John

Surely the first and most important line of support is through the vendor from whom the scope was purchased ?

For new scopes at least.

I think Takahashi scopes are great, although I've only owned or used one example, but I don't want to put them on a pedestal. There are some other great manufacturers around as well.

1 minute ago, JeremyS said:

Tell us more John!

3 hours of filming with ITV on Clifton Down, Bristol with fellow Bristol AS members pretending to be at a star party, in the fog, in the persistent rain, We bought our own scopes including an 18/20 inch dob which took ages to get in place only for the production people to decide that it didn't look enough like a telescope. They had put some tiny tents up that we were supposed to crawl in and out of looking excited. They put masking tape all over my scope to hide the branding and insisted that having the lens cap on did not look realistic (true - but it was raining !). It took ages to dry and clean the objective later. 

The piece was going to be part of a montage that ITV used to show local activities before the evening news. As far as I know our bit was left on the cutting room floor. We probably looked a bit too wet and grumpy !

We did get some pocket money for doing it though and I did get to know some of the good folks at Bristol AS a little better in the pub so it was not all a negative experience  

My only experience as an "Extra" and probably that's a good thing !

6 minutes ago, jock1958 said:

If I had my time again I would probably have gone for the TS AZ5 over the Skytee 2 purely from whats been said in regards to the quality differences. 

Plus TS sensibly sell it without the poor stock DT clamps on it. Those things are an accident waiting to happen IMHO

Can't imagine why Synta have not improved them over the years that the mount has been sold.

Yep - get that scope under a really dark sky and the views should be stunning

Look on the bright side: you might get one in time for the next Mars opposition

Having performed as an amateur astronomer in front of cameras once, I can verify that the ideas that the director / production team have on what looks good through the camera is sometimes completely at odds with sensible astronomy practice

8 hours ago, Spile said:

I am keen to enhance my skill in finding objects for viewing with my 200P Dobsonian..... 

 

Your list should include PRACTICE as an enhancement of course

At the end of the day it's getting out there regularly with some targets in mind and some star maps that will increase your success rate.

Coma correctors are only really needed if you use wide angle or very wide angle eyepieces AND the coma distortions that you might see at the edges of the field of view bother you. Many folks use scopes of these specs without a coma corrector quite happily.

If they did include one, such as the Baader one it would add £135 to the price of the scope. If it was a Tele Vue one, it would add nearly £500 to the price of the scope !

I think useful upgrades might be to add a illuminated reticule finder to the scope, the Telrad is very good, a cheshire collimator and a good guide to what to see such as "Turn Left at Orion"

https://www.firstlightoptics.com/finders/telrad-finder-astronomy.html

https://www.firstlightoptics.com/other-collimation-tools/astro-essentials-cheshire-collimating-eyepiece.html

https://www.firstlightoptics.com/books/turn-left-at-orion-book.html

In due course there are almost endless further upgrades to eyepieces, filters etc to consume any disposable income you might have !

Enjoy the scope

I've followed Ed Ting's reviews for many years and found them very interesting and useful.

Ed has produced quite a few videos on his Youtube channel recently which seem to be nicely put together as well.

Here is his website:

https://www.scopereviews.com/

I've just watched this one on Telescopes in the Movies and on TV which is fun

That sounds like simple poor seeing to me. Mars is now a small target (under 9 arc seconds in apparent diameter) and the seeing has been variable to say the least over the past few weeks.

One of our members, eliot, has clearly managed to upgrade the focuser on their TAL 200K. It looks like it needs to be a very low profile unit though with a low profile diagonal modification as well:

Unfortunately the Crawmach focusers are out of production now. Maybe there is something similar from another brand available ?

This is what I use on my 12 inch dob and have done for a number of years now. Combined with a good star chart, I've been able to locate and observe many, many deep sky objects with this setup comprising a Rigel Quikfinder and a RACI 50mm finder. For me, I don't feel that I can improve on this arrangement:

It is not a Skywatcher EQ5 mount, old or new. It is closer to an EQ3-2 but not the same design. A different manufacturer. It looks very similar to this one:

https://www.astroshop.eu/telescopes/zoomion-telescope-genesis-200-eq/p,45319

I can't see the video I''m afraid - the message suggests that the file is corrupt ?

It's the other side of the mirror that collects and focuses the light.

Telescope mirrors are front surface aluminised so the light does not pass though the glass at all.

9 minutes ago, Seme said:

At 12.00 theres a Celestron Cardboard box upside down i'm sure it is.

Yes, I think you are right. Maybe they are just re-branding Celestron scopes really ?

What a nice report !

Lucky you to get a decent clear patch

Well done for getting M1 - it is not an easy thing to find by any means.

M101 is likewise, probably a bit harder again. A lot larger in extent than M1 as well.

Am I correct that the optical elements for all Takahahsi refractors are made by Canon Optron ?

or is it just certain model ranges ?

Before they made telescopes, Takahashi were a specialist sand casting company:

http://astrosurf.com/sogorb/takahashi/takahashi.html

16 minutes ago, Robindonne said:

Found an advertisement where they were sold in 2011 as skywatcher sct’s. I guess it didnt work

http://www.teleskop-spezialisten.de/SC_6_Schmidt_Cassegrain_SkyWatcher.html

Interesting that the internal secondary holder still shows the Celestron Branding in the plastic moulding. Too much trouble to change that I guess, for a marketing experiment.

I guess it's 150mm SCT which Synta have made with the Skywatcher branding on it rather than the Celestron branding. Synta make the SCT's below 11 inches (maybe 14 ?) now as they own Celestron.

Whether this means that we will see Skywatcher branded SCT's at some point, who knows ?

For a while in the USA you could get Orion (USA) branded SCT's. This is an Orion branded C11:

The above OTA is from the era when the C11 was still made in the USA I think.

Having tried for the HH quite often and not got it, I came to the conclusion that the trick was going to be to be able to see / detect the underlying streak of emission nebulosity IC 434 which Barnard 33 (The Horsehead) is set against. To me, when I eventually did manage to see it, the Horsehead looked like a place where an indistinct "bite" of IC 434 was missing  I think this is where the H-b filter helps - to tease out this faint HII emission nebula so you can see where it is, and, crucially, the small patch where it isn't. And that is the Horsehead Nebula.

A UHC passes both O-III and H-b band widths so can help but the H-b just isolates that one bandwith so is a little more of a helping hand with this task. The O-III bandwidth does not seem to help with this one.

As dark and transparent skies as possible are another very important factor as are eyes that have become as dark adapted as they can be. I even stopped using my Rigel finder for a couple of hours when I was doing serious Horsehead searching. No light at all anywhere near my eyes for quite some time.

All that to just about visually detect a small patch of blackness against slightly less black, blackness. We must be a little mad

7 minutes ago, Peter Drew said:

Not to hand but there should be some somewhere on SGL or Cloudy nights.        🙂

 

Here are some

I have a Skywatcher ED120 Pro which I love but I have put a Moonlite focuser on the scope and the overall build quality and finish is not as good as my APM, Vixen or Tak refractors. The objective is a very good one though, which is rather important !

I would think that the TS / Altair scopes are a notable step up in all round build quality and quality of fittings such as the focuser, sliding dew shield etc. I had a William Optics 90mm Megrez for a while (it followed a Skywatcher ED100 as it happens) and I would expect the TS / Altair scopes to be similar to the William Optics level of fit and finish.

Interestingly, the objectives from the Synta made ED doublet series were used in scopes under other brandings such as William Optics and TS. So we can see where Synta put their effort in with that series.

Skywatcher did produce a better finished series with the ED doublets in them called the Equinox series. No longer produced now though:

Very nice report Magnus !

I can't wait to get my 12 inch dob out again

You seem to be looking in just the right place for the Horsehead. I've spent quite a lot of time looking at that small patch of sky over the past few winters. Most of the time with no sign of it but when I have managed a glimpse it has been with the H-b filter on the end of the eyepiece.

Such a subtle and challenging target - probably about the hardest thing that I've ever observed when I think about it.