Space Hopper

Not me then.......!! 😉

Not me then......!! 😉

Make that 140mm......😉

It looks superb ! A great buy 👍🏼 The Vixen mount / Berlebach combi look nice too.....

Paid and ordered mine mid June. Marcus quoted me a 6 to 8 week delivery (from then) so possibly mid August, but hopefully a bit before. Jupiter and Saturn should be nice targets by then.

Shocked at saddened to hear this news. Bound to be arson in this day and age i'm afraid 😠 I have seen an appeal page somewhere, and if i can locate it, i will gladly donate.

2026 seems a long way off. Where we'll be by then i often shudder to think.

@Quetzalcoatl72 that eclipse image has come out a treat. Nice one. I had 10 sec out of the entire event to grab mine, poorly focused and rather over exposed. (i won't share it on here....😃)

Antares is to me a bright red / orange kaleidoscope. Possibly due to having Derby directly to my south and close by, so i have to see through all the pollution and plumes coming off it. M4 though, makes a good second prize. Its one i try for every season (like Sirius !) but no luck so far. The same story with Trap E, F stars i'm afraid. 54 year old eyes don't help much either. I'd love to be able to study Scorpius and Sagittarius in detail as they are my favourite constellations, but its not to be i'm afraid.

Yes a Feathertouch. In for a penny, in for a pound. Yes, the GPC is definitely needed for high power, but not for low. With my 24mm @ 27x i can nicely frame M45 into the field of view. My scope is the F6.2 version.

The refractor in question is currently going modification. Its current 2.5" focuser has a drawtube length of 90mm, and will allow focus with a bino sans GPC. However, with the 2.6x gpc in place i run out of focus to where the focuser is fully racked out. I can get it to focus by pulling the whole rig out and unseating it about 10mm or so but this is far from ideal. I'd imagine a 2" diagonal and big 2" glass would be a similar situation, although i don't currently have any 2" eyepieces to test that. The focuser on my scope has its limitations, so i'm upgrading it for something more robust ; not just for binoviewing, but for future imaging plans as well.

Maybe a SW Esprit 100 ? That should give you the wide field views you are after ?

I remember toying with the idea of buying a Canon EF100mm Macro lens a few years ago. It was a nice lens and well specified and used to hover around the £550 - £700 price range before it went up towards £800 ish if memory serves me correctly. And this was only a couple of years ago. The same lens in the new RF mount is retailing at close to £1500 😟 !! Which basically means they have now lost me as a potential customer.

They are out and about, but they are very, very expensive.

I went for the Baader Planetarium version. A bit expensive, but you get what you pay for with Baader. https://www.firstlightoptics.com/solar-filters/baader-coolceramic-herschel-wedge-solar-diagonal.html Also for me, the Baader system has the T2 compatibility, meaning its easily adaptable for bino-viewing. And binoviewing the sun, like the moon, gives extra special views.

Fingers x'ed for a good showing 😀

Nil points again........😄 Talk about a hiding to nothing. You know things are bad when Israel finish way ahead of us. (i missed it all ; i was a work. Best place)

Happy retirement. Think of all that potential extra time for astronomy 😀 (if it ever stops raining)

I've really enjoyed all of the meetings i've attended. I've missed a fair few as i often work Sundays. But thanks to FLO for putting them on. If i had to pick a format with a view to keep them continuing, i'd go for the monthly or option with a bit of rejigging as you suggest.

Afaic, where optics are concerned, the Russians know what they are doing. Tried and tested, and world class. Enough said.

Its an amazing object and a great capture with it being so low down. I've seen it a couple of times from Boa Vista, Cape Verde islands (Lat 16ºN) and it looks similar naked eye to what M32 Andromeda looks from a dark site here in the UK.

Sorry to hear of your Taks unfortunate demise. Interested to know more about what happened : was you using a Vixen or Losmandy type dovetail ?

+1 for the tube rings. They look very smart.

And one of the best things about the design Gary is you'll find it much quicker to cool down and reach ambient temperature. My own 140 cools quicker than any other scope i've ever owned before. Thats a major plus for grab and go observing.

I know they did a FLT123mm version for a while that used a fast F6 LZOS optic that was a great imaging scope. But i don't recall a 110 LZOS, only the TEC version.