Jarvo

It’s bigger brother is reviewed in the August Sky at Night Magazine. It gets a good review. Its a work of art - I went to view one at Rother Valley Optics. I really don’t think you would be disappointed if you bought one (especially if the accessories are all the same colour ). In the end I opted for an esprit 100 because I got the accessories included (finder/diagonal/ flight case). Let us know what you decide Jarvo

I sure do Louise. It’s the first eyepiece I use on an evening. When I first bought it it was the lowest mag I could practically use and having a mak ie a slower scope meant I didn’t need a nagler or a panoptic at the time (yes I am a slave to the green and black). Now with the Esprit 100 it’s made it the biggest finder scope in the world but still fabulous to use for wide field stuff. Im currently waiting like a crouching tiger for a TV sale to kick off as I’ve got my eye on an Ethos Sx Jarvo

There’s no such thing as too many Bubbles on this hallowed Site Rodd. To my eyes it’s perfect. Cracking image. Jarvo

Ok so I need to quantify that upfront. I bought the Esprit specifically because the big boys were too far south for the next few years and wanted to turn my attention to astrophotography. The Esprit is billed as an astrograph but I think it is a very capable bit of kit for visual use (the Moon looks fab and my Retinas are healing nicely). Anyway I wanted to see how big a disk was created so I fired up the Esprit with an 8mm Radian giving me a whopping 68x Power. And guess what I was pleasantly surprised by the size of the disk which may well make my 150 Mak even more redundant when Jupiter and Saturn return. As for detail well the observatory’s lower frame means the lowest declination is slightly higher than where Jupiter is. This means that when I defocus I literally have a sliver of light to work with. No belts or Red spots but I could just make out the Galilean Satellites. So whilst is sit envious of Mr Astrovanis extraordinary images I will remain crouched for another couple of years until Jupiter peeps over my observatory door again. And we’ve got a decent Mars opposition next year haven’t we? Thanks for looking. Jarvo

Love it. Can you push those wavelets in Registax a bit further? Looks like there’s more detail lurking in there. Jarvo

Where have the last 10 years gone ! Jarvo

See if you can tweak the gain and brightness settings in the capture software as the images look a bit dark. Im at nearly the same latitude 52 degrees and given up on Jupiter and Saturn for a couple of year but that’s mainly due to the observatory doors hampering the view. Jarvo

These images never fail to impress. Great work! Jupiter is too low down to clear my observatory window at the moment jarvo

Like that! jarvo

Love a good Bubble! Brilliant image. Jarvo

Hi SAW. Think we may have the same Mak I’ve put mine away for now as the planets are too low down but I used to get some similar results. Apologies if I’m teaching you to suck eggs but that image looks like the “before” stacked image before you tweak the wavelets in Registax. I’d process in registax only, use about 80% of the frames then adjust the top 2 wavelets the most and the remainder by only small tweaks. Don’t overprocess As for barlows I’ve tried em all (x2 apo, x2.5 powermate, x5 powermate) . The only one that gave me the best results was the x2 apo. Even the 2.5 drowned out the detail. Altitude is going to be a huge factor. Like I said I packed my Mak away and bought a refractor. Maybe not sell it because it will come into its own in a couple of years when Jupiter and Mars return (Saturn’s going to take years for us int North). Cheers Jarvo

I’ve got the 8mm and it’s great. Hope you like it. Jarvo

My beloved Esprit 100... Jarvo

It’s a testament to this groups resourcefulness that a workaround solution has been found to this issue. I ended up getting new rings from OVL. I still think Skywatcher need to step up here. They are at the end of the day supplying kit that could fail catastrophically (this kit ain’t cheap). The stockists are great (Rother VO sorted me out) and FLOs reputation goes without saying. FLO - can’t you feed this back to Skywatcher? Jarvo

Hi Hamey. I had the same problem you essentially have two options 1) get in touch with your stockist and get replacement rings almost certainly via OVL. I did this and they swapped the with minimum fuss and the new ones are fine. Alternatively you can line the existing rings with adhesive Velcro. I’d go with the first option. You’ve spent a lot of dosh on your scope. Let’s know how you get on.