RobertI

Very nice sketch, an almost identical view to when I sketched it the other day (your sketch is nicer though!)

I saw it was clear on my drive home but it had clouded over by the time I was ready to observe. Shame because the seeing looked good. I think we may have some clear nights coming up though.

Thanks for the idea, I do have a ND filter so I will give it a go. 👍 You’ve reminded me that I have a load of colour filters too which I can try too.

It was a special moment, my first brand new scope in twenty years and a quality piece of engineering that feels special. Looking through the almost invisible lens and down into the blackened and baffled tube is a wonderful sight. Really looking forward to first light. Thanks for the encouragement, your positive comments sealed the deal. 🙂 I’ll probably start a separate thread to share my experiences. 👍

After waiting two months for a Skywatcher ED100, still no sign of delivery, so I cancelled order and bought one of these beauties. Arrived next day. A very solid and well made piece of kit. Hope it performs as well as it looks. Can't wait to try it out.

Thanks Mike. I’m really motivated to continue this, inspired in no small part by your excellent drawings and maps.

Thanks. If you still need templates, you're welcome to use mine. They show the following phases - 85%, 90%, 95%, 98% and 100%. I reduce them to about 50cms on to a printed sheet of A4 (50cms circle size seems to be the commonly recommended size).

An impressive rig then! The outer shell is coming through nicely, looking forward to seeing part 2 (if you end up going for more data).

Crikey John, that's a top quality image. Well done! I bet you had fun processing that. Can you say anything about the equipment and exposures? Edit: Just seen the level of detail you can get from zooming in the full image - extraordinary.

I've been observing for many years but last night was my first attempt to capture the red planet on paper. A nice night too as Mars was very close the the 90% waning moon.The seeing was unfortunately poor, even at the end of the session, but there were brief moments of relative calm which helped tease out some detail, but not the best night. The result over a period of 90 minutes is shown below. Rather underwhelming I know, but a start, and I can only get better I hope! C8, x200, Seeing: Poor, altitude: 37 degrees max Observing notes The main dark feature is Mare Sirenum, it initially started as a dark 'seagull' shape, but it eventually became apparent that the whole lower hemisphere was dark with the seagull shape even darker. Apparently Olympus Mons was also visible but I could not see it. I think I timed it to see one of the most featureless faces of the planet! The polar ice cap is ringed rather than doing a full blow shading with a white patch. Would it be cheating to pre-prepare a coloured template with the ice cap already shown in white and then shade in the dark areas and rub out the light areas during observing? A screen shot from Sky Guide as a comparison (mirrored). For info I only consulted maps/apps only after the session so I was not influenced. Although I have a number of apps and Maps of Mars I found there was no single map that did the job, it was a case of looking at a number of them. Do other people have this problem? What do people use? Equipment From previous experience I felt the C8 was the best scope for the job so I put it on my simple non-goto driven CG5 equatorial mount at a height to allow me to sit - I have to say being seated and having the scope tracking made life so much easier and I don't think I could have observed for 90 minutes (on and off) with my usual setup of standing using a non-driven altaz mount! I also briefly tried the Tal100RS and the 150PL as a comparison. The C8 clearly revealed the most detail of the three but the colour through the TAL was a glorious deep red and still showed some detail - on a night of good seeing I think it could reveal a lot. After observing through the C8 for 90 minutes, Mars seemed white and the red colour was barely apparent!

I was coincidentally reading “Observational Astronomy” this morning and this information appeared in the chapter on Observing Mars. Hope its still relevant 👍

Nice illustration from Stu. Another way to look at it is a feature will be in the same position 37 minutes later each night, so you can concentrate on one feature for a couple of weeks if you are prepared to stay up late! It will take 5.5 weeks for the feature to be back in the same place at the same time.

Never cleaned my RC6 mirror (I've had it around 5 years) but it rarely gets used and is pretty well wrapped. Never cleaned my Heritage 130P mirror (had it around 3 years) but it does get used more often and is more prone to dust and would probably benefit from a light wash to remove dust and grime - which I may attempt soon. Of course the mirror of my 20 year old SCT has never been touched and is as pristine as the day I bought it!

My first scope as a teenager back in 1980 was a 6" F8 newtonian. What is the best all round scope now for a beginner? I reckon a 6" F8 Dobsonian! (or possibly an 8" F6 dobsonian)

Useful insight into your process, thanks!

Excellent sketch. 👍

Looks like a good fit, where did you get the case?

For everyone's interest I tried several suppliers and the only one who answered the phone was Rupert at Astrograph. An extremely helpful chap who told me a lot about the Tecnosky scope, and confirmed it was the same as the TS and AA scopes. I really wanted to give him my business but I just felt the Altair Astro scope was the safer bet. But I will look to purchase from him in future. The lens is from Kunming United Optics. It is FPL-53 (he indicated it is likely to be better quality glass than the SW) with a Lanthanum mating element. What I didn’t realise is that Lanthanum is a coating which increases the refractive index rather than a glass type ...at least that what he said! Perhaps someone more knowledgable can explain.

Thanks all for your positive comments folks. I think I’ll have a lot of fun using the scope and get a lot of pleasure from owning it. If it’s anywhere near as good as the Vixen ED102SS I’ll be a happy bunny. 👍 In anticipation of its arrival I have bought a used 2” Astronomik UHC filter to go with the 38mm Panaview. Hoping this will be nice for larger nebs. I think I need to stop spending now! 😬 ...although I do need a padded bag.....

Well I’ve been told around 5 days (by Harrison Telescopes who I ordered from) - they place the order with AA who I know AA are on hols and will have a backlog when they return so I am not expecting it to be quick. I am also fully expecting somewhere along the line to be told that it’s not in stock after all! I’m not expecting a smooth ride but will be pleasantly surprised if it is.

After much consideration, I have been brave and pulled the trigger ....... https://www.altairastro.com/starwave-102ed-r-fpl53-refractor-459-p.asp We’ll see what happens next!

Been struggling with the Crescent, I've seen it, but it's been very faint and underwhelming - I probably need to try a dark sky and a different scope.

You're not wrong there! Big red is an amazing looking scope - beautiful and sleek but bred for a single terrible purpose - to kill Planets!

Interestingly the TS version make a big deal about the 'Lanthan' (assume Lanthanum) mating element. None of the others (Altair or Tecnosky) even mention it. I have included this question in my emails to Altair/Harrison/Astrograph to double check. I fear the responses will be "we don't know". Although the review by @Paz was glowing, it did ram home the limitations of the aperture. I musn't expect too much from this class of scope! I think I am the kind of astronomer who will make the best of any scope I have and use it on objects for which it is best suited, and push the limits for fun, so I know I will use it and enjoy it. It's just that £900 is a lot of cash, nearly ten times what I paid for my (admittedly used) 150PL! However, none of my scopes are perfect and they all have their foibles, either the design or the build quality, some more irritating than others. The one exception is probably my zenithstar 66mm - a beautifully engineered tiny ED frac! So I am still hopeful that a 100mm ED frac will both fill a gap in my collection and meet my desire for a foible free, high quality frac with that super-contrast and 'perfect' stars! My impossible quest continues.....

Thanks for that. I have actually just read your review of the scope from when you bought it and it made interesting reading. Thanks for heads up - I couldn't actually see any stock indicator but I have fired out an email to them and Harrison who also appear to have it in stock. Unfortunately Altair are on holiday this week! Too true! But I am getting plenty of envouragement.