John

I have a Uni 28 and an EQ6 2 inch steel tube tripod. They seem to be about as stable as each other but the Uni 28 goes a lot taller. The EQ6 is still a good height but you need the legs fully extended with a long refractor on board. The Uni 28 legs don't need to be  anywhere near fully extended to get the mount to a decent height. The only reason you might want to use a pillar extension with the Uni 28 is to ensure that a long scope clears the tripod legs all the time, not for additional height.

I have the 8 inch pillar extension with the EQ6 tripod but I don't find that I really need it.

An EQ6 tripod plus the 8 inch pillar might be a lower cost alternative to a BB Uni / Planet for the AZ100. It does not have the looks but it is a stable tripod.

My T-Rex mount is similar in bulk and weight to the AZ100 but does not use counterweights.

Glad thats sorted for you at last.

The one you now have is how they have looked from Skywatcher for years - the original one looked different. 

6 hours ago, PoI-LordBlackwood said:

Hmm let me see... 

I would always go with a 30 mm at around 66 degrees for quite a nice view. The power isn't as low as the 40mm but it gives enough view for a very detailed observation of large DSOs. If you can get 70 degrees or more but that's only if you want to do visual astro and you have the budget (it is kinda expensive)

That would mean moving to 2 inch eyepieces of course.

Not sure that @cutepetgroomer wants to go there yet ?

You have got to really push the equipment on really challenging targets as well as easy ones, under a variety of conditions, over a number of sessions, to draw consistent conclusions. Or at least that's what I found.

See what you think of them by the Autumn

I own an XW 7mm.

I've not noticed this effect.

They all have slightly different optical designs though so I guess it's quite possible that some FL's will suit an individual better than others ?

Great stuff Steve

You just need to repeat the comparison under nice dark skies now before drawing conclusions

29 minutes ago, RobertI said:

Inspired by your success I had a go at this one with the 150PL tonight. Sadly conditions were just not right, with the star jumping all over the place and no sign of a secondary. I was also limited to 240x - I need more magnification for these tight doubles. So I ended up looking at some nebulae instead. One for another time.

I found the seeing "variable and hazy" tonight. I gave up trying anything too hard !

Another night and you will get it, I'm sure.

Good move for being flexible and finding something that could be viewed reasonably well

52 minutes ago, markse68 said:

..ooh Lambda Cyg is tight isn’t it! 

Probably the tightest that I've split with any confidence, so far

Once you get to an arc second or so the atmospheric conditions become hugely influential I think.

On the CN forum some folks suggest that the BB Planet is highly desirable with the AZ100 if you are using push to, to maintain accuracy.

I didn't use that facility with the early versions that I had so I don't know if there is something in that or not. I think @Stu uses a Planet.

2 hours ago, Peter Drew said:

One for sale on A,B & S today.     🙂

And here.

19 minutes ago, Lockie said:

Hi John, I bought the H 150p and the Starquest 102 R with my own money rather than loaned. I was starting to feel a bit guilty loaning scopes to review with such a small Astronomy channel. Maybe once my channel is a little bigger and it's more worth their while

 

Sorry for that misunderstanding Chris and good for you for making that commitment

5 minutes ago, johnturley said:

I've never seen the point of dual 2in/1.25in barrels, the eyepiece ends up being a lot bigger and heavier than it need be.

John 

I think they are only used with eyepieces that would be bulky and heavy anyway due to the glass element numbers and sizes. I don't think the use of the hybrid barrel itself dictates the eyepiece size and weight.

Personally I would prefer that such eyepieces go for a 2 inch barrel and be done with it. I use 2 inch barrel extensions with my Ethos eyepieces that have the hybrid barrel. I can use 2 inch filters with them then as well

I've just measured my Ethos 13mm. It would need a 45mm clearance to fully insert the 2 inch and 1.25" barrel sections without contacting anything below. More if you had a 1.25" filter fitted of course.

I think the Baader 2 inch - T2 adapter has a depth of around 30mm so, yes, a T2 spacer would be needed. Baader do those in a number of lengths I believe.

It might have a finder that can be pointed in the same direction as the scope too !

3 minutes ago, Dannomiss said:

Well we must dream big - even though this is smaller than than the heritage 150p and infact I think the mirror isn't as good

The 130P mirror will be of the same quality as the 150P. It is the same mirror set that the Heritage 130P uses in fact.

49 minutes ago, Zermelo said:

OK, I was a bit prematurely worried then.
I'll try to do a star test tonight, and depending on the result (and how brave I'm feeling) I'll give it a tweak.

Good idea. Remember to use a high magnification for the star test - 200x or more ideally and make sure that the scope is fully cooled.

50x will show Jupiters disk, it's main cloud belts and the 4 Galilean moons. Actually even 10x shows that it's not a star and that it has moons.

It's a very new scope - just on the market. It will be popular in due course but there might not be many out there yet.

@Chaz2bThe red dot finder in your picture is the Baader Sky Surfer III - it's pretty good I found when I had one

16 minutes ago, Zermelo said:

Thanks John, but is that a secondary adjustment, or primary (which I can't do on this scope - at least, not unless I try to emulate the factory process)?

What ever you can adjust, adjust in very small steps. You might have to experiment a bit - looking through the cheshire, make a slight adjustment to one screw and note which direction the dot moves in. If it's the wrong way, adjust back then try another screw.

As long as you only make small adjustments, it's easy to undo as needed.

9 minutes ago, jetstream said:

In the long past John I've used shims to align hunting optics because of poorly drilled mounting holes. You can use anything thin for the shim- I used to have dedicated brass shims made just for this but any thin plastic or even paper, matchbook cover can be used. It can be placed just on a quarter of the shoe at the front or back depending on the direction needed. Usually only a very thin shim is required to skew the finder to work.

 

I've done the same Gerry. Some insulation tape on the front end of one side of the finder foot or shoe often does the trick.

I'm just trying to work out what would have the same effect on this design

5 minutes ago, Pixies said:

I have just spoken to a friend with the same model. His RDF can be aligned just fine.

So what is different in the way that the 2 finders are mounted / adjusted ?. Maybe @Dannomiss does have a faulty unit ?

I know that @Lockie had some issues with the finder on the one that he was loaned for review and I think @JeremyS might have had similar.

Trouble for me is that I'm shooting "blind" on this, not having an example of the scope to hand to play with.

Thanks - those are really helpful.

The finder is installed perfectly as far as I can see.

You have the adjustment in azimuth (left and right) right over to one side presumably to try and get the dot to match your scope eyepiece view.

So somehow we need to skew the finder mounting in that direction a bit more to allow the adjustment to put the dot where it needs to be.

Hope that makes sense - just got to think of how to do it neatly !

It's really not far off. If you can get the black dot of the cheshire in the centre of the "donut" on the primary, I'd be happy with that.

Clear night forecast again. A chance to try experimenting perhaps ?

Could you post a photo of the finder mounted on the scope next to the focuser ?

Maybe from a few angles and when the finder is as closely aligned with the main scope as possible ?

It will help work out what will hopefully be a simple fix to the problem.

Currently I can only find one photo of your scope and the finder is not well shown in that.

Sorry if you have already posted these somewhere else and I can't find them.