StarDuke82

You adjust the angle of the secondary via the three knobs behind the secondary mirror, the spider vanes or assembly as you call it not being perpendicular has very little if no affect on the position of the secondary as long as they are relatively the same at both end points.

I live by a lake in the southeast US so I know the mosquito problem all too well, not sure if it’s available in Canada but Yard Guard in its various brands keeps them away for awhile. I spray it around my observation site a good 10-20 minutes before I go to set up my scope and it keeps them away for several hours. However our air is pretty still in the summer barring the rare breeze or evening updrafts mixing it up. And to not be off topic to respond to Stu’s question 1. Lucky to have a dog that wants to play mine just wants to sleep constantly 🤣 and 2. I would have to say when I am out in the early evening and I see clouds and hear thunder in the distance that makes things more difficult. I am always worried it might start raining any minute and I won’t have time to pack it all in.

I collect rocks and minerals and that is either a Pyrite Nodule or some other form of Iron Concretion easiest way to test it would be to do a streak test on a piece of unglazed porcelain or underside of a toilet tank lid in a pinch and run it across, Pyrite will leave a dark blackish green to black streak, Iron will leave either a reddish brown or rust orange streak behind, based on the corrosion on the outside and the color though I’m going to say it’s a specific type of pyrite called arsenopyrite if it’s golden Or Marcasite if it’s more Silver which is found with quartz and often rusts out of rock beds. However it’s not a meteorite unfortunately those are extremely rare to find a large specimen if you do want to find some tiny particles you might have luck straining your downspout water and running a magnet over the water tiny particles of meteorites rain down on our roofs every day and we’re not even aware of it.

Interesting and well drawn white light sketches, lot’s of spots in both of them. The second one reminds me of a chain of islands going across the Sun, the things non distinct shapes make people think of. (or maybe I just need a holiday 😆) You obviously have an eye for detail and observation also.

I have been using Skyportal Celestron’s free version of Skysafari to control my Celestron 9.25 SCT, 6 inch Astrofi and find target my 8 inch Newtonian for almost a year now. I like Skyportal and find it fairly easy to use with a good list of targets but I keep seeing members mention Stellarium so I keep wondering which is better? The Apps look and seem very similar in the App Store; I guess what I am asking is should I ditch Skyportal and switch to Stellarium?

Thank you and noted, I hadn’t thought of that for sketching DSO’s though I am documenting the phases of Venus and I am noting the time, date, and coordinates in the sky beside those very basic sketches every few weeks.

Excellent and beautiful images, your images have been both inspiring and helpful to me by verifying what I am getting in my bright glare filled basic images as I try to document the phases which I plan on posting sometime in August. Thank you.

Thank you it can be quite calming like photography and just being out under the stars observing the key is to not get overly critical and just keep at it just like anything else.

Thank you very much, I find with averted vision and often when I blink that they suddenly become brighter and seem to have more detail whether that’s my imagination or simply the light hitting the correct photoreceptors in the back of my eye I don’t know but it always quickly fades and they dim to faintness. I would love to do some Solar sketching have you posted yours? I would love to see them I find some of them quite fascinating to look at, especially during periods of high sunspot activity.

First attempt at drawing some DSO’s picked M3 the first globular cluster I can see during the night, M81 because it was directly above and easy to hold my pad and observe at the same time, and M27 using my Oiii and UHC-L filters cutting out any remaining light pollution. Drawing in the dark was a new experiment in and of itself as I draw regularly but always at my desk, I think I am a bit too heavy with my pencil in the dark. I also couldn’t decide whether the right way to draw them was as sort of photo negatives with the density of light darker or lighter so I went with the negative approach.

Thanks for the easy explanation without the off putting disclaimer in the installation video on the website makes it seem a lot less complicated and I decided that it’s the best solution overall, and ordered one for my SCT until either order arrives guess I am going to pull out my old Newtonian as only ever had dew problems with it my secondary frosted over a few times in the winter months but until my means to control dew gets here looks like it will be the best option if I want to observe, my Newtonian is probably better by far than SCT for viewing the Hercules Cluster and other DSO anyway might need start taking to two scopes out with me. 🤣🤣

I live in the southern US it’s like the Amazon in the hot 90-100 *F (32-35 C*) with steamy humidity with pop up storms almost every afternoon. Winter is full of cool damp evenings and fog so if I am going to get the most out of my telescope it looks like a dew heater of some type would be a wise investment based on last night’s viewing conditions and the advice of everyone here. I am already looking at options the Celestron replacement collar dew heater interesting though I am not sure how confident I am at removing the collar holding my corrector plate in place, I may just get one that slips over the OTA and save that one for later on when I am more adept at customizing and modding my own scope. Thank you all for the advice and some tips I will try tonight to help keep me out under the skies until my dew shield arrives. 🤗

I decided to pack it in for the night I tore the scope down and placed it inside it’s travel box carefully with the lens cap off and left the box open for the ride home I’ll set the scope up as soon as I get home and point the OTA down so the dew won’t spot and wipe the housing down if it’s still overly saturated but I suspect by the ride home the box I carry it in will catch more of the dew than will be left on the outside of the OTA as well as outside of my eyepiece case so I will toss a bag of rice in each for good measure and hopefully things will look better tomorrow. I do have a question though Dew forms on the lens much the same reason why frost forms on in the winter time except in the spring and summer it’s because the ambient temperature falls at or below the point of moisture available in the atmosphere, could you use say the same temporary solutions that work in the winter in the summer months glove warmers and insulating the OTA in combination with a Dew Shield or does the increase in moisture plus the warm temperatures necessitate a dew heater as the only solution?

It’s the first night in almost 4 days that I have been able to get my scope out however it’s very humid and I have dew that’s formed on my corrector plate it’s only 12 am still plenty of stuff to look at but my evening is ruined at the moment. I know it’s a horrible idea can I use of my microfiber lens cleaning clothes to wipe the condensation off my lens if I’m through in drying and removing the condensation and then use the make shift dew shield I quickly threw together out of some cardboard and extra insulating foam I have laying around or should I just pack it all in and head back home? I just threw the scope in hibernate mode because I am unsure what to do I don’t want to streak up my corrector but I just got my first glimse of a globular cluster before I realized how much dew was accumulating so despite the moisture skies are pretty clear tonight. If I pack it in I will be sure to not put the lens cap on the OTA so the dew can evaporate right now I just want to no if there is anything I can do to salvage my night or is it a lost cause at this point? Also any other pointers until my actual dew shield arrives in a few days.

It’s the May 11-18th here where I live US according to the official website two passes each night one after sunset and one just before sunrise each day. Last night it was storming so far this evening looks promising.🤞🏻

My first Zoom eyepiece was a Celestron Zoom because it was inexpensive and while it was okay I recently bought a Baader Hyperion Mark IV and I can really tell a difference between the two. The Baader is a little lighter and the quality of the optics is much better, doesn’t seem to be as much glare when viewing planets or stars and the eye relief is just as good, with a decent field of view for a Zoom. It’s a bit wider than the Celestron Zoom eyepiece though which is my only complaint about it I sometimes like to snap a quick image with a smartphone mount and it’s a bit difficult to get a mount around it but it’s easy to fit a camera onto so that’s not really an big issue. I have looked through a Tel Vue 3-6mm Nagler Zoom before and I really want one of those to use with my Newtonian the views through them are superb though I was looking through one in a friend’s refractor so the type of scope really helps with such a small focal length zoom, Tel Vue makes great eye pieces though.

Baader has a set of 8- 68* ep, you can also break up the set and buy them individually at many online retailers Highpoint Scientific for example. Personally I would buy two Baader Zoom Mark IV EP since you’re interested in the 68 to 82 degree range the Zoom has a field of view of 50-68 degrees as you adjust its magnification and the Zoom is just a little short of this and it gives you 4 different magnification settings at 8,12,16, and 24 focal lengths. That’s just my personal preference at owning one it’s a pretty good mid quality EP giving nice flat views with exceptional eye relief it’s actually my most used EP after my 40 mm Wide field EP. Also like you I am becoming partial to Baader I like the quality of their optics.

Thank you for your response I was considering getting one to view many of the nebulae that are currently visible in the sky right now I realize nothing helps with viewing galaxies perhaps I should have used something other than M81 to help explain my skies, 😅in any event you have helped me make my decision on adding one or both to my kit thank you again.

I will start by saying I live under Bortle 5/6 skies on the best nights I can see hundreds of stars and on the worst I can barely see M81 faintly overhead. I know my view’s won’t improve much unless I truly get out to a Dark Sky site nearest is a Bortle 2 zone several hours away but would getting an Oii or UHC filter help a little. I am mainly doing visual at the moment and beginning to get into imaging and will probably get more into imaging as time goes by, I know not to expect much as these filters work by stopping certain wavelengths of light and only letting the narrow and dim wavelengths of light from DSO through so basically it darkens the sky, just wondering if adding them my list of things to add to my growing kit are they worth it and which ones are best?

Didn’t think I was going to take go out tonight been cloudy with high humidity all day but as evening sat in the clouds due west broke apart and I took my scope out to snap a few quick images of Venus as I have been trying to log a photo at least every few weeks to document it’s phases. The upper level moisture and haze was so bad I really didn’t need my filters I probably captured my least glared images of Venus albeit a little soft around the edges, however the 97% humidity, 80 F* (26 C*) temps and clouds rolling in with drizzle had me quickly back indoors. Looks like it might be next week before I can get the scope out again but the way the weather is around here who knows I may get lucky and get a break like this evening for my Venus project.

Thank you very much 🤣 and forgive the late response there have been a few nice nights where the clouds have broke and I have been out under the stars with my scope, even got a bit of time in tonight before dew clouds ran me indoors.

Hmm I wonder if the Bluetooth shutter is better on this one? I have the Celestron NexXYZ and I can never get the bluetooth to stay paired up, also this looks a lot more stable than the NexXYZ I mean you bump it slightly or need to switch out your eyepiece and your out off alignment and need to realign and half the time you can’t get your phone to sit right in the spring loaded holder especially if you’re in a hurry.

Amazingly although the weather man said it was supposed to rain all afternoon and it was cloudy all day yesterday it cleared up last night and although it was a bit hazy along the horizon I was able to get the scope out last night. Viewed tiny Mars, some double stars and practiced my averted vision on some dimmer deep sky objects in my suburban bortle 5 neighborhood before I packed it all in around 4am.

I don’t know now I looked at the images on the Wikipedia link and one of them is really close to the image I took just without the glare also didn’t mean to double post I couldn’t get the edit images function to work correctly. My image is on top of course and the Wikipedia image is on bottom. 🤷🏻

I felt that way a few days ago down south after a beautiful cloudless day I take out the scope only to have clouds start to roll in while I chase breaks going from east to west trying to catch fleeting glimpses of Venus and the Moon until I finally gave it up to wait until better weather, luckily the next few days were clear and I got in some time. However it’s going to be sometime next week until I get to take my scope out again because of rain the next few days