CraigT82

Nice work bet John Rogers was pleased to get those.

Had a reprocess of this data on my lunchbreak today, this time used only 10% of frames rather than the 40% of the original posted image. I think it's an improvement: a bit less 'wispy' for want of a better word. Top new, bottom old

Nice that's definitely got potential, just gotta catch a period of good seeing and you'll be laughing. Yes I use winjupos it's a godsend really, it's pretty easy really, the key is to get nice sharp images to feed into it as they are much easier to measure with the outline frame.

That’s really nice, sharp as a tack 👍🏼

That’s a conical mirror, cast glass with reduced thickness at the edges and ribs for stiffness and reduced weight. Held in place by the central bolt at the back as you say.

I feel your pain with this one I have had two old scopes recently which were otherwise superb scopes let down by rusty old 1.25” focusers. I think the chances of you fitting a new focuser without having to drill the tube are close to zero unfortunately. You may be able to fit a focus motor to it if you could fabricate a custom bracket, but then you’d still have to deal with backlash in the rack and pinion (if it’s there?)

Very nice yes seems to be some surface details on Ganymede, great work with an 8” manual dob

That’s a beaut Neil the detail is excellent and pretty smooth too was this 6 minutes? You know I’m not sure you’re going to gain much by going to a mass produced 12” scope over your 10” with high quality mirrors

Definitely a halo but looks actually quite attractive to me as far as halos go, though I do like the glare of the unfiltered sub even more. A 5 min sub of Vega is a hell of a test for any optical element

Thanks Geof 👍🏼

Thanks Tristan, I doubt in another league TBH your Mars images from 2020 were pretty awesome not to mention your deep sky and solar work with the 250PDS! Just lucky I had decent seeing really and was able to get out there, that's half the battle with planetary just being in the right place at the right time

Jupiter from Taunton UK on 8th October (I’m at exactly 51 degrees latitude, and I do mean exactly… my observing spot is 51 00’ 00”) SW300p on AZEQ6. ASI485mc. Baader Q barlow and ZWO ADC. 18x 90sec captures.

I’d be surprise if you got a dud mirror from either Synta or GSO these days, those guys have got their optical production and QA pretty fine tuned I think. More likely that the cell it is in is either poorly designed or poorly executed. The cell on my 300p was not working properly when I got it but a bit of fettling sorted it. I have seen some superb images for people using tracking dobs so one of those would be a great place to go I think, having motors on both axis with variable speed is a real boon compared to and EQ platform where only the RA is driven and is just either on or off.

Thanks Neil, yes the seeing was good and steady at the start of the session at about 10.45pm so I rattled off 30 mins worth of vids and then went back in for a nap. Came back out at 2am to get a shot with GRS and Europa but I couldn’t get focus at all and the image was dancing all over the place so packed up and went to bed. I’m using the Astronomik L2 as my UV/IR cut, purely because that was the only filter in stock when I was shopping for one, literally the only one! Usually use a Baader but not fussed about the brand really so pretty happy with this. Yes I do like a slightly warmer tone to your ultra white/ bluish preference, we’re all different beasts ain’t we?! I think the extra aperture was really put to use last night not often it does get the chance here in the UK but the old girl really stretched her legs. Not bad for a 300 quid scope.

KIT: SW 300p on AZ-EQ6 (in AltAz mode). ASI485mc. ZWO ADC. Baader Q barlow 2.25x (working at 3.4x). Astronomik L2 filter CAPTURE & PROCESS: 18x90sec captures in FC. Best 40% stacked in AS3. Image derotation. Sharpening in Astrosurface. Finishing in Gimp. DETAILS: Image scale 0.12"pp/5200mmF/17. Planet at 36 deg. Derotated to 22:03 UTC. Seeing varied 3/5 to 4/5. Transparency 8/10. Captured from Taunton, UK Thanks for looking & Clear Skies!

That’s very nice, excellent work with the C8

Nice image looking forward to seeing the full process. Seeing was ok for me early on but deteriorated by the time GRS rolled around.

Nice work, tons of detail especially as only 8”

@neil phillips @Pete PreslandDefinitely a dust storm, as mentioned in this article it’s “continent” sized! https://mars.nasa.gov/news/9275/nasas-insight-waits-out-dust-storm/

Yes for sure, it’s huge if it is definitely a dust storm

Just seen @geoflewis post in the other thread, definitely a dust storm then and a major one at that. Let’s hope it doesn’t go global 🤞

Excellent image Neil! Definitely cloud over the north polar region. Nice view of the Tharsis Montes and the Xanthe/ Valles Marineris regions, and I think possible the shadow of Olympus Mons. Looks increasingly likely to me to be large dust storm over the Argyre region as I can’t remember it being that sandy/yellow coloured last opposition (see circled area below)

Nice one Pete

Thanks Neil I do see what you’re seeing on my phone but can’t see it on my monitor, but then it is a budget work monitor so no surprise there! I can thoroughly recommend an AZ-EQ6 if you go down that route, I’m really impressed with it handles my 300p nicely and the tracking knocks my old black EQ6 into a cocked hat. Probably not much more expensive than a decent EQ platform unless you make your own

Really nice shots!