bomberbaz

What a very sensible man you are and refreshing to see such a pragmatic approach.

Should get this well with the 14" dob and I am also going to have a go at getting its spectra with the portable imaging rig. These are exciting times.

I use the sw az gti in eq mode with a sw 72ED. It isn't a triplet granted, but it does give a well corrected, flat field when in use with the stellamira FF and is only 2kg. However I have 2kg of counterweight to contend with too. The william optics range al;ways seem highly recomended and the 81mm triplet weighs in at 3.3kg. Ttoal weight is 4.5kg. William Optics GT81 WIFD Apochromatic Refractor | First Light Optics

Mike makes a very good point. It's all well and good us lot on this thread pointing out that we use this and prefer that, but you are who you are and what suits you may be totally different to us. Find a local club, ask to go around and you will be welcomed with open arms. Take a list of questions with you and you will find the answers, as well as a demonstration where practical of these answers EG collimation.

Blooming heck, those were a flipping bargain then, good buy!

They look very nice Guy, was there any extra duty when they reached UK?

Be interested how you get on with that John. I would also be interested in hearing your finding process for it. I have had it once using the dob, but that has DSC so that's relatively easy in comparison.

Interesting video, good job he threw in his caveats at the beginning or I would be shouting at the screen 🤣 Yes his "there is tele view and the rest" comment could have grated me a little. There are some dam good competitors out there, however since I now sold my Nikon glass it is a less contentious comment but I still don't agree with him😉 Where I think I am tending to agree is the use of two eyepiece in a session. If I am galaxy hunting, I use one, an APM zoom. Nebula, an APM UFF 24mm. Planets, a zoom and another zoom. Then I have a panoptic 27mm for everything not covered with those 3! If you look in my signature, the statement in white has nearly been achieved 👍

Thanks for your help in this thread vlaiv. I have been over this and other matters since but I think I am now getting a better understanding of how these things work. Sometimes they seem counter intuitive but when you thinnnk it through, it makes sense.

Few things, Ref collimation mentioned above, get yourself a concenter. They have come down in price recently and are the easiest thing ever to use. Do watch video to see how someone does it who it skilled for tips. If you get frustrated with your eyepiece, buy a zoom. The 21-7.2 by OVL is a cracker and will easily keep you going until you gain more experience. Stellarium is a great tool for using whilst at the scope, Skysafari 6 plus is what I use and both are basically virtual maps of the night sky. Both can be put on dark mode and this can be used as an interactive map at the eyepiece. Go for easy objects at first as mentioned above. Search through stellarium for messier objects (M82 as an example) as these tend to be the easier things to find. Most of all your a young chap, take your time learning, stars are going nowhere.

Thank you very much indeed @han59 for this. I shall give this a go and see if it achieves what I am aiming to do. Noob question again. If, after I remove the checker pattern I then convert the RAW files to FITS say using PIPP, what will I get out assuming I don't tick any debayer options in the programme. I assume B&W. cheerrs steve

A very important point that I overlooked. If you are planets only person as an example, then a dob may not be the best option. I overlooked this simply because although I view planets, but they are not my main thjing to view.

@Spile alludes to the fact a 200 suits him, it meets his needs and that is what matters. And that is what you want to consider. Right now, with my own preferences and experiences a 250 would be my option on a set budget, but that is based upon what I know and what would suit me, that is as clear as I can be as it's not my money and I am not you. Balance up what people say and their experience then you have to make an informed decision. Either way, 200 or 250, neither will be disappointing.

A lot to consider but the biggest consideration from my own experience is portability. If you are able bodied, you will have no problem with either but it needs considering. A 250 is about 30% heavier than a 200. If you are able bodied, are comfortable with the weight and lunking around then a 250 will serve you for very many years (subject to you not getting afflicted with aperture fever) However there is nothing wrong with the 200 and the F6 focal ratio is more forgiving on lower cost eyepieces and as far as I can gather many people stick with these for life, they are the bast selling size of dobsonian. FYI most 250 are F4.8 - F5. As far as aperture goes, in urban skies the difference will be negligible. However in dark rural skies, the extra light gathering power of a 250 over a 200 (about 50%) will really tell when it comes to hunting for feint fuzzies and things like globular clusters will take on a whole new dimension. Again there is nothing wrong with the 200 size. As far as brands goes, I really like the stellalyra dobs. dual speed focuser, cooling fan, RACI finder, roller bearing azimuth and what appears a decent alt fitting. However the SW, ursa major and bresser all bring something of their own to the party.

I got a pair of the 8.8mm ones for my giant bins and them had to return them, the kidney beaning was horrendous. TBF I have not really got anything else to compare too so maybe other versions would have given the same result. I wasn't impressed with the response I got when I asked to return due to kidney beaning, not very professional in that instance although again in the past when I used them they have been fine. (off day I guess)

I saw these this morning https://www.astroshop.eu/instruments/omegon-binoculars-brightsky-22x70-90d/p,61489 They are not really hand held but the price states vat included. If this is the case, they are an absolute bargain.

For anyone interested I eventually went for the askar, the price and shootout results made it a compelling buy. If they ever bring out a 1.25 ultimate, I would be tempted.

The 21 and 25mm will be ok for UHC as typically they are still useful down to an exit pupil of 2mm and sometimes less on very bright objects, the crescent does respond to UHC as well as OIII but when I tried both on it, the OIII won. (Both were at 5mm EP) The OIII is not restricted to 5mm exit pupil but my testing just showed that it responded best to one of that size. FYI I could not see the crescent in my dob at 3.5mm EP, that's the difference. A 32mm plossl in FLO'S AE range is 29 quid, bargain. And it still give your C8 plus reducer a very nice 1.27 degrees true field of view, big enough for most DSO nebula. I think that would cover nearly all your bases and as remarked, won't bust your bank either. Let me know how you get on as I would be interested to hear about it! Also apologies to OP, all useful stuff this though.

I( would suggest trying it. The exit pupil is a little on the large size at 5.7mm, but try that on a dim nebula, (M57 etc are far too bright) and also an eyepiece around the 25mm range to see what results you yield. I would expect the 38mm to be brighter than the 25 but the darker background would help the smaller exit pupil. It could possibly a little washed out depending on your eyes response to darkness, none of us are the same. What filters do you use/have?

Sorry Rob but I have only just seen your query directed at me from the end of last year. I think the reason you are struggling with seeing this object is your exit pupil although you don't state any viewing details, let me elaborate. My dob may be a light bucket in comparison but the key here is the focal ratio. At F4.86, a 24mm eyepiece gives a near 5mm exit pupil (24/4.86) so all that lovely light we need is spread over as many receptors as possible, 5mm is seen as something of a perfect size when using a line filter, OIII in this instance. Also my magnification is 71 Now let's look at your F10 SCT, generally used for planetary work and star clusters etc. A 25mm eyepiece is going to give you around x85 magnification but the exit pupil is only going to be 2.5mm! (25/10) There in lies the problem. Just to elaborate on this a 2.5mm exit pupil cover and area of 0.04909 cm2 and a 5mm exit pupil covers 0.19635 cm2 which is 4 times greater. You don't need to be a rocket scientist to figure which will give best views on feint fuzzies. However a way around this is to use a reducer Celestron f6.3 Focal Reducer | First Light Optics and you have a scope that should perform pretty well on nebula and galaxy. Pop a 32mm plossl or similar in that and presto, 40x magnification and more importantly, a 5mm exit pupil.

That is indeed what I used Jeremy Paton Hawksley Star Analyser 100 | First Light Optics and I have purchased the Rspec analytical software to go with it. For a couple of hundred quid outlay, there is a lot of fun and learning to be had. Knowing me I end up buying a slit version but I have lots to learn before I go down that path. PM me if you want any more information although I will be starting a thread on my experiences shortly in the science section, just need another nights worth of data to cover off my research. 🙃 Steve

Last year I bought the eVscope from unistellar, they had a promotion on at the time and I took advantage of it. I have shown/shared the results with a few people in the family and they were very impressed by them. The Tarazed below and NGC925 are far from my best efforts but I cannot find the rest, think they are on the tablet. However they give a taste of what you get. What I personally find more impressive to me are the results I am getting from it for spectroscopy. My interest in this subject being recently renewed after seeing a facebook post regarding the subject. It allows me to get involved in the science behind the hobby in a more meaningful way. The result below is of Talitha in UMajor. The thing with the evscope is it is a reflector so the image is clean for spectroscopy purposes although the colour camera does affect results a little. However I am involved with other members of the spectroscopy community and looking at workarounds/solutions to this. Exciting times.

Thank you for this. I remember the walking noise post now, think I started but got lost and gave up. Then forgot about it, the last bit is an age thing. Anyway, now I have more experience I shall have another bash.

I recently purchased a APM super zoom, 67/68 degrees from 15.5 through to 7.7. I also have a APM 24 -65 degree and a panoptic 27 -68 degree + a 20mm plossl. I have got rid of 2x 82 degree ep's and my beloved 102 degree Nikons plus a plethora of other glass. God that hurt letting the Nikons go but they simply were not getting the use they deserved. I now have nothing over 68 degree fov consisting of 4x zooms and 3 fixed length eyepieces. At one time I owned around 25 fixed length eyepiece and no zooms. Seems a few of us are changing our glass outlook. Finally an apology to FLO whose glass sales must have plummeted 😆

What did you do to achieve that, the third recovery was half decent, would be even better with more data. Do you have any links to the process or methodolgy. I have never used synthetic flats (or even heard of them to be honest)