StarryEyed

Sound lighting effects its free. Go see.
Close up.

Full moon and I never took a photo from the Dark Side before.

Its so good. I spent over an hour in the room. Twice I tried to leave but couldnt bring myself to do it.

An Airbus works better than an ADC with less chance of cloudy skies...

On 27/12/2018 at 03:23, Brian Nordstrom said:

My R100L on its Super polaris mount , this is a very good telescope , the newer chinese 114mm Newt's on the to small EQ2's could learn a lot from this beautiful setup .

 

Brian.

Such a good looking telescope.

When I dropped my Televue 32mm Plossl on a concrete floor and when picking it up saw the eye lens had cracked my bottom lip came out and a tear formed in the corner of my eye. That was more than ten years ago and I have never forgotten the feeling I had as it hit the floor. I used it in an 80f5 and I had so much fun with these two. I remember using them on the Canary islands and the wide view and contrast took my breath away, never forgot that view either.

Another point of view is. So what if it gets weathered as long as it gets used.

I gave up on imaging and complicated setups. Grab and go scope is on the mount in the garage and I can pickthe whole lot up and move it through the door out side and be viewing in a couple of minutes. I can then roll out the extention for the mount if I want or grab a couple more eyepiece from the case. No goto computers, no polar alignment or finding alignment stars.

A setup time of zero no keypads or missed opportunities.

12 hours ago, MattJenko said:

....

 

Hope that's the spare room.

Having looked through this thread a few times I have come to realise two things.

The number of people using altz is far more than I realised.

From an asthetic point of view. Refractors and rings are like cars and wheels. The right wheels can make a car in the same way the right rings can make a scope. My WO is eleven years old and I have been using a SW plate and green Vixen rings which have worked.  Its been a good scope and looking here at some of the beautiful scopes I realised  deserves better. 

So I have bought WO rings yesterday from APM  and a WO plate from FLO both half price (ish) in their sales. I have also done a bit of house keeping and maintenance.

Photos? you think. Well I also realise that refractors are or can be quite photogenic and I don't think that store room, garage or living room photos do them any favours or at least show them at their best. So a I will wait for a sunny day wipe the smudges off with a cloth and take a couple for the family album. Until then thanks you've been an inspiration.

I will post this one my old 80f5 from twelve years ago. 

On 02/10/2016 at 14:58, moriniboy said:

Just taken this year's insurance photo and looking at my post last year 10/10/15 I have managed to reduce the number of fracs I own by one 

List as follows, left to right:

152mm Altair Astro Starwave

120mm Skywatcher Equinox

101mm TeleVue Renaissance SDF

102mm Ikharus (still my workhorse scope)

100mm TAL 100R stage 2 PST mod 

80mm Vixen FL80S Fluorite (now with Baader diamond steeltrack focuser)

80mm Skylight Kenko f12

70mm TeleVue Ranger

63mm Zeiss Telementor

The only change I'm currently contemplating is swapping the Ranger for a TV60

 

Collectively the light gathering power of a 300mm refractor.

The motors in the HEQ5 pro are stepper motors and won't 'burn out' if overloaded,

Yeah thats right.

To much torque will burn the motors out by design it should be free to move with the clutch disengaged.

The obvious question is was it always like that?

Assuming it was not then something has likely got into the bearings. Or between the rotating surfaces of the shaft and housing.

When you stripped the mount down did you

clean and repack the bearings

Debug and polish and bearing surfaces

I guess another question would be has the head been dropped oorhad a blow.

There are in truth many possibilities the cluth could be sticking etc etc.

A good clean and careful inspection should have sorted it out.

As you disassemble you should check to see when the movement frees up and then scrutinise the relevant parts.

Best of luck.

Mark_c

Did you photograph the strip down?

I wanted to buy one of these mounts for nearly a year but have vowed not to buy another mount from synta which doesnt leave a lot of options I know. If Haynes did a manual for one I would probably jump in.

A BMW is more like a 10 micron than a synta. Sadly when materials fail and contamination is discovered during the fix and a lack of support or information is a available this reflects on the whole. But its still fair value for money.

I' sure the mount will work all the better for a strip and clean, synta's always do.

A very nice solution for fair weather.

Depending on the prices of your ep's a new focuser might be a nice idea however a longer draw tube might cause a problem with the light path when racked all the way in. I would add that my WO 80FD came with extensions not needed with a two inch diagonal but as the over all weight on the end of the draw tube goes up the focuser starts to struggle both in holding the weight and movement. I wish it was better but I have learnt to live with it as it works for any combination I can think off.

It might also be worth noting that eyepieces from the same line all have the same focal point. So its always a good idea to stick to the same brand and line even though this can be restrictive on options and price. I do beluve that all televues have the same focal point regardless of the line. (Correct me if I am wrong here)

Prinz 8x32 (1977) AND OLYMPUS 10x50 (2006) right flares. Time for an upgrade!

TSA 120 Its versatile. I am trying to hold off buying one. I like visual astronomy always makes me smile. Nice and simple. I would buy one of those new FC100D if there came as a FC120D.

I hate choosing.

Lazy eye ! You lucky man I suffer from a lazy mind. Sometimes cant even be bothered to finish an

I asked the questipn here at SG about problems with youe mount of the box a couple of months ago. Guess what seemed like every manafacture got tagged even TAK and SB. Cany say I remember if AP got caught out. Interestingly the difference came down to how the problem was resolved by the dealer that became the significant point.

Everyone knows about SW QC issues. But as an example AP QC their mounts and if neccessary swap out sub standard parts until the standards are met. Note that the point here is they also manafacture sub standard parts but they catch it before it goes out the door. Synta could do this but thats not their business model.

It remains that you need to understand who made you stuff and their approach to QC. Vixen had big problems with this and have changed there QC to being based in Japan pulled back from China. Remains to be seen....

I have spent six months trying to work out which mount to buy and in truth I cant bring myself to buy anything from anyone given all the problems I have heard in that time. With the exception of AP who are prepared to put down in writing what exactly you are getting and how it is achived which explians the cost (which is to rich for me) I find the whole subject of mounts and the lack off quality shocking. In the end I will either keep saving or just accept that there is a chance of getting a lemon and having to deal with the consequences buy basing the purchase on the dealer and not the mount.

Merry Xmas.