DirkSteele

Indeed. It was too much. I wanted to try it but the scope loaded up is more than 7kg and the mount was not happy. I switched out to the Tele Optic Ercole shortly after that photo.

Awesome. Taking a scope south of equator really is a special experience for us north based astronomers.

As someone who has a 180mm LZOS triplet, and only did not buy the 8” because I wanted to take it star parties, I do struggle to understand the key selling point. Such a scope requires a permanent home and a heck of a mount. Combined with those extra costs, it is hard to see the value over a mirror based scope. Especially, if there are some compromises around the optical quality.

Bigger case! Everyone needs too many eyepieces. So ends my pointless contribution to this thread. 😉

The Baker Street Irregular Astronomers ran a Perseid event on Primrose Hill last night. Close to 100 people at the peak I believe. Took the APM LZOS 105 to show some sights between meteors. Constantly pointing the telescope, I ended up seeing zero meteors!

Legend in our hobby. Certainly always felt synonymous with astronomy given all the best atlases had his name on them. As a kid I always thought is sounded cool to be called a Stellar Cartographer as well. He gave an interesting presentation at AstroFest years ago. In the age of digital stellar maps, tends to use it less, but will never let my laminated field edition of Sky Atlas 2000 go.

I missed this thread back in 2020. Some amazing scopes on display! Has made me feel rather lazy about not using my 7” refactor more often!

I will take any opportunity I can, regardless of true astronomical darkness being available or not. From my not so desirable central London location, there is limited difference due to light pollution between nautical dark and astronomic dark.

The completionist in me means I had one more purchase to make in a certain book series which has appeared in this thread in recent pages. Jumped on volume 4 as soon as FLO got a couple in stock.

I have taken the 5” f/9.2 triplet across London many times to Baker Street Astronomer star parties which is more then 20kg all in (should use a more robust tripod) but I do just jump in a black cab from my house so carrying distance is just a few hundred metres. I have taken my 180mm triplet to star parties out of London. That weighs well over 70kg and has been known to sink slowly into the ground over a weekend. Even more weight now I have added a pillar extension, extra weights to shift balance and larger finder. But recently I tend to take out the Tak FC-100 as it weighs less than 3kg and with carbon fibre tripod and mount less than 6kg so perhaps I am getting lazier!

And another awesome scope. One of the best 5” ever made.

Awesome scope. Truly one of the best 4” ever produced. Enjoy.

I saw exactly the same phenomenon last night. There was high cloud so Arcturus was barely visible and Spica not there at all. About 20-25 degrees west of Spica a concentrated flash blasted through the cloud lasting no more than a second or two. Even through the cloud it was magnitude -2 by my estimate. Would have been very special in clear skies. Had just stepped outside and I always find my gaze drawn upwards so lucky spot. Clouds clearly shortly thereafter over Spica hence the judgement on angular separation.

It is extraordinary. Nice resolution to the problem. My solution was small tube rings which can fit the outer diameter of the attachment point of the focuser and fix the finder to that.

Think of me as the little angel/devil (depending on how badly you want that 40kg scope) on your shoulder whispering in your ear…. 😉

I would not worry too much about this if you are considering a 6mm eyepiece. 0.75mm exit pupil is still very useable for planetary viewing and the 203x very much an appropriate power with a well collimated scope when seeing conditions permit. If you go smaller still, eye defects like floaters can start to become apparent but some observers (me included) are not that bothered by it. As for actual field, the wider the apparent field (as long as it is well corrected) the more useable drift time you will have. A 100-deg AFOV would yield 0.49 degrees in you scope which is just shy of the full moon and would give you around 100 secs drift time from field stop to field stop when viewing the celestial equator. A 50-deg AFOV that a typical plossl provides, you can half those figures.

My first astronomy book is from 1986 and I would have been well under 10 years old. A couple of years later, and still probably under 10 I picked this up either at the London Planetarium or Science Museum when I started using my dad’s 10x50s and was getting a bit more serious about stargazing.

That sounds like a good mix of eyepieces. You want wide field for things like Eta Carinae nebula and for finding stuff, something mid range and then high power. With my Fc-76, I use the 24mm Panoptic, a 10mm like Delos or Radian and the Nagler zoom. That covers all you need. I do not recall the pilot’s name. Have done that balloon flight twice. The second time was the day after proposing.

That was my thought too. I have seen a few over the years, one of which was brighter than mag 0 so similar to what you saw. One question would be,, how long did the phenomenon last? More than a few seconds and we may need to consider alternatives.

The now defunct Argo Navis constellation should keep you occupied for hours. I have numerous observing reports on my site from the southern hemisphere which should give you loads of ideas. Argo report below. http://alpha-lyrae.co.uk/2019/08/17/exploring-argo-navis-on-benguerra-island/

I could watch content like that all day. Great video.

Mine would probably accuse me of adultery. My APM LZOS scopes would be jealous of the Takahashi scopes, and the Taks would be suffering green eyed monster towards the LZOS, with all of them wondering why I keep playing the field rather than just committing to one of them. And the oldest scope, the C11 would be wondering if it is really lost all of its lustre as it is never used any more. 😉

805mm

Ha, still young enough (sort of) to get away with it!