John

The one that I've pictured is from a LDX55 - I wondered if that component was the same thing.

The Bresser EXOS2 and the Celestron CG5 are probably the same as well. Especially the Bresser which I believe is a clone of the LXD75.

These are the worm housings (RA and DEC) from the Exos2:

Does your RA worm gear assembly look like this (apart from the colour) ?

The EQ5 is pretty much the same as the LXD75 I think so you might be able to use a spare part for an EQ5 to replace your broken LXD75 part.

Exactly what is broken on your LXD75 ?

I agree with Stu - a good 100mm refractor will be comfortable at 200x, 250x and even 300x when the seeing / target allows.

The T6 Naglers are very good eyepieces in all types of scopes. I used to have a full set of them.

I have had a pair of 25 x 100's but found them heavy and unwieldy despite having a decently tall and stable tripod. I found that I was seeing more with 15x70's and 20x80's simply because they were that much easier to use.

If I ever own another pair of 100mm binoculars they would be the type with 45 or 90 degree angled eyepieces and mounted on a sturdy fork mount. Something like these:

There are several things that I've ordered that are yet to show up. In one case I've been warned of a delay. In the others I assume that the current circumstances are causing all sorts of problems for both the companies I ordered from and the delivery agents. Probably both.

I'm owned a couple of refunds on other things which will be processed in due course but are taking much longer than normal because the companies involved are short staffed and completely snowed under with other similar transactions.

These are unprecedented times. We have food in the house and are currently healthy. Everything else does does not matter right now in my opinion.

I think companies have every excuse for a lack of service but many are still managing something despite the odds.

What ever you go for, budget for a really tall strong tripod to hold the binoculars. The 20 x 80's are easier to mount steadily than the 25 x 100's. Don't under estimate the size and weight of the 25 x 100's - they are really large and heavy.

5 minutes ago, merlin100 said:

I thought it was due to trying to peer into a neighbour's window?😜🤣

That can also result in the "black eye" effect !

I've observed M87 a few times but I've not seen the jet. To be fair though I've not really looked for it so I'll take that challenge the next time I have my 12 inch dob out

I wonder if any narrowband or line filter would help spot it even if that is at the expense of the galaxy view a bit ?

I usually get distracted by Markarian's Chain when I'm in that part of the sky which might be why I've not studied M87 for too long

12 minutes ago, Stu said:

Well I’m into my second week of lovely clear skies, had loads of sessions on the Moon recently so that is, I’m sure, related to fewer planes flying.

I was thinking just the same last night.

42 minutes ago, Littleguy80 said:

...What was the photo shoot with your refractor you mentioned at the start of your report?

Here Neil:

Having setup my 130mm refractor for a photo shoot this afternoon I was pleasantly surprised when the skies cleared as evening approached despite a forecast of 50-70% clouds.

While the transparency is rather mediocre ( eg: comet C/2019 Y4 Atlas was quite hard to spot despite being billed as mag 7.9) the seeing seems very good.

The Moon and Venus put on a great show earlier and then I was able to split Sirius at 240x and 300x while there was still some light in the sky. The faint glimmer that is the Pup star became somewhat more tricky to see once the sky was dark though.

Revisited Tegmine (Zeta Cancri) with the 130mm refractor and this triple star looked truly spectacular. Having the 2mm-4mm Nagler zoom in the diagonal I could press on the power and, my gosh, the stars stayed so well composed and crisp right up to 600x ! The close pair here are around 1 arc second apart and that thin black gap was clearly defined by the 5.1 inch objective lens.

I played the same game with the easy pair of Castor and found a pair of bright headlights blazing back at me with a large gap between them at the top end power.

Over to Cassiopeia for an up close view of another of my favourite multiple stars, Iota. Another superb grouping framed by the field stop and looking sharp and tight again at those very high magnifications. 

Using this sort of magnification and with such well defined star images you can see very subtle differences in the tint and brightness of these tightly grouped stars which tend to look very similar at lower powers.

The two long slow motion control cables of the T-Rex alt-azimuth mount gave smooth and precise control even at these crazy magnifications and the mount handles the F/9 130mm triplet scope so well. Virtually no vibration at all and any that crops up when focus is adjusted damps down in under a second. At last I'm able to really push these excellent Russian optics hard

Hercules is still quite low but even so I've managed to split Zeta in that constellation and I'll be back for more when the constellation has risen higher.

Some nights I love to go to those distant faint fuzzies with my 12 inch dob but other nights, conditions allowing, the smaller but precise optics of a quality refractor deliver these text book views of binary star systems that are a sheer pleasure to observe

Missed them both !

Just been taking a call from my mum though so can't be helped.

Nice shot Stu

The Triesnecker Rilles are looking superb tonight with the 130 triplet. A real "cats cradle" at 375x.

Not forecast clear skies either !

Glad I put the scope out for the photo session earlier.

Its clear here currently - against the forecast as well !

Hope you have something similar Jeremy.

The Moon and Venus look superb with my 130m triplet just now.

5 minutes ago, Louis D said:

Was there ever a British Express equivalent?

The advice we have had when visiting the USA is that American Express is the one card that they prefer us not to use !

Wow !

I feel the 24mm Panoptic is one of the best 1.25 eyepieces out there. I didn't think that much of the Hyperion 24 at all when I tried one for a while. For me both the 24mm ES 68 and the Maxview 24 / 68 were better corrected and the 24 Panoptic a touch better again. I also saw quite a lot of field edge distortion at F/6.5 and slower with all the Hyperions - too much for my taste.

Shows how personal these things can be. You've got to try these things for yourself I think - our preferences are all so different I'm beginning to think thats the only way to find what works for you.

Read 10 reports and you could have 10 different results !

....... Approximately .......

And there's more:

Some more:

More gratuitous posting of a refractor during lockdown I'm afraid

TMB/LZOS 130mm F/9.2 triplet #20 made in 2006 by APM in Germany on the T-Rex Alt-Azimuth mount. Both quite rare items and they make a great match

49 minutes ago, JOC said:

 

Well that answers a question I often had about whether observatories use the same EP sizes that we all seem to (1.25" and 2") on their huge telescopes.  It seemed almost inconceivable that with all their enormous costly mirrors it still boiled down to what they plonked in a tiny focusser, just like us back-garden mob.

For outreach they use a Meade 55mm plossl in the Alvan Clarke 24 inch refractor at the Lowell Observatory. It gives 178x in that scope, apparently:

Superb scope Jeremy - congratulations

I used to use some of the (V) (Vixen) .965 inch eyepieces engraved "Or." They worked rather well. I took two apart to clean them and found that the optical design consisted of 2 doublets rather like a plossl or symmetrical rather than the triplet plus singlet arrangement of the abbe ortho. The Vixen ones still worked nicely though.

Here are the 3 sizes for comparison. As the photo says, the .965 inch ones are not available new now, as far as I'm aware: