wookie1965

Another great report lovely read hopefully I can get out soon. 

Wow Mike I didn't know you had a 16" I bet the views through that are amazing. 

Fabulous report cracking read the ring nebula is one of my favourite objects I would love to see the central star. 

I would love to go there looks amazing and if you get clear skies it's a bonus. 

Paul 

Great report really good read thanks for posting 

That's brilliant I have never had a good look at this constellation I have only ever looked at Kied thank you for posting I am going to write some of them down. 

Paul 

A warm welcome to SGL 

Well just come in from 7pm just started clouding over which is disappointing as wanted to get M42. 

I had already set starsense up or so I thought went to Mars nowhere in the FOV so I found it myself zoomed in then told the app I need to align it skipped through until the part you align the scope up. 

Sent it to Jupiter and got it, seeing was terrible got 3 moons I'm sure there was one right next to the planet but when I looked again it had gone. I could easily make out two bands with quite a bit of colour. 

Moon next what a sight aperture makes a difference the craters looked huge. 

Mars went up to a 4mm but it didn't look good was much better with the 8mm x150 although could not make out any surface features. 

I wanted to see M13 but it was behind my house so had to go to the double double which was just above the roof top 12mm easily split it. 

M36, M37 and M38 again aperture makes a difference using my 15mm x80 all looked brilliant the Starfish especially this is when the cloud started rolling in but had a chance go to Mars again but still the seeing stopping any surface details to pop out. 

First impressions I'm going to love using this especially if the app stays aligned couple of things I need to check collimation if needed I may change the springs on the primary and I definitely need the lacerta upgrade other than that I am really very happy with it finding objects is a doddle I do need to adjust the azimuth bearing it was a little stiff trying to turn it to get objects in. 

Paul 

10 minutes ago, paulastro said:

wookie, last night Jupiter was around 15 degrees to the W of the Moon, and I had no problem using SS to switch between the two.  Previously, I recall finding  Mars when it was closer to a virtually full Moon.  I can honestly say, in the conditions I've observed in since buying the scope in early July, the Moon has never been a problem.  In fact, in moonlight, I tend to observe open clusters as they are less affected by moonlight than galaxies and nebula and its a lot easier than finding them than it would be with a finder  in the same conditions.  My experience is that I look at objects in moonlight I wouldn't previously have done without SS.

I can't say moonlight can never be a problem, but its certainly never been a problem fior me.

Great well looks like I am going to give it a whirl if it stays clear. Thank you very much really appreciate it. 

Paul 

What is it like in bright moonlight, it is clear here at the moment but very bright I am thinking will the moon interfere with it.

I have the latest news letter from this institution it was posted on Facebook on a society page. Am I allowed to post it and is anyone interested in it.

On 24/11/2022 at 12:42, Ratlet said:

I should be getting some shafowfoam (or kaizen foam) for Christmas.  Its basically layers of foam stuck together.  You cut it it shape to fit the tool/object.  I'm not a huge fan of pick and pluck historically.

Just sent for a piece of this for my flight case £12.83 free postage cannot grumble about that.

Your Polar scope should look like this if it does as of now at this minute you would position Polaris where it is in this app. That is what I do every time and then I do a two star alignment it's good enough to hit 20/30 double stars I normally go for in a session. 

9 hours ago, woldsman said:

I’ve heard about this. My scope is quite light (71mm frac) so I feel ok about adding it & the counter weight before PA. With very heavy setups isn’t there a school of thought that the adjustment bolts can be strained. So unless you are on, say, grass  if the ground is stable your technique is safest. But for light setups, you might as well load up & just do PA once. Does this make sense!?

PS freezing fog where I am so reading the forums to avoid lamenting over the Mars opposition.

 

The bolts do bend I know because it wrecked my mount luckily a good friend on here re-engineered it for me, but I dont take any chances.

I have a EQ5 I level my mount and polar align before adding weights or scope then check it again after I have put them on. 

The first star is always a fair bit out what I do is defocus the star making it as big as possible easier to centre not having a cross hair eyepiece. 

The second and third stars will be closer and the third should be near on as it gets. 

As long as your targets are in the FOV I would not worry too much, there is a procedure you can do which is PEC training (periodic error correction) when the mount stops and the object is in the FOV press back then press on back again this time holding it down until the mount says centre object do that finishing with right and up (helps with backlash) you will find it more accurate. 

Hope this helps. 

Paul 

The little cups are for when you are looking at a bright object I. E the moon it doesn't let all the light in so you can view the moon without it being so bright. 

The let has a twist up eyecup to help if you wear glasses most eyepieces have this or a rubber eyecup. 

A warm welcome to SGL

A warm welcome to SGL

A warm welcome to SGL, as you can see I like 4" refractors as well. 

Well forecast for the next week is cloud and rain so I am stuffed

A warm welcome to SGL

A warm welcome to SGL 

7 hours ago, mapstar said:

Unsure why their is a large bit of the last post that is blank?? 

I thought that I thought you had posted photos and the phone would not load them I refreshed it 3 times. 

One of these helps with not getting into all sorts of positions to polar align, 

8 hours ago, Ricochet said:

Well I would hope that it is not 1x as that would mean it is making no difference at all. As a general rule if you screw the nose piece from a 2x barlow straight to an eyepiece it tends to work out somewhere around 1.5x but it depends on the distance between the lenses. The only way to know for sure is to time how long it takes for a star to drift from one edge to the other, or from centre to edge, with and without the barlow, and then compare the ratio. If your eyepieces have their field lenses in different positions you may have to work it out for each eyepiece. 

I was typing too fast and did not proof read it is supposed to be 1.5 and 1.25 thanks for pointing that out.

Hi I know some Barlow`s can  be unscrewed and then screwed into an eyepiece to change the power. What I want to know is my Tal barlow  the very bottom comes off and will screw into my eyepieces but what would it be X1.5,  x1  or anything in between thanks.

Paul