OTL is shorter than my Sky Watcher 100ED. I believe that’s where the problem lies, the OTA is on mine long it vibrates when focusing at high magnification. I think the AZ5 is a great mount, In fact now that I’m getting away from higher magnification I’m less inclined to complain about it. It’s with a 5mm eyepiece at 185x where there is a bit of vibration, only when focusing. That magnification it’s too much for the telescope anyway because the object moves out of view too quickly. . First I was big on magnification but with the problems of high magnification I’m happier at somewhere around 125X. And the only time you really need magnification is when you’re looking at the planets. All of the DSO’s are better viewed at low magnification. 

4 minutes ago, johninderby said:

The Skytee is a bargain. OK not a precision bit of kit but works brilliantly although it may need a bit of fettling to get the best out of it. 

Think pf ot as future proofing as it will handle a biiger scope later on .

I was surprised how inexpensive the SkyTee id to ship to the USA. They must absorb some of the cost. 

6 minutes ago, jjohnson3803 said:

Interesting.  I have an f7 102ED on order and I've been wondering how my AZ5 will do with it.  Guess I could sell a few things to finance a SkyTee.

 

 

How long and what is the weight of you’re telescope?

On 16/01/2022 at 11:28, cloudsweeper said:

.......when there's a fine long-focus frac (AR127L) on the Skytee II, with the ED80 Triplet acting as a guidescope with a good 80mm aperture and field in excess of 5deg?  A great set-up, easy to use - especially with the adjustable Geoptik Nadira observing chair.

Fingers crossed for some good viewing later!

Doug.

 

Hi, I’ve considered a SkyTee for my SW100. Are they stable at high magnification?

The binocular-telescope is the way to go. My BT-100 is far more fun than my telescope. I’m not ready to sell it yet. 

I have my email but haven’t had time to go through it but will soon. On quick view it looks great.  There isn’t a link to buy the book though. Thanks 

I had Orion 25x100, they were excellent. I only get rid of them because where I live now I’m in a valley and you have to look up in my neck strain drove me away from them. If you’re in an area where you’re not forced to look so high they are great. I can’t comment on Celestron other than I don’t like their customer support. Orion has easy online returns if you’re not happy with them. 

On 15/10/2021 at 06:00, wibblefish said:

I created a thread where I mentioned this but it seemed a better place to ask than where I had done previously (as this is also a different question).

 

 

I own this mount for my Sky Watcher 100ED. It holds up until I go to high magnification. Then it vibrates too much. If you have a heavy telescope it will drive you crazy. Check out the SkyTee 2 or the DSV3. I haven’t upgraded because I’m not pushing the magnification these days. 

Thanks again everyone

Do you have enough storage on your gone to download the files?

24 minutes ago, Louis D said:

What mount do you use with your SW 100ED and BT-100ED BT, and do you move them around together?

For the SkyWatcher, I bought the AZ5. It’s OK with my and Celestron 8–24 eyepiece and definitely my 40 mm Penntex. But when I get into the higher magnification  8 mm in below there’s too much vibration. It becomes hard to focus especially with the 5 mm eyepiece because the object moves out of view by the time you make your adjustment and the shaking stops.  So if you’re not using high magnification it’s a good mount, it’s about $350. I have considered the SkyTee2 and the DSV3 but  I’m not using the telescope so much anymore so I’m probably not gonna do that. I’ve lost interest in high magnification so it’s a moot point for me these days. High Magnification is only good for planets and maybe the moon to see the craters. But everything else looks better at 8 mm and up on my telescope. My favorite is the Pentax 40mm for general sky surfing. It’s TFOV is 3.5°

For my BT – 100s from Oberwerk, I chose the wood Oberwerk TR3. This particular tripod comes with the mount, there are more expensive mounts but I’m happy I didn’t spend the money. This one works great with the BT. My only complaint is the elevator shaft is manual. And with a heavy binoculars sitting on top it’s a bit of a stretch to raise and lower it. The one they make with the crank style elevator is metal but I love the word so I’m gonna deal with it. Once again when you use high magnification there is some vibration when focusing. It’s not as bad as the AZ5 and it’s only a problem during focusing. Hearing others post on the forum I think the vibration issue is common across all brands in all models at high magnification.

I prefer apps over books but that’s just me. I like sky safari and star walk. I have the book Night Sky Pocket Atlas but it’s a little much for a beginner and I’m just learning how to use it. But it’s a great book for finding DSO’s. I have the Messier Marathon book and have found it the most useful for learning the night sky with all its charts. I don’t intend on doing the marathon, just find some of the easy Messier objects, I have too much light pollution. Lastly Sky and Telescope magazine is loaded with information with a monthly sky chart. 

I’ve been thinking about this too. I vote for getting there before dark when you can see what you’re doing to set up. Remember to bring you’re red light in case you need to see which eyepiece you’re grabbing. 

On 03/01/2022 at 15:18, Dakuwaqa said:

What do you do with these when like myself you view outside in a park.

A small one would be so low on the ground to view and I’m old and stiff. 
 

Is an expensive tripod required?

Thanks!

Old and stiff, forget about dobs. I had an 8” and sold it. It was to awkward and heavy to move around and added to my back pain. I sold it and bought a Sky Watcher 100ED. Much easier to deal with. I then added a BT-100ED binocular-telescope. If you have the budget, that’s the way to go. I use my BT five times more than my SW. I’ll probably eventually sell the SW. 

On 08/01/2022 at 11:51, sonicninja said:

Evening everyone. I recently made the purchase of a used but in superb condition SkyWatcher 200P and I have a couple of immediate questions im hoping someone might be able to help me with.

Firstly, i noticed that the focuser is 2" but comes with 1.25" eyepieces and a step-down converter. Is this ideal or should I aim to purchase some 2" eyepieces?

Secondly, the primary mirror is a little dirty, is this something I can clean myself or best left to a professional?

Thirdly, I noticed that three screws are missing from the back behind the primary mirror. I believe these to be the locking screws (the other three large thumbcrews with springs are present). Are these vital and should I go about getting them replaced?

 

Many thanks in advance.

 

Keith

Don’t clean the mirror, I once did this successfully alter days of research, it was pretty dirty. After all the stress there wasn’t a difference so I’d never take that risk again. As far as 2” eyepieces the only one I have is a Pentax 40mm. It has an AFOV of 70°. I love it for sky surfing enjoying the wider FOV, in my case it is 3.12°   You might add an additional 2” eyepiece with moderate magnification but when I do the math the TFOV isn’t worth it. My other 1 1/4” eyepieces suffice for my needs. I don’t know what the screws do so I can’t comment. 

1 hour ago, Don Pensack said:

Sorry, I can't resist.

This is a LongPerm:

https://www.hadviser.com/perm-hair/24/

and this is a Long Perng:

https://www.longperng.com.tw/goods.php?act=view&no=98

Thanks for the chuckle.😁

Ha ha, Everybody’s a comedian. I guess I have to correct the link that I posted I, guess the copy and paste didn’t work out properly. OK silly guy here’s what it is, and thanks for pointing it out for me. I can’t spell worth a darn and I know I can’t even copy and paste, hee hee. 14.5mm - Agena Long Perng. 

I sold my 8 inch dub recently. With my back issues I couldn’t get it in and out. I agree with you on higher magnification a pieces. Unless you have a good atmosphere and DNA is there a waste, plus you spend all your time chasing the object because they drift out of view really fast. I don’t remember what the degree of the images but it is less than 1°. From what I remember Jupiter would fly through the IP‘s in a matter of seconds. I never could get the fine adjustment focus because it was gone before I could get it. Also with the high magnification eyepieces,  vibration is a huge issue.
 

I do have an eyepiece that I am selling, I used it with my binocular telescope so I have two of them. My new binocular telescope comes with the similar IP‘s. It’s a 14.5mm Agena-Long Perng eyepiece. It was my favorite Eyepiece with my binocular telescope but my new Oberwerk came with a 14 mm so I don’t need two. I’m keeping one for my SkyWatcher 100 ED, It works really well with that telescope. With my do  I used a Celestron 8 to 24 mm zoom. It was pretty good but I always liked the individual pieces. Currently my favorite is a Pentax40 millimeter, it gives a pretty wide field of view. I use it mainly for Star surfing. I didn’t have it when I on the dob so I don’t know how it would work but it should give you a pretty good field of you. It’s heavy and expensive though.

This is not uncommon. Get all set up and everything goes south. I don’t have anyone too near me but a neighbor across the street has a motion light that lights up my area a little. I’m getting off point, the other day, like you, all things looked great at 4:30. So I not only set up my binocular-telescope on the raised deck, I set up my SW100 telescope on the lower uncovered deck. I got all my eyepieces out for both devices and was ready to go. I went in for dinner and went out to check the conditions. I was shocked to see black clouds rolling in from the west. That’s not uncommon here and they usually pass over. Not this time, they were followed by grey clouds that blanketed the entire sky. I had to rush to tear down everything in fear of rain. This happens quite a bit, perfectly blue skies ,then an hour later complete overcast. So my friend, you are not alone. 

How about Oberwerk, you can get the cool wood tripod too if you need to replace that. I bought their wood tripod that comes with the mount, I couldn’t afford the fork mount. But my BT100’s aren’t heavy enough to need one. 

2 hours ago, Zermelo said:

With respect to the scope's dimensions alone (i.e. ignoring anything specific to the Evostar, which I have not used), its CA not the worst out there for a shortish achromat:

My own Bresser achromat is worse on this measure. So you would have the option of taming the false colour with a filter. CA is rather subjective; some observers can quite happily put up with (or in some cases, not even be able to see) colour that others can not. Bear in mind that, on extended targets, the CA will also have the effect of muddying the detail, so you lose resolution. Also, if you're going to be using it for planets, you will need some decent levels of magnification, and CA increases with magnification.

The short refractor and the Mak are in a sense complementary; if you could have both, you would prefer the achromat for low-magnification, wider-field observing and the Mak for higher-magnification views of planets and smaller DSOs. If budget constrains you to just one for now, then either will still be usable on a range of targets, but not ideal. There is no scope that is ideal in all situations, however much you spend.

For a first scope, I would go along with the advice above and give serious consideration to a 150mm dob. You can get decent views of planets (I agree with your intention to upgrade the eyepieces) and the extra aperture will help to see fainter DSOs than with the other options.

 

 

 

I’m not sure if you were responding to my comment but I can say, you have to be pretty picky about CA to complain about the SW Evostar 100ED. It is very limited if any. Charts are nice as a guide but ultimately you have to use you’re eyes to see what is acceptable. If your want less CA go with the SD version. 

I’ve used cloth wipes against recommendations. I’ve stopped stopped doing this after reading stuff but I don’t have scratches. I’m looking into dew heaters. My area has a lot of moisture in the air. On colder nights the fog up frequently. 

I own a Sky Watcher Evostar 100ED. I can’t say enough about how nice their products are. I love mine and use it frequently. I also have  binocular-telescope. If you have the budget they are great too. I find the BT easier to find targets. But back to what was recommended, you can’t go wrong with SW. Maybe add the Evostar 100ED to your list.