RobertI

Superb. Can we make this a sticky?

I think they canbe found here.

Yes, a few spring to mind that would be useful to easily reference; Paul's LL downloads, Martin's Pretty Deep Maps, Don's LL Guide. I know there was also a useful guide to stacking in LL - apologies I don't know who wrote it as I can't find it (see, there is a need!) Rob

Thanks Don, what a great piece of work, I shall enjoy reading. Rob

Thanks James and Jeremy for your interest and kind words. I think my powers of observation and description were far better then than they are now!

I managed to track down some observations I made at the time as published in 'Apollo', the quarterly magazine of Clacton Astronomical Association. The sketches haven't translated very well as the printing technology used was very basic (what do you expect for 35p?) and I think my FOV calculations are suspect. . The observations made interesting reading - apparently I saw an Aurora from Clacton, which was subsequently confirmed by the BAA. Hope it's of interest.

That's great to hear, I guess a classic never dies An 8" would have been a fantastic amatuer scope in those days, especially as a 19 year old. I think my OTA may have been Fullerscopes but the mount was definitely Charles Frank. I think mine was around £250 in1980 from Exchange & Mart.

That's a great idea James, I'm sure I could dig up enough material to make it entertaining. Thanks Jeremy, I expect my construction met a simialr fate in the end, when I left home the scope had to be sold and the observatory dismantled.

Thanks James, Finding the photo certainly brought back memories, unfortunately I don't think I have any pictures of me posing with the scope which is a real shame. I am not sure I have any original observation notes but I do have some copies of our club's monthly magazine at the time and I'm pretty sure there will be some observations in there so I shall dog them out and post later - thanks for the suggestion! By the way the glass jar still had glass around it - not a very well engineered solution really! Rob

Came across this photo of the setup I had as a young teenager back in 1980. It was a 6" reflector on a manual equatorial by Charles Frank. I was really lucky that my parents supported my passion and it was an incredible scope for someone of my age at the time. The 'run off' observatory was my Dad's own back-of-fag-packet design, made of 4x4 plywood with a felt roof - Dad and I had fun building it one weekend over the summer. It worked brilliantly and the scope lived there for 5 years. The bulbous looking counterweight was in fact a glass jar filled with cement and painted white! I'm not sure the scope was set up very well or was very good quailty but that didn't seem to deter me and I was out every clear night that I could. Hope it's of interest. Rob

Fantastic post Dom, some great result there, you can see the improvement in resolution over the Lodestar. Looking promising for the Ultrastar too. In terms of star tightness, it would be good to see a comparison of the 825 and 829 without an Ha filter as i believe the Ha has the effect of tightening the stars anyway, unless I am missing something (not unusual!). Cheers Rob

Can you post the image so we can guage how elongated and the type of elongation? Is it the same in all four corners? I seem to recall my ZS66+WO Flattener 6+Canon EOS1100D was producing slight flaring in the corners, but nothing major.

Stunning. Please keep us posted on your progress with the poster, I would pay good money to see an 8 metre version of this! In the meatime I shall have some fun tonight identifying the various DSOs on the image.

That's an impressive list! Keep it up though because your extensive ownership experiences results in some excellent advice for the rest of us. I think a post outlining the reasons behind some of your major buying/selling decisions would be really interesting and informative....if you're prepared to share one day? Rob

Ah i think i understand what you are trying to say, i think the confusion comes from when you say ".......when you look in the EP, that blue circle and everything in it, will only look the same size as red circle"; You are referring to apparent field of view but referencing a diagram which is showing actual field of view? Or am i missing something? So just to be clear a 0.63 reducer will increase the actual field of view? Rob

Hi Russell, this has confused me somewhat! I realise that using a 0.63 reducer will not change the apparent field of view, ie: 40 degrees will remain 40 degrees, but surely it will change the actual field of view, ie: lower magnification means wider actual field of view? Rob

Nice report. It does look like a very carefully thought out package with some nice touches. Well built too from what you say.

The Celestron 0.63 Focal Reducer will increase the field of view significantly. A lot of SCT users have this for visual (I have one). They can be had for only £99 from FLO. I echo Ronin's concern about the ability of the single arm to solidly support the scope. They didn't offer a 9.25 on the old SE single arm, and even if it is beefed up on the Evo, the 9.25 is 9kg compared to 5.5kg for the C8; a LOT heavier. I'd research carefully before buying. Rob

Welcome back to the 66 fold Chris! Congratulations on your purchase. My 66D still doing good service, in fact I have just bought a Horizon Tripod for some quick grab and go with either of the two WOs.

I have a superb pair of Bausch and Lomb Classic 10x50s. They have a pretty wide field of 7.5 degrees and an extremely bright image. The stars are not pin sharp to the edges but I have had some very impressive deep sky views and have not found another pair of 10x50s as good, although I have never had the opportunity to compare it to really top quality binocs.

You guys continue to impress! I can see this developing in to the 'one stop shop' for imaging and observing preparation.