johninderby

The Neodynium filter is also my favourite for lunar. Really helps bring out the details and gives the moon a nice neutral colour. No off tinges. ?? BTW everyone on this forum is always ready to help you empty your bank account. ?

Explore Scientific 2x Focal Extender and a Batinov mask. Sold the 3x Fri aft and the 2x replacement arrived promptly from FLO.

Yes that’s the one. Same filter just dropped the Moon & Skyglow bit from the name on the filter recently. The original,Moon & Skyglow didn’t have the IR cut but then it became the Moon & Skyglow & IR Cut. Find it gives a natural colour as well.

The Baader Contrast Booster filter is OK but find the Baader Moon & Skyglow is an even better planetary filter particularily on Jupiter. Have you tried the Moon & Skyglow for planetary? Had both filters but ended up selling the Contrast Booster.

So this isn’t on your wish list then. ? https://www.ioptron.com/product-p/9501.htm

Works great on my Bresser. John

Replacement dew shield to fit my Skymax 180 from FLO. Astrozap changed the sizing of the one that used to fit without telling the dealers so the one previously sent by FLO wasn’t the right size. Anyway all sorted now and FLO included a Celestron Elements TrekCel 3300 - Torch / Power Pack free of charge to make up for the inconvieience. Good of them as the “mistake” wasn’t their fault in the first place. ? John

Warm and sunny day again and not a sign of rain. Garden needs some rain soon. 28 tomorrow and warmer on the weekend. John

Opticstar manual filter wheel. Wasn’t expecting much at the price but thought it would do for now. Surprisingly nice bit of kit though. Well made and moves smoothly and easily and clicks positively into each position. Great value. However the one bit I didn’t care for was the eyepiece holder. One of those types with a single screw. Had a TS one with compression ring though that screwed right on. Now will do me for a while. ? Oh yes will need something to fill it with. ? Will just have to see what the postman brings. ?

Looks like it just might be a pier. ?

Yes the 24 Pan just hits that sweet spot I think. ? Also really like the 26 Nagler but bigger and heavier.

The 24 is my favourite Panoptic. ?

c'est arrivé The ZWO ASI 290MM Mini USB 2.0 Mono Camera arrived this afternoon. Was due Monday but not to complain. ? Now just to wait for the USB hub to arrive from Amazon tomorrow. Tablet won’t power the camera so need a powered hub. John

Still waiting for the new camera but in the meantime bits arrived for mounting the tablet on the mount. Nice CNC aluminium adjustable tablet mount. Don’t trust the cheaper plastic ones. Ball head used for adjusting the tablet to the right angle and tilt. John

Yes I think you’re right. Closeup of a flower with the prisim.

Did some testing with a prism and there was CA which wasn’t there with the regular dielectric diagonal. It’s a very good prism as well. So it looks like prisims aren’t well suited to this scope. ?

Been playing around with the AR102xs in the daytime to see how suitable it would be for nature observing as it looks like being a great little travel scope. Turns out it actually is quite usable and CA is not a real problem even though it is a fast little refractor. Took a few pics using my smartphone and they were not half bad. Every bird and cat etc seems to have abandoned the area for the afternoon so lamp posts, buildings and foliage it is. ? Will stick an erect prism in it and try a few more shots later. John

What I’m finding is it can be used for lunar and planetary and gives pleasing views and the CA is so minor that it doesn’t bother me. So while it is naturally a wide field scope it is good enough for general observing.which is what will make it a great travel,scope as it can be used for any type of observing even if it’s not the ideal scope for everything.

Lucky you. ?

One problem with a new scope like this is that so few have actually got their hands on one that most opinions are based on supposition not fact. Yes it’s no APO but it is still a nice well,built scope with decent optics and very well priced. Lot of negative opinion on CN from those that haven’t actually looked through one. Lot of good people on CN but plenty of self appointed “experts” as well that are anything but. ? Remember a while ago reading widespread opinion on CN that the Carton 100 f/13 optics were just cheap low quality optics no better than the cheapest Chinese stuff. Then someone on CN actually took a look through a Skylight scope and found out how wrong they were.

It’s the aluminium plate with the name of the scope stuck on one side. Just irritated me for some reason so off it came. ?

Tried the Explore Scientific 3x focal extender today and find it suits this scope & wedge perfectly. Using the 7.2 - 21.5 zoom eyepiece at lowest mag the full disk of the sun just fited in the FOV and the image was still clear at max mag. Pefect match. ? The extender wouldn't fit all the way into the eyepiece holder and bottomed out so took a Baader T2 15mm extension piece and ground three slots to fit over the three screws in the top of the eyepiece holder so it would screw on properly. Nice neat solution that looks factory. The TS wedge comes with their own version of a continuum filter and quite frankly can't tell any difference between it and the Baader. Performs exactly the same. Impressed with this scope every time I use it. The optics are definitely better than a plain achro with very little if any distortion and almost no CA if you're usng a decent diagonal. Perhaps it should be called a Semi ED? Hmmm reminds me of the old Semi APO discussuions (arguments?) of a few years ago. ?

Well first light.....sort of. Sun peeped through the clouds for about a miniute. Just enough time to align the solar finder and take a quick look at the sun. Have about 20mm infocus travel to spare and sun was the same green as a Baader continuum filter. Then of course the clouds spoiled everything. Oh well at least the first glimpse seem’s promising. ? John

Just had to drill a couple of holes in the tube. Focuser comes off easily and stuffed a small towel inside the tube to stop any bits getting on the objective and put some wide masking tape below where the holes would be drilled to catch any bits as the fell. Then afterwards pat down the inside of the tube with masking tape to collect any residual bits. The stock bracket screws on just behind where the new bracket fits. Did some lamp post observing this aft to check CA but virtually nil as you can see in this pic. Rubbish pic as it was taken holding a camera to the eyepiece but gives the idea. Think it will made a great wide field scope. John

Bought the Manfrotto geared tripod and 405 geared head years ago. Just out of interest looked up the current prices and was shocked to find the total would now be about £860.00. And I thought astro gear had shot up in price!!!! The 405 head has been modified to remove the centre section thus making it an alt/az head. Note the size of the wedge compared to a Skywatcher Dielectric 1.25" diagonal.