RobertI

On 17/09/2022 at 13:10, WilliamAstro said:

I have checked the mount again and even set it back to factory default and still, I think the motor is pretty much had it.

3 hours ago, lvan said:

@RobertI had a similar issue with his Skyprodigy which is the same class mount. I believe he replaced the motor for £40-ish and all good again, I assume it still is as it’s still listed in his signature. Maybe this is something you could explore.

Correct @Ivan well spotted. Yes I did have exactly the same issue with my SkyProdigy which I believe has many of the same internals. I replaced the azimuth motor and it solved the problem, works smoothly and quietly now. I can’t honestly remember what troubleshooting I did but I thought it was worth a go for £40. Obviously can’t guarantee that’s the problem but seems to be a common problem. Changing the motor was actually pretty straight forward from memory - I think I just ‘winged’ it in the end and I’m not a technical expert and only have limited tools. I’ll see if I can dig out the relevant threads. 

11 hours ago, Paz said:

but I do have some epic sessions now amd again with the eq5.

Yes I will try again sometime (possibly without BVs) as I don’t recall previous sessions being so problematic. 
 

17 minutes ago, Davesellars said:

learnt finding targets with the EQ5 mount (8" SCT on it) and bought an Alt/Az quite some years after. 

Exactly the same here. I ‘grew up’ with EQs and only bought my first AltAz about eight years ago, so was surprised and disappointed with my EQ session. I think the final straw (which I didn’t previously mention) was that the RA motor seems to have developed a vibration issue which turns stars into small dashes and wipes out any planetary detail!!! Some investigations required. 

2 hours ago, Nyctimene said:

Congrats for spotting the Crescent. Compared to it, the Veil is easy. It's almost always visible only with averted vision and O III in my SQM-L 21+ skies, even with the big dob. To locate it is not as easy as well. Look for a trapezium of 6 - 8 mag stars (HD 192536; HR 7752; HD 192766 and HD 192422). The last one is very close to the variable star RS Cyg, which glows in distinct orange colour. When you have found it, you can be sure to be on the right track. 20 arc min to the SW the three stars that are embedded in 6888 are now easily to locate. You'll need dark skies and good transparency and a low to medium power eyepiece. Hth.

Stephan

Thanks Stephan, and a useful description of the area. I found a really good finder chart for the crescent which helped me find it first time, and I know the starfield fairly well now which I think really helps me to know where to look and what to look for. What I really want to do is take my C8 to a really dark site and see if I can do better. There’s still some time left this year!

2 hours ago, Kon said:

Nice session and report. Likewise, I was disappointed with the Crescent last year when I first observed it. The blinking is worth retrying. Don't use a filter as you can have it come and go with averted vision; with your OIII it's directly visible.

Thanks! I’m pretty sure I have seen this neb before a while ago so I was perplexed to not have found it. I will get some detailed finder charts and try again!

Just had a nice session of mainly DSOs and Jupiter. Good seeing tonight! More details here: 

Beautifully transparent so I thought I’d try some DSOs with the 102ED - almost went with the C8, but didn’t really want the additional hassle. The Veil was beautiful as always with the Oiii - both east, west and Pickering wisp clearly visible. I then spent some time on my nemesis the Crescent, and could eventually make out a very faint oval glow with a brighter corner with the Oiii. Pretty much the same as previous attempts. Why this is called a ‘bright nebula’ is beyond me! Then onto NGC7027 sometimes known as the Pink Pillow nebula. I found it using the blinking method with the Oiii filter. At low mags it didn’t look much but when I zoomed in to around 200x I could make out a clear oblong shape with ill defined edges - unexpected! I then failed to find the Catseye and the Blinking planetaries which was disappointing. Before packing away, I thought I’d have a go at Jupiter and was amazed to see how good the seeing was. In went the binoviewers and I was treated to five minutes of wonderful photographic like detail, with textures I just don’t normally see. The seeing went wobbly again so I thought it was a good time to stop while I had some good memories. 

6 hours ago, Mr Spock said:

My EQ-5 couldn't be easier. Plonk it outside aligned with the patio slabs (my garden face due west exactly) and switch it on. That's it! Just undo the clamps to swing it around to where it needs to be, adjust the eye piece angle - my 102 has a rotatable focuser so being seated I can always get the eyepiece at eye level - and we are go.

A few nights ago I spent a couple of hours looking at Jupiter. Not having tracking would have done my head in.

I nudge can't tweak im-nudge-ag-tweak-ine faff us-tweak-ing nudge a nudge alt-tweak-az nudge... too much nudging, tweaking and faffing.

It was actually seeing your 102ED on your EQ5 that inspired me to have a go! I think the experience was made worse for me for some additional reasons:

• My mount is slightly stiff and ‘sticky in both axes making pushing to the right part of the sky more of a problem.
• The BVs are tall and heavy and made the changing orientation/angle both slightly nerve wracking and more of a pain.
• The mount was possibly set a bit low with the result that there was possibly more ‘low flying’ than should have been necessary
• My old non-goto is VERY slow to slew (max 8x), so can only be used for tracking and fine centering - no ‘fast slewing’ with my setup!

There are some additional things you can do with a manual altaz which you can’t do with an eq like lift the whole thing up to reposition the legs so they don’t get in the way!

Perhaps I’ll give it another go with my other CG5 which is goto and slightly better set up. 🙂

5 hours ago, RobertI said:

Trying out the old non-goto CG5 to see if the convenience of tracking outweighs the hassle of an eq

The verdict is in: 

I’ve just come in from a session, mainly observing Jupiter. Unfortunately seeing wasn’t fabulous, although I could see the GRS and some festoons and some lovely colour. For the first time in a LONG time I used my old non-goto CG5 equatorial mount to see whether tracking would improve my observing of Jupiter. Eq mounts can take a little more time to set up over an altaz and can be awkward to use, but I thought the tracking might be worth it. I was quite excited to get then CG5 out again after so long and I was reminded of the great times I had with my 6” newt on an Eq mount when I first started out decades ago, so I was hopeful.  Well, having spent a couple of hours tonight using the 102ED on my CG5, I have a verdict; if I am concentrating on just one object, eg planets or moon, and I need my hands free to sketch, then yes it’s worth it. But if I am not going to sketch and I have hands free to nudge or twist slo mos, then it’s not worth it. And if I am going to be viewing several objects in different parts of the sky, then it’s a monumental pain in the butt! The variation in height, odd eyepiece angles and twisting of the focuser needed, was just a pain. And at one point the binoviewers ended up at an angle and immediately twisted round and ended up pointing to the ground because something was not tight enough  - thank heavens it was firmly attached to the diagonal! Perhaps if I used the CG5 every session, I might be happier to use it, but it was so clunky to use compared to altaz mounts, I’m not sure I’ll be rushing to use it again! 

Super sketch, nice rendition of the transit. 👍

Nice report Stu, lovely pics too. I love the shot of the tripod flat on the ground - it looks like it’s having a little rest! 

Not quite dark, but ready for some fun with Jupiter. Trying out the old non-goto CG5 to see if the convenience of tracking outweighs the hassle of an eq. 🙂

On 16/09/2022 at 09:43, markse68 said:

There’s one tonight/Sat morning (starts 1am) complete with GRS, and the forecast is clear 😃 

 

A crying shame, it was clear but I am laid low with a cold and was just too tired. 🙁 Hope everyone else enjoyed it. 🙂

Some really great thoughts there, thanks everyone, I knew eyepieces would generate a lot of discussion, in fact I was a little worried about unearthing a hornet’s nest! 🙂

The truth is I am very curious about eyepieces and would love to see whether a super-wide-field would give me that wow, or whether edge-to-edge sharpness improves my viewing pleasure. With my scopes I’ve always been very clear on what I want to achieve with my observing before buying - I think the 102ED was the only scope where I bought for other reasons - namely to treat myself to something a bit more ‘premium’ and to see if what everyone said about them was true. Well the 102ED turned out to be a resounding success, so perhaps I should just try the same experiment with a new eyepiece and see where it goes ……. surely just one little eyepiece can’t hurt? 😉

@Louis D you’ve actually got enough eyepieces to play eyepiece top trumps! Each eyepiece can compete on:
 

• Cost (the more expensive the better)
• Number of elements (the more the better)
• Field of view
• Edge correction
• On axis detail
• Focal length (the shorter the better) 
• Eye relief 
• Weight
• Rarity

Let me know how you get on. 🙂

30 minutes ago, Louis D said:

Nothing wrong with you wrt eyepieces.  To each their own.  I must be going now, or I'll be late for my EA (EyepieceAholics Anonymous) meeting: 😉

That’s hilarious! But I’m also jealous. This is so confusing. 

I think one of my issues is that I have quite a few scopes, so I am often swapping between scopes and eyepieces, so it’s never a case of “this is a terrible eyepiece” as it might have some aberrations in my F5 Newt but be fine in my F7 refractor and really good in my F10 SCT! Also, I can’t think of many times when I’ve been observing and the edge of field aberrations actually matter, it’s usually the object in the middle that is important. Wide field Milky Way sweeping and large objects are the exception I guess. But I totally get why some people are more sensitive to aberrations and other issues. If I had just one main scope, I might be more motivated to get say three or four premium perfectly matched eyepieces. Perhaps the key is to start trimming down my telescope collection! 😆

31 minutes ago, JeremyS said:

This will do nothing for you then, Rob 🤣

Strangely enough, it was seeing a review of this very eyepiece which started my whole thought process about eyepieces!! 

Ok, perhaps the title is a bit of an exaggeration, but I have never been that excited by eyepieces, and I’m wondering why. Do I get excited by telescopes? Most definitely. Mounts? Oh yes, some lovely mounts out there, a Rowan AZ75 is definitely on my list. But not eyepieces. With my new 102ED refractor (admittedly not ‘premium’) with its fancy FPL53 glass, I have considered a new premium eyepiece, but I’ve struggled to find a good case for the spend. I know that the best eyepieces have fewer aberrations, less scatter, etc, but from what I’ve read there is very little difference in what you can actually SEE. And I recall one famous reviewer who said he could make out very little difference between a premium eyepiece and a cheaper zoom when viewing the planets. I bought a couple of Baader Hyperions at least 10 years ago, and have supplemented them with a BST, a Baader Zoom and a OVL Panoptic for wide field, and I have been neither delighted or disappointed by any of them, they do the job, but none have transformed my viewing pleasure. My binoviewer did, but that’s another story! So am I missing out on a whole world of eyepiece pleasure? What am I doing wrong? 🙂

14 hours ago, lvan said:

I work on a laptop all day

Me too, and strangely enough this is one of the reasons I was attracted to EAA, as I found the post-processing aspect of imaging too much after a long week of using the laptop. I do use the laptop for EAA in the field though, so I’m afraid I can’t share my experiences of video astronomy. Sounds like a nice relaxing way to do EAA though. 

Beautiful. Will give this a go. 👍

Nicely described. Sounds like you have been through quite a journey to get your perfect setup. There is definitely a 12” dob in my future…..

On 11/09/2022 at 23:25, Mr Spock said:

This scope, purchased the end of last year, is what finally gave me back my astro mojo. With the addition of the 12" Dob, I've been out more times this year than in the previous ten.

This is combination of scopes which I aspire to. I have one, just need the other. 🙂 I too have really loved having my 102ED and it’s added a whole new dimension to my observing - more so than any other scope I have owned. I think it’s the fact that it really has no foibles mechanically or optically (unlike most mirror scopes) - there is really no sense of compromise. As for the views, it produces perfect stellar views, and performs impossibly well on solar system. And wide field. Oh, and it’s really portable! What was it about the scope that helped get your mojo back @Mr Spock? 

That’s no mean feat sketching a big glob and actually getting the detail there. Fantastic, well done. 

3 hours ago, ScouseSpaceCadet said:

Oh I dunno... The black and white contrasts well... 😉

 

The Starfield is a very nice looking scope Spock. I hope somebody has one or a variant at Astrocamp I can try. 🧐

 Very nice too. Unfortunately my CG5 is sort of dark grey, so doesn’t match anything, but it’s mostly in the dark so doesn’t matter I guess! Perhaps I’ll set it up and take a pic - see if we can turn this into a “Show us your 102 ED on an equatorial mount” thread! 😆