Steve Ward

Thank you Geoff ...

Garbage in , garbage out , one of those days ...

Dead link !

And don't forget that the mount has to withstand the tremendous forces exerted by the mindblowing "One revolution per day" that it's subjected to so don't skimp ... 🤣

Rough rendition from a very rapid capture through a misty , milky mess , hope to have another look later ...

Lovely seeing again early doors , soon went downhill but the first few sets provided plenty to stack ...

Lovely conditions first thing , shed loads of good frames collected ... The main region has grown tremendously overnight so I added today's offering to yesterday's GIF , and there's a new spot arrived too ...

Would that be Doug German .... http://astrophotographyonabudget.blogspot.com/ I mentioned his YT channel on Page 1 ...

Got that second look at 15:00 , conditions still rough but hey ... On a sad note , my trusty EOS 1000D that's done all my solar imaging for the last ten years finally threw in the towel half way through the session. She'd clocked up a pretty impressive 320,000 shutter operations so the old girl didn't owe me anything bless her ... ☹️ Replacements on their way as only one of my 'spares' can be tethered so hope the one worker lasts a week or so. And the GIF showing a decent amount of development since 06:45 this morning .

Another rough offering from the thinnest sliver of blue first thing , hoping for another bite later.

Taurus et al from 17,000BC ...

Slim pickings today ... don't venture too close ...

I'd make a full aperture filter with Baader film and some masks that you can add to reduce the aperture as and when. If you have exceptional seeing for the majority of the time the views full-bore will be magnificent , but I suspect you'll be quickly disappointed if your seeing is generally so-so. I try the Mak180Pro now and then when I think the seeing will allow it but invariably as soon as I get set up I realise that it's not worth the extra hassle , generally speaking 100mm aperture is about all the usual UK conditions allow.

Robert makes a good case for this nice little 60mm Mak ...

Had to be on it as soon as it cleared the trees with a grey blanket approaching apace. Remarkably good seeing , despite shooting through a thick haziness , which meant my exposure was at 1/100s instead of a usual 1/800s , but the seeing was good enough to let me get away with such long exposures. Stacked 90 from a rapidly grabbed 160. Was supposed to be at an outreach event this afternoon at Wicken Fen , held by Cambridge Astronomical Society , but I shan't be travelling to sit under overcast skies and the threat of thunderstorms ... ⛈️

Nice to see I wasn't the only one out grabbing some early on ... 🌞

It's fine now the clamps have been tweaked up , just the joys of seasonal movement of timber , something as a lifelong woodworker I've accepted ... I wouldn't normally store it in such a hot enviroment but it's very covenient at present and so quick to get on target that it'll stay put ...

Remarkable turn of conditions today , first four sets shot through the haze yielded very few worth looking at but a clear patch of blue was approaching followed by thicker cloud. Went and made a fresh coffee and grabbed a further two sets of 120 in the best seeing I've seen for years , thought the software had frozen in the camera as it just sat there with barely a shimmer , I actually only chucked away 50 frames from that 240 and they were all considerably better than the harvest from the first 480 ... ! And within five minutes things had returned to the usual milky wobbly mess that I'm accustomed to .

Just singles.

Awful wobbles first thing (06:00) so rather than have to stack rubbish yet again I waited an hour and had another look. Surprisingly , considering the rapidly rising temperature , things had settled down considerably and the next few sets shot gave me loads of decent frames ...

Google's a wonderful tool ... 😉 http://www.wolfi-ransburg.de/astronomie.html

Just a quick note/warning for Berlebach users . My Berlebach Planet is currently 'stored' fully rigged with the HEQ5Pro and Tal 100rs etc. in the summerhouse , ready to plonk in position for my Solar work , and obviously it's out in the full Sun for an hour or so at every opportunity. This morning I was seeing a small but steady 'drift' in a strange direction that I'd not seen before , tripod positioned in the same place as normal and pretty well aligned for my needs. A quick check revealed that the legs have dried out a little in the warmth and one was imperceptibly creeping down and causing the drift . A quick retightening of the legs cured it no problem , just an eight of a turn or so , but it could have been a pain if I hadn't spotted it ( I always get a little drift as I haven't actually polar-aligned it) So if you have one make sure you give the legs a tweak before loading it up too much this time of year ... 👍

Here you go Peter ..... https://www.astrobin.com/search/?q=+CF-APO+155+mm+f%2F8+

Another glorious morning here in Suffolk , seeing a tad better today but a milky sky all over , if it's not one thing ........ Canon EOS 1000D + Tal 100rs + 1.8x Barlow + Baader ND3.8 + Oiii , PIPP , AS!3 , Reg5 , Gimp. 122 frames stacked from 600 shot.

Good thinking Batman , never thought of that , but turning it off during capture kinda defeats the object of using it as an aiming device. Will have to look into the SkyTrack software option but I'm not sure that it's an easy option.