kirkster501

@symmetalyes true Alan. I became aware of that doing soem reading a few months ago (as you do!). However, I have not yet had a problem with the current pin arrangement and I don't want to have to take the XLR's apart and redo everything, it is all neat and heat shrinked in. If at some point I should need to do so then I will repin it. What I will tell you guys is that this box (battery) is ***HEAVY*** !

It is very small with TEC140 as well. I fancy a go at this with the Meade 14" ACF but a night good enough to support 0.33 Arcsec/pixel is rarer than dragon poo where I live.

With this object it's very hard not to posterise the colourful ring whilst simultaneously trying to drag out the outer shell.

No not cheap at all but worth it in the end. Doesn't matter how great your camera, scope etc is, it needs power....! I was powering my NEQ6 mount, G2-8300 camera, laptop, guidecam, 2 x dew heaters, motorfocus (i.e. a lot of stuff) and I'd get about 2 x 12 hour sessions from it over the winter (or more, shorter sessions) before the voltage dropped down to about 21.5v. Generally I charge it after every use. https://www.amazon.co.uk/Surplex-Drill-Titanium-Coated-Metals/dp/B07DF744DM/ref=sr_1_1_sspa?dchild=1&keywords=3PCS+HSS+Step+Bits%2C+High+Speed+Steel+Step+Drill+Bits+Set+-+(4-12mm%2C+4-20mm+and+4-32+mm)+Cone+Drill+Bits+Hole+Cutter+for+Wood%2C+Stainless+Steel%2C+Sheet+Metal+by+SS+SHOVAN&qid=1589638862&s=diy&sr=1-1-spons&psc=1&spLa=ZW5jcnlwdGVkUXVhbGlmaWVyPUEyTFFDSUM2QldNS0RRJmVuY3J5cHRlZElkPUEwOTk2OTMwQ0tQTzVGNDBRV1NFJmVuY3J5cHRlZEFkSWQ9QTAzMDU4MzIzUE1YVlZJUlNMR1NaJndpZGdldE5hbWU9c3BfYXRmJmFjdGlvbj1jbGlja1JlZGlyZWN0JmRvTm90TG9nQ2xpY2s9dHJ1ZQ== These bits. Very useful. I've subsequently used them for many things. I did not include the cost of these in the £300 I quoted above. I will draw up the digram and share it. It is very simple however. I will make a video of the box and share it on YouTube since some others have asked me about this battery box as well.

I use the ASCOM drivers for everything.

Yes true. But don't make the mistake, on a rig that had previously been guiding well, that if you get a bad guide graph one night that you have to make wholesale changes. I have learned this one the hard way. After years of trial and error and me thinking that I know better, I've found the defaults are indeed very good choices.

Sorry to miss the posts, will reply over the weekend.

You can drive yourself mad obsessing over the guide graph. Very often it is just the seeing that night.

Very difficult to process and bring out that elusive outer shell. Well done, I like your treatment of this.

.... I will put the full pic on my Dropbox tomorrow if anyone wants to see if they can improve it.

Great idea Vlaiv, I shall give that a try!

A bit noisy still due to only one hour in each of my LRGB Astrodon filters with TEC140 and Atik 460. I hope to grab more data on this. I am fascinated with this galaxy. In the close up (in the main image too), if you avert your eyes slightly, you can see the famous jet at the 2 o'clock position emanating from the Supermassive black hole in the core. You can also see a few of the larger globular clusters of which there are thousands around M87. Some of M87's largest globulars are 25 times the size of M13, making them visible at the vast distance of 60 million light years I hope you like it. You don't see this imaged on its own very much since it is a bit bland on its own.

Yeah it did have the L filter in. Good idea Olly. I am trying the paste the RGB on top of the LRGB in PS but removing the two bright PITA stars first with patch tool and a blur then pasting the RGB on top again. Will give it a go. Those two large stars in this image are impossible to control otherwise.

Really? How Olly?

I will check it again though but I am 99.999% sure the filters are in the right places.

Yes it's an Astrodon L filter. Something else I have found. HSV repair script pushes that light blue into the bright star core on the RGB giving my stars that blue tint. I need to go back and re-evaluate.

Typical example of my ongoing Abell 1656 Coma Cluster project (in progress and noisy still). LRGB blows up the stars. Thanks Olly I will try that.

Hi all is there a way to do this in PI or Photoshop for that matter? I always seem to blow out my stars when I do LRGB combination Only way I can think of is to use Starnet on the L image prior to doing LRGB combination? Appreciate your thoughts.

Is it oil or air filled primary objective? If it is air filled you can mark where the lenses join, separate them to let them dry and put them back EXACTLY like they were before. You use a peice of masking tape and make a very fine line so that you can do this. Oil filled and it has to go back to manufacturer or a professional at this. All that said, looking at your lens - from that picture at least - I would leave it the hell alone. A tiny bit at the edge will make no difference at all. OCD has no place when it comes to telescopes and cleaning and you need to learn this right now.

I have stopped using superbias. I think it causes problems. I have a dead column on my Atik 460 and the superbias (and dark with superbias subtracted) does not remove it. Regular Bias does. I have read similar stories too.

Four hours of luminance 1x1 and 100 mins each in RGB 2x2 TEC140 and Atik 460 with Astrodon LRGB filters. April 19, 20th 2020 Thanks for looking, Steve

Many thanks!

I think astronomy is over if this lot appear like what we saw tonight.

Yeah maybe. Something is amiss in my set up all of a sudden. I can't seem to guide at the Celestial equator either......

its wrecking my M100 shoot!