jamesc96

Is the comet visible with the moon being what it is at the moment? Or are all these sightings after moonset.

View of Mars last night at approximately 10pm (Ireland)

Also keep an eye out for local astronomy events and just use the same location at a different time

I've just started, but looking at light pollution maps and then finding mountains/hiking routes within dark spots. I've found that popular mountains for hiking often have a car park nearby and these are perfect to observe from. They are normally without street lights and no one is around at night.

I've accepted portability is more hassle than it's worth. I've just bought the skywatcher steel tripod. I might cut down the legs at some point but not for a while. All the portable tripods suggested arent much narrower than it and that was my main gripe. Thanks for all the suggestions I'll definitely keep them in mind if I ever get a lighter scope.

Update I would not recommend a cheap tripod for this setup. It is far too unstable and flexible to be used. The heritage 150p + az5 is too heavy. Unusable once any breeze picks up (never ending wobbles). The vibrations from using the slo-motion controls weren't awful though. Maybe on an perfect night it would be passable but how many of those are there? I've now forgotten about portability and have bought a skywatcher steel tripod and will just have to deal with the size/weight. Maybe I'll cut the legs down a bit in future if I find that it is steady enough already to risk doing that.

That tripod looks very aesthetic when cut down! Do you think it would be able to deal with higher magnification at all? I am not very fussy. I know 3+ seconds to steady is generally considered poor, but my current photo tripod takes infinity seconds when the winds pick up even a little.

This is a good idea. The steel tripod would still be no good though since its width is also a problem for me. How have you found the AZ3 tripod? It seems to get a lot of stick here but looks like it could pack down quite flat.

Im very keen on observation at both high and low power so maybe I will give the mini a miss.

I tried a skywatcher steel tripod today at my local store but it was way too big to load on the bike. So the small tripods are my only option. I'll have a look at the leofoto now. I've been looking at manfrottos too since everyone recommends them but I'm not sure if I'll gain much more stability over my own cheap camera tripod. My original (simplistic) thinking about the berlebach was that wood = stable/no vibration but I guess there's more factors to consider than just that.

I see now, it is definitely a more reasonable size but the load capacity goes down from 15kg to 5kg according to their website.

I didn't see a large version, I'll look now. The one that's selling in my location is the one that has a max height of 36cm

I have an az5 mount

In what way wouldn't it work? I really have to emphasize the size of my chair, it's about 20cm from the ground. Edit: nevermind, just seeing your other reply now

Has anyone experience with using a berlebach Mini with a reflector? They are much cheaper than the larger versions. I have a heritage 150p reflector and need a very portable tripod (traveling by motorbike). Since I use a short camping chair when viewing I was thinking the berlebach could be perfect. Additional info: The weight of my scope + mount + eyepiece would be roughly 6.5kgs