John

I can't recall the views I had back in 2003 but some of the views this opposition have been memorable. I've got far better equipment and much more experience now than I had back then (and the benefit of SGL) so perhaps that is not surprising.

The thing I learned a long time ago is to keep my setups very, very simple. Therefore I don't image, I just observe with a range of very simple, low or no tech, setups.

Me too 100%

That's sounds like the effect you get when one or more of your optical surfaces has become fogged or misted up. Either one of the mirrors or the eye lens of the eyepiece ? If you keep eyepieces in a cold place, they can fog / mist up really quickly as the warmth of your eye approaches the eye lens. Do you use a light shroud with your scope ? I found one more or less essential when I has a Lightbridge 12.

The only one of those that I have personal experience of is my TMB/APM/LZOS 130mm F/9.2 and that is a superb optic. My experience does suggest though that other "non premium" manufacturers have narrowed the gap between their products and the very best so the value for money factor has shifted in their direction more. Something similar has happened with eyepiece optics over the past 5 years or so.

Nice report ! It took me ages to find a combination that would split Sirius. In the end my 12 inch dob plus a 6mm ortho eyepiece did it. Since then I've manged to split it lots of times (easier after the first time like most things !) with scopes down to 100mm. I generally find that I need to use 250x or so to get the split and you don't see it like a normal double star - the Pup star glimmers out from from the glare that surrounds Sirius, sometimes only popping into view now and then. Your scope and eyepiece selection makes sense - you just need to keep at it and when the seeing is decent, it will come though. The separation is similar to Rigel but the brightness difference is so much more and of course it's low down from the UK. Folks who observe where Sirius is higher in the sky wonder what all the fuss is about I think !

Both will give you a noticeable step up in performance on deep sky objects, less so on the planets. The 250 is F/4.7 wheras the 200 is F/5.9 so the latter is a bit easier on lower cost eyepieces than the former and a little less fussy over collimation. If the deep sky is a big priority for you then I would definitely go for the 250PX. I've owned them both and liked them both though

The X-Cel LX are much better than the older X-Cel's in an F/5 scope. Those might be the ones that Neil was referring to though ? When I had a Lightbridge 12 I used mostly Tele Vue Nagler's but they are very expensive now. The Meade 26mm QX (the supplied eyepiece) is really not very good though so you will be replacing that in due course with a better 2 inch eyepiece. In the F/5 optics you want something quite well corrected if you go to wider angle eyepieces. The Explore Scientific 68 and 82 degree range perhaps ? Perhaps use what you have for a while plus the zoom and see how your opinion on what you like to use develops ?

I don't know about the 18mm but the 25mm BST Starguider is not particularly well corrected in faster scopes, which means that stars will look more like seagulls in the outer half of the view. The challenge with the 114mm F/4.4 newtonian is that it is a rather fast scope and therefore it creates optical challenges for lower cost eyepieces with wider than average fields of view. If you are not careful you can invest 2x - 3x as much as the scope has cost on decent quality eyepieces when you could have actually bought a scope with much more performance for the same overall investment. As you don't actually have the scope yet, I'd be tempted to say don't buy any additional accessories for it until you have used it with what it comes with a few times. After that at least any future investments will be influenced by some of your own personal experiences

Hi Dave and welcome to the forum I don't image so I can't really help with scope suggestions. Your budget should be able to get you something decent though. The challenge at the current time is finding what you decide on, actually in stock somewhere !

Great report Baz It was very nice out last night but a bit nippy I agree.

I observed them last night with my 12 inch dobsonian: Difficult to say without knowing the scale of your image, it's orientation and the relative brightness of the objects imaged whether you have captured Titania and Oberon or not. They are both around magnitude 14 and were approx 30 and 34 arc seconds from Uranus when I observed them. This is from Stellarium at the time that I observed (newtonian view):

Not sure about the tracking issues but the fall of the optical tube could well have affected the collimation of the optics in the scope even though it fell onto grass. Contrast of planetary views can go down hill quite fast with SCT's if the collimation is out.

Good to hear that the Vixen 102 achro can still cut it I used to have one on an SP mount and was very proud of it. I must give my Vixen ED102SS a spin out soon. It tends to get a little neglected at times

There is always "something better" out there, although generally the margins between quality eyepieces are pretty close. Unless you have Zeiss ZAO's and / or a Pentax XO which I think are the very, very best and have been for some time now. I've tried to give up chasing now and I'm sticking to the Nagler 2-4 zoom, my Pentax XW's and an HD ortho 4mm. I'll just have to do the best that I can with those It's interesting and helpful to hear that Takahashi have produced a really nice planetary eyepiece in the TOE's though

Not really. Just use the lower power eyepieces (20mm and 12.5mm) as you get used to using the scope. The 4mm will make things much more challenging because it gives very high magnifications - it might be useful to view the moon with though.

If you see a circle, the scope is not focused properly. Try using the 12.5mm eyepiece and adjust the focus until Mars appears at it's smallest in the view. It should then look like a very small pinkish spot.

Following my success in spotting Neptune's brightest moon Triton earlier this evening, after a good session observing Mars, I turned my 12 inch dobsonian towards Uranus. The seeing is steady tonight and Uranus was showing a well defined disk at 398x magnification. Careful observing of the area surrounding the planet showed a faint suspect to the North of the planet with direct vision and another a touch fainter to the West which needed a little averted vision to confirm. I made a quick sketch of the relative positions of these dim objects and consulted Cartes du Ciel and Stellarium. I was pleased to see both applications showing the two brightest Uranian moons, Titania (magnitude 13.9) and Oberon (magnitude 14.1) in just the positions that I had noted my suspects to be in. I might also have glimpsed Ariel (magnitude 14.3) but that is closer to Uranus as well as fainter and I was not convinced of that one. Titania is currently around 30 arc seconds North of Uranus and Oberon around 34 arc seconds West of it. I was very pleased to find these two distant moons as I had earlier not been able to see Phobos or Deimos at Mars. I think these Martian moons are somewhat more challenging because they are close in to their much larger (apparent diameter) and brighter parent planet. While I have seen Triton at Neptune a number of times now, this is just the second occasion that I've been able to see these companion worlds of Uranus

Nice report I have heard that the TOE's are something special and you seem to confirm that Mark. Must be very close to the "top tier" of planetary performers.

Uranus is not that far from Mars in the sky so that could be a fifth

Triton spotted again this evening with my 12 inch dob at 318x (Pentax 5mm XW). The magnitude 13.5 moon is 14 arc seconds North of Neptune tonight. This is the newtonian view:

I've owned a couple of TAL 100's and at no time felt the need to filter the small amount of CA that they produced.

That could be astigmatism from the eyepiece rather than coma from the scope mirror or maybe a mix of both. The Ethos are really well corrected in fast scopes - it's what Tele Vue do excellently. Personally I would try the Ethos 21 for a few sessions and see if you see anything towards the field edges that bothers you. I have the 21, 13, 8 and 6mm Ethos and they are my main set with my 12 inch dob and used without a coma corrector. This useful article shows what the aberrations look like so you might be able to tell them apart: http://umich.edu/~lowbrows/reflections/2007/dscobel.27.html

I'm not a moderator now Gerry but I think it is OK.

A good start down the 100 degree road ! What focal ratio is your dob ? My 12 inch is F/5.3 but I don't find a CC necessary at that focal ratio with my Ethos's.