johnturley

I have an AZ-EQ5 mount for my ES 127 Refractor which is used for quick grab and go, and to access parts of the sky which are blocked off by trees from my observatory  shed.

I actually found it easier to set it up in EQ mode, and after setting my latitude by the scale on the mount (I know that it's not very accurate), and pointing the telescope in a north-south direction (determined by the shadow of the sun at local midday), I found that an object using a medium power eyepiece (around 100 x) would stay in the field of view for around 20-30 minutes, which is as accurate as I require as I only use it for visual. I have never used one of the alignment modes which the mount can perform. 

John  

2 hours ago, Cornelius Varley said:

What software are you going to use to control the camera ?

Do you necessarily need any software to control the camera, I don't use any with my Canon 6D, although I do have a programmable cable release. 

John 

On 03/06/2020 at 21:39, Alien 13 said:

I have to ask why are you using an eyepiece rather than prime focus or a Barlow lens, both offer better image quality?

Alan

Prime focus gives too small an image scale for planets and close up lunar shots

John

Very nice, lots of detail, lots of rilles.

John 

26 minutes ago, Doc said:

Yes John it will slew at any speed and track the stars. It's going to be connected too one of these:

https://astro-gadget.net/gadgets/control-of-telescopes/eqpower

That's interesting, so in theory at least my 14in fork mounted Newtonian could be upgraded to computer control.

John 

I assume that with the new motor you have fitted, you will be able to slew at various speeds, the original mount would have had an AC synchronous motor, the speed of which could only be increased by up to 100% using a variable frequency oscillator. 

In theory I assume that the same sort of motor could be fitted to my 1980's 14in reflector, which is driven by a 1/2 rev per minute synchronous motor via a 720 teeth brass RA wheel.

John 

Finally after 2 days I found a means of converting the MOV format videos files produced by my Canon 6D into a format so that I could use RegiStax, thanks to those who made suggestions, after unsuccessfully trying a couple of options, I emailed 'contact us' on RegiStax.

The person who replied informed me that RegiStax was designed to be used with dedicated astro cameras, not digital SLR's, moreover doubted whether my SLR would be able to record images fast enough (>15 FPS) and if the image dimensions are below the maximum that RegiStax can handle (3000x2000 is the maximum format). (my Canon 6D actually records 25 FPS in a 1920 x 1080 format). However he did suggest trying PIPP which was available for free download, and which, unlike some of the other programmes suggested, I was able to download, and found it not too complicated to use. This programme actually coverts MOV files to MOV_pipp format which RegiStax was able to utilise. 

I found a YouTube video on processing lunar images with RegiStax, plus found it to be reasonably user friendly unlike some other programmes, so here are the results below, which I think are a big improvement on my original photos, although with being in bmp format, they cannot be viewed directly.  I'm also hoping that it will also work ok with planetary imaging, which I'm planning to do with the recent upcoming oppositions of Jupiter, Saturn, and Mars.

John 

Alpine Valley and Plato Processed.bmp Appenines and Copernicus Processed.bmp Clavius Processed.bmp Straight Wall Processed 2.bmp

On 01/06/2020 at 18:52, Skipper Billy said:

If you download 'Handbrake' you can convert your video 'Mov' files to a more common format and its free!!

https://handbrake.fr/

Lovely image BTW!

Thanks Billy

I'll give it a try

John 

Attach photos of the moon I took last night with my Canon 6D digital SLR, and using eyepiece projection with a 15mm Plossl through my 14 in Reflector, which are the best that I have taken so far. I found that using a 15mm, rather than the 12.4 mm Plossl I usually use for planets, gave a sharper result. 

Although not comparing in quality to images others have posted, all the attached images were single JPEG shots, on which I have spent a few minutes (not several hours), enhancing and sharpening in Adobe Lightroom, before reducing the file sizes (to about 0.5 Megabytes) to post on SGL.

I did also take some 30 second movies which came out quite well, and from which I was hoping I could stack the frames to produce a single enhanced image using RegiStax, unfortunately however I discovered that the MOV format files produced by the Canon camera are not compatible with RegiStax

John 

Attach the best of several images I took last night, I have today just discovered how to get rid of the false colour due to atmospheric dispersion, in Adobe Lightroom.

Taken through my 14 in Newtonian using eyepiece projection with a 12.4 mm Plossl eyepiece

John 

Amazing photos, far sharper than what I can see visually through either my 14 in Newtonian or 150 mm Refractor, or photograph with my Canon 6D.

John 

I don't know whether it was an optical illusion, but observing the wafer thin crescent Venus only 6 degrees from the Sun at 17.00 hrs today, I got the distinct impression that I could see a faint ring of illumination all the way round the Venusian disc. In addition the mainly unilluminated disc appeared a slightly darker shade of blue than the background sky.

John 

16 hours ago, bomberbaz said:

Found now, 395$ should be around £350 plus postage.

https://www.apm-telescopes.de/en/eyepieces/58-74-wide-angle/other/nikon-nav-sw-10mm-eyepiece.html

That's more money than the equivalent Nagler T6, do you think that it will be better.

John 

I've noticed this too, ok if you are thinking of selling some stuff.

John 

I rely on 1980's technology to find Mercury and Venus in daylight, by setting the meridian pointer on my mount to local sidereal time. I do have an actual clock (see photo) although nowadays I use an iPhone app, which is probably more accurate.

Simply set the meridian pointer on the mount to sidereal time, and the RA and Dec  circles to the RA and Dec of Venus, Mercury, or the object you are trying to find (obtained from astronomical tables or an app such as  Skymap Pro or Stellarium). I found both Venus (which is a lot easier, and was also visible in my finderscope), and Mercury yesterday within a few minutes (see attached photos). I know that these photos do not compare to some which others have posted, but they are both single shot unprocessed JPEG images. 

A few points worth noting :

1) The mount needs to be more or less in a permanently aligned position.

2) You do require large and fairly accurate setting circles which most current mounts available do not have.

3) You do also require a 'driven' RA circle, i.e. one which continues to point to the same RA position as the drive slowly moves the telescope.

4) Ideally you need to the eyepiece you are using to find them in focus before you start looking, if you are only slightly out of focus, then you can't find them, and having parfocal eyepieces are a great help when switching to a higher power eyepiece .

A word of caution as well if you are looking in daylight, and have an open or partially open tubed Newtonian. Yesterday when looking at Venus, I became aware of something warm on my cheek, it was due to off axis light from the sun being reflected off the main mirror, even though the telescope was pointing to a position about 20 degrees from that of the sun. I solved the problem by sliding back the roof of my observatory shed so as to cut off the sun's rays. 

John

3 hours ago, rwilkey said:

Hi Steve, the great advantage in my opinion is that the 24 Pan is a 1.25", whereas the 26 Nag is not, that makes the 24 Pan very easy to use as 2" eps can be unwieldly and heavy, esp. for a smaller, lighter set-up, in other words, so I think it is more versatile.  Like John has intimated in the past, it also quickly became my favourite ep.

I agree, since acquiring a 24 mm Panoptic, I tend to use it in preference to my ES 24 mm 82 degree eyepiece, although the field of view is slightly smaller, the edge definition is better, and it is much lighter, so that I do not need to have to adjust one of the sliding balance weights on my 14 in Newtonian, which is very balance sensitive.

John  

2 minutes ago, John said:

 

 

Rob Miller went over to the USA to work with Roland Christen at Astro Physics on their mounts I believe. Also worked with Software Bisque on the Paramount.

 

 

 

That would explain the similarity between my mount and the Paramount Taurus Fork Mount, however I paid a lot less than the current price of the latter. 

On 13/05/2020 at 14:30, Second Time Around said:

My brother and I had a secondhand  6" f/8 AE on an undriven German equatorial with a metal tripod, both in that same blue colour.  Both the optics and mount we're excellent.

Our scope had a closed tube, but most AE Newtonians were an early truss design.

That would have been about 1975.  I well remember the excitement of seeing the Ring Nebula for the first time!

 

That looks like the AE 'A' Type Equatorial Head, they did the 'A', 'B', and 'C' Type German Heads, and the 'D' Type Fork Mount, the mount on my 14in Newtonian made by Rob Miller (who at one time used to work for Fullerscopes) of Astro Systems (Luton) is bit similar to their 'D' Type Fork Mount.

Looking at the number of wires going to the motors, they do not appear to be the original ones, which would have been a 240v mains AC motor for the RA Drive, and probably a 12v reversible DC motor for the Dec.

My Astro Systems mount still has the original motors, which touchwood are still working ok after 36 years.

John 

Looks similar to some UniBond 'No More Nails' doubled sided tape that I have, but would be a bit nervous about relying this to hold a secondary mirror in place.

John

3 minutes ago, Captain Magenta said:

Number-plate tape (double-sided)...

 

Quote

 

What sort of glue did you use

John

6 hours ago, dan_adi said:

 

Off course I made the mistake of starting imaging with a long focal length mirror system. Lesson learned! Also my seening will not support such a big scope. So for my next purchase I am in favor of either a 175 mm LZOS or a 185 mm Cff (both have great reviews, I guess I will just toss a coin at some point  )  I am 90% confident the apos will be the right choice. Why 90% and not 100%? -> cause I never looked through or imaged with a high end refractor
A few but important benefits:

 

I understand that CFF have discontinued their 185 mm Refractors, supposedly due to shortages of suitable low dispersion (FPL 53 & 55) glass, and according to their UK distributor Peak2Valley instruments, they will also be discontinuing their 160 mm Refractors when all the blanks they have in stock have been used. I gather  TEC switched to fluorite for their larger refractors for the same reason, but Chinese and Japanese manufacturers do not seem to have this problem, and Takahashi have gone the other way for their larger refractors switching from fluorite to low dispersion glass.

In addition I've read mixed reports about CFF Refractors, they appear to be more popular in the USA despite being made in Europe, and some claim that they are better colour corrected than TEC's. However although most purchasers were delighted with the quality and performance of their scopes, others were less satisfied and ended up returning them either to the dealer for a refund, or to the factory for a re-collimation.

John 

1 hour ago, gorann said:

I was thinking about this thread from 2018 where FLO praised Esprits, saying

 "A small number have needed tweaking on the bench before they were released but I cannot recall one that was rejected outright for optical reasons. We still occasionally reject one for mechanical/cosmetic reasons, though usually before it is sent to Es Reid. Overall we, ourselves & Es, are very impressed with the Esprit series. I am not aware of any other range of triplet refractors that perform as well, certainly not at the price Esprits sell at. "

 

One interesting, but probably less well known fact is that the Esprit 150 currently sells for about the same price in real terms as the early Astro Physics 6in Refractors, which sold for $1,295 in 1987.

Although these early AP scopes represented quite good value for what was available at the time, however contrary to what some reports state, having owned both scopes, I can say that the early AP scopes were not that marvellous both in terms of colour correction and build quality, compared to the Esprit. For example the focusing mounts were rough (I think that most people who kept them subsequently upgraded the focuser), and the lens cells were not collimatable. I should stress though that the later  Starfire models were of  a much higher standard, and also much more expensive. Nevertheless you sometimes see, mainly in the USA, these early 6in AP scopes up for sale at around $4,000 or more.

John 

I understand that you can get a free download version of Pixinsight, would this offer significant advantages over Adobe Lightroom, which I already have.

I should stress that I'm not interested in spending hours stacking, and processing images, just want spend a few minutes to improve brightness, contrast etc., of short exposure deep sky, lunar, and planetary images taken with a digital SLR. 

John 

Has anybody compared Pixinsight with Adobe Lightroom (which I have).

I understand that unlike Lightroom, Pixinsight is available as a free download, however I am never going to be into spending hours, stacking and processing images, just want to spend a few minutes enhancing the images I take, for which Lightroom appears to do the job.

John