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I’m sorry the fix didn’t seem to work for you, maybe I was just lucky. I’ve not had chance to try it again as the weathers not been good, if I get chance to try again I’ll let you know how I got on.

A member of the Celestron Starsense explorer group on facebook suggested I try this: ‘The problem with the targeting circle disappearing happened to me too and I found that if one of the existing scope display or Telrad display settings is active it can interfere. Make sure all scope display field of view options are turned off. Also, if multiple devices are being used with SkySafari, the scope display Settings interfere with each other due to cloud backup syncing. If that's happening, put the device running SkySafari in airplane mode during your observing session and it won't automatically sync the scope display Settings to any other device.’ Well I tried it last night and had no problems at all so hopefully it may work for other people as well.

Its reassuring that it’s not just me, I was beginning to think I’d done something in the settings and that’s what was causing it. If the weather forecast is correct for East Kent tomorrow I might get a chance to test it again. I did have a look in the SkySafari forums but there’s nothing I could find relating to the Starsense function, so maybe I’ll have to do a post like you’ve suggested.

So after having my scope for a few months now I’ve decided to get some upgrades for it(Xmas isn’t far off so I’m getting my list in early lol) I’m looking at upgrading the diagonal, getting a Barlow lens and phone adapter. The phone adapter seems to be the easy one as a lot of people have recommended the Celestron xyz but I’m unsure on the diagonal and Barlow. I’ve been looking at the SvBony SV188P dielectric diagonal, is this a good choice and will it make a lot of difference in the seeing? And sticking with SvBony I’ve also read good things regarding their Barlows, any thoughts? I bought the SvBony 7.2-21.6mm zoom which I’m very pleased with so I’ve not included any eyepieces in my upgrade list. Feel free to suggest anything else that you may think would be a good upgrade to the scope as I’m still very much a beginner in all of this and would appreciate any suggestions.

As sky safari was on offer the other week together with the fact it now includes the Celestron Starsense Explorer functionality I decided to buy it as it contains a lot more information and functionality than the standard Starsense Explorer app. However I’ve come across a couple of problems that may be bugs or just me not doing something right. I’ve setup my scope within the app and entered the Celestron code to enable it and when I first use it it works exactly the same as the Starsense app , the arrows show which way to push the scope, the screen zooms in as you get closer to the target and the targeting circle turns green when you on target. However after a few targets the targeting circle disappears and it no longer zooms in and all I’m left with is the arrows and a small blue targeting circle that doesn’t change colour. The only way I can get it working properly is to restart the app but again after a short while the targeting circle disappear. The other problem is the actual plate solving, even though it’s using the same technology as the Starsense app it doesn’t seem to be as good. Quite a few times it couldn’t locate where it was looking at and kept asking for the scope to be moved to a clear part of the sky, the it would work ok for a while. I kept switching between safari and the Starsense app to compare and the Starsense app would locate 100% of the time where as safari would only work 50 % of the time. In the end I went back to the Starsense app as Safari was almost unusable. Has anyone else used the Starsense function in Sky Safari and had any issues? Any help would be greatly appreciated.

RVO were true to their word and my new tripod leg was delivered today so my tripod is now all fixed and ready to go. Just a shame the weather is now looking bad for the next few days. Its my fault, my new Svbony zoom lens was delivered on Saturday and of course as soon as you get a new piece of kit the clouds roll in lol

Had a reply from RVO this morning and the are going to dispatch a new leg out to me ASAP. So good news. And thank you to RVO for your quick response and sorting this out for me.

After reading these posts I took the plunge and ordered the SV191 which arrived yesterday. As is typical when you order something new the clouds had started rolling in last night but did manage 10 minutes on Jupiter when there was a break in the clouds. What can I say! Even though the seeing conditions were poor and the wind was shaking the scope the views I had of Jupiter were very good, the zoom was nice and smooth and the optics were crisp and sharp throughout all the magnifications. I did try to view a few stars but the viewing conditions had deteriorated by then so can’t really give a definitive review on them. From this initial use I can’t wait to try it out when the skies are clear as it seems to be a very good zoom eyepiece and we’ll worth the money.

The very reason I’d mentioned it being over tightened was because that’s exactly the response I would have given if I’d seen the photo myself, so I do understand your response. After having a search on the internet I’ve found I’m not the only one who’s had this problem either and Celestron replaced theirs under warranty so hopefully they’ll do the same for me. The problem is if you don’t tighten enough the legs collapse (which happened to me, luckily I was sat right next to it) so your then scared of it toppling over and breaking the scope so you tighten the bolts a little bit more which I think is understandable. Is that then classed as over tightening?

That’s what I thought, but on closer examination all the bolt does is tighten the outside two legs to secure the middle one. I was surprised at the mark too, as I said early I consciously don’t over tighten because of the plastic parts but I’ve found it needs to be a bit tight otherwise the leg doesn’t secure. I’m still quite shocked that it broke as it did, I can quite understand that people may think I over tightened as I would probably think the same if I saw the photo, but you would think to break it off completely would take a lot more force than just over tightening. Like I said earlier the only reason I can think off is there must have been a weakness in that part of the plastic.

Since I got my Dx5 Starsense scope at the beginning of July I’ve been really impressed with it until tonight. After a brief session of trying to see the comet just after sunset (nope couldn’t see it) I decided to collapse the tripod until it got much darker. Unfortunately as I was tightening the bolts that secure the legs one of the bolts together with a chunk of plastic snapped off meaning I can no longer secure one of the legs. I’m always careful not to over tighten things, especially if there’s plastic involved, so only tighten things hand tight, I can only think that there must have been a weakness in the plastic. I’ve emailed RVO about the problem and hope they can try and help. In the meantime while I’m waiting does anyone have any ideas how I might be able to secure the loose leg so I can carry on observing? I’ve thought about maybe a jubilee clip or something as it’s the two outer legs squeezed together by the bolt the secures the leg.

Thank you for the offer but it comes with an email allowing you to view in various websites like NASA and Google sky

Ok thank you. I think it would be very hard to find it has a magnitude of 12.263 but if I could put the coordinates in at least I’d be looking at the right piece of sky. Which skySafari would you recommend the plus or the pro version? I’m only a beginner so if I don’t need to pay out for the pro version I’d rather not.

We’ve just named a star for a friends birthday and have been given the right ascension and declaration coordinates for it. Is it possible to enter these into the Starsense explorer app to find it or do I need to upgrade to SkySafari to do this? Any help would be appreciated thanks.

That’s a good idea about recording my observations, I think I was just excited about actually trying my scope out for the first time. Thanks for the links to the BST eyepieces an 8mm or 12mm was the size I was considering so it’s nice that I’m the right path, although I was also considering a 2x Barlow. I forgot to mention about the tray on the tripod, does anyone have any suggestions on a simple way to mount it without the need of the wing nuts? The reason I ask is it would be much quicker to fold up and store and also to setup, I’m sure I saw somewhere someone had modded theirs with elastic or something so that it folded up when the tripod was collapsed.

Right, so after 3 nights of clouds I finally managed to take my scope out for the first time the other night and thought I’d give you a quick review on the scope and how I got on. First off a big thank you to Rother Valley Optics for their speedy delivery, ordered Friday and delivered on Monday. Setting up the scope was easy with the detailed supplied instructions and only took about 20 minutes, first thing that struck me was the weight of the tripod, it’s quite heavy and solid. The scope itself seems well made as is the 25mm eye piece, the 10mm though doesn’t feel as good. The phone mount holds the phone well and is easily adjusted and the Starsense app is very easy to setup. So with the scope all setup and ready I took it outside just as it was getting dark, even though the sky was still slightly blue with only a few stars visible I was surprised that the Starsense app was able to plate solve and work out where it was looking however as it wasn’t quite fully dark yet the views weren’t the best so I decided to wait half an hour before I tried again. And what a difference it made, the views of the stars were pin sharp and though it may sound obvious but the sky was full of stars! The Starsense app worked flawlessly and I carefully worked my way through the list of what was best to see, l can’t remember all the names of what I saw but some of the highlights were the wild duck cluster( I think that’s the name), the dumbbell nebula and some double stars. I then thought I’d try the Andromeda galaxy but struggled to see it as there appeared to be a smudge on the lens, I cleaned the eye piece but the smudge remained it was then that it dawned on me that the smudge was Andromeda lol. So my final thoughts are it’s an excellent scope, in my beginners opinion, a good solid tripod that settles down after a second or so after moving, the 25mm seems very good and the Starsense app is excellent. The only downsides are the 10mm, it seems very difficult to use as I have to have my eye right against the lens and it doesn’t seem very bright and the slow motion controls have a bit of slack when moving in the opposite directions causing a bit of a jolt until they mesh. I can’t wait to try it on the planets once they are more visible and to take it to a darker site so some of those grey smudges resolve themselves a bit better, I highly recommended this scope for beginners as they won’t be disappointed.

Look what turned up today 😀 I apologise in advance to all those in the SE of England as of course the weather will be rubbish now it’s been delivered lol. Will let you know how I got on and what I think of the scope once I get chance to use it. Again thank you all for your advice.

Once again thank you all for your comments. At the moment ( though I might change my mind again lol) I’m edging towards the Celestron dx5, the main reasons are not needing a power supply of some sort which would require extra money and the ability to just easily move the scope with no need for realignment. Also a friend of mine commented that using a push to scope would also help me learn the sky rather than just clicking a target in a list to aim the scope. The only nagging doubt I have is if I’ll really miss the tracking ability, maybe I’m wanting to much and should learn to walk before I run. Im hoping to be able to buy my scope at the beginning of July as long as no big expense comes along.

Thank you all for your helpful advice. I hadn’t considered about the sharing aspect, it’s definitely something I need to think about. I suppose at least with the Starsense it wouldn’t take much to realign the scope using the app. Has any one got anymore thoughts on the actual Dx 5 scope itself?

Hi Everyone. I’ve finally decided to take the plunge and get into the wonderful world of astronomy, it’s always something I’ve been interested in the last 40 years or so. Ive read a lot of the posts in this forum which offers great advice and for the last couple of months read reviews and watched countless YouTube videos before I even started looking for a scope. The best bit of advice I’ve seen is ‘ the best scope is the one you actually use’, together with the different criteria for choosing a scope. The main thing I need is something that’s easy to store, preferably on a top shelf in the cupboard. The reason for this is the uncontrollable force of nature ‘children ’, my son still can’t seem to grasp the ‘ no kicking a ball indoors’ rule lol. With this in mind I quickly whittled down my choice down to the smaller Mak scopes, I realise that this may limit me to planets, stars and brighter DSO but that’s ok. The problem I have is deciding between a GOTO scope or a Starsense. GOTO would move to the target and track but needs alignment first, chews through batteries so would need a power supply and would need realigning if the scope is moved plus more moving parts and electronics to go wrong. Starsense again finds the target but would need to be manually moved but doesn’t track, no alignment needed, can easily be moved and less things to go wrong plus no need for a power supply. So I suppose it all boils down to tracking, is this something I’d miss? At the moment I’m more inclined to go with the Celestron Starsense Dx 5 SCT, I like the simplicity of it and also I’m lucky enough to have a dark field a few minutes walk away so it would be much easier with this scope as it doesn’t need a power supply. Sorry if I’ve rambled on a bit I just wanted to explain my reasoning and also if another beginner was having the same dilemma it might help them. So what are your thoughts? Are the two scopes I’m considering good? Am I missing an alternative solution?