arrayschism

Well, the new scope has arrived. It's in a massive wooden box and I am currently working up the strength to extricate it 😅. Pics to follow...

Latest update from Adam - scope will be shipped at the start of the New Year! 

@cajen2 I have gone for a T400... lead time was 6 months or so but there is a Pro float glass mirror kicking about in Poland - coatings 96%, 1/8 p-V or better with a certificate. so I have gone with that.

Thanks @The60mmKid I have just ordered it and I am hoping that it'll be here before Christmas, all being well  

I'll definitely be posting first impressions, first light etc as I go

Hello there SGLers,

After a few years of imaging I have decided to move back to where I started and spend more time under the stars (weather permitting) actually experiencing them with the naked eye.

I am in the process of talking to Adam at Taurus regarding a new scope delivery which is great because at least I get to spec it the way I would like. Interestingly, Astroshop are claiming that they do not ship any Taurus scopes out of the EU - so that route was closed off to me from the beginning.

Must admit, I am quite looking forward to when it arrives (months from now) and I hope to be able to start sketching at the eyepiece to try and truly see the objects.

It I had problem optics, I'd rather know than not and have the chance of doing something about it before it was too late.

The devil in the detail might be finding a way of delivering the bad news to someone in a diplomatic way 😁

4 hours ago, gilesco said:

I was more interested in whether other Esprit 120 owners find their focus position that far out.

Yep, mine's the same - haven't got a precise measurement of what it is as it's not to hand right now... but the drawtube is way out before focus. 75% sounds about right where mine is.

I just drilled the holes out very slightly, left plenty of copper pad to solder to. Didn't have to touch the diode legs at all.

Well, this thread has been a fascinating lunchtime read! It's also just cost me a bit of money - I've gone and bought a couple of the books mentioned!

What an absolutely fascinating pursuit this is

Love it.

Just now, Rusted said:

Not half as much fun when science denial is all the rage.
Besides, many [common] action cameras suffer from severe image curvature.
Barrel distortion?

Yeah I guess you're right...

I find it odd how flat earthers call Science 'Scientism' and that we are all taught science as though it were a belief. They seem to conveniently forget that all those practical experiments prove the theory :0

What a shame the guy had to risk his own life - why didn't he just build himself a camera and put it into a home made 'weather type' balloon instead? Far safer. I assume he had to see 'the proof' with his own eyes???

Re the MOSFETs, I bought the Fairchild, FQP30N06L types as suggested and they oriented as indicated on the silk screen.

The flat earth belief is just one of any number of bizarre beliefs that these sorts have. The problem is, as said above, a distrust in (experimentally provable) reality - a general problem of the mind that would hang onto any strange idea.

Feels like this is exclusively the reserve of the mentally ill (who deserve medical attention) and the easily influenced (who need a dose of scientific education).

An intervalometer for my travel wide field set up  Just in time for the cloudy weekend, of course!

On 24/01/2020 at 15:58, whipdry said:

Switches on at first then intermediate on off on, so guess it's the latter. Will have a look for an SS Relay. 

Thanks 

I would advise that you use the relay to actuate a 240V contactor. It's exactly what we do at work where we have PLCs that control large currents via 12v or 24v relay lines.

PLC switches relay, relay switches contactor.

11 hours ago, JamesF said:

In my mind, Google will never really have mastered search engines until it can do:

"Oh, you know, a thingy!  Has lots of holes in and you use it when you're cooking spaghetti.  Begins with a 'C'"
"Yeah!  That's the one!  Parmesan grater!"

Google? Pah! Google can't yet beat the SGL hive mind    

Thanks all!

Brilliant, thanks all!!! I'll be able to sleep now

I am making a cover for a box to go outside as part of my pier. I've used (but never bought) these fixings before to hold down plate steel panels and thought they would do the job.

Thing is... I don't know what they're called so struggling to look for them. 

The basic idea is that the pin pushes through a hole. Once the other side, the internal tab rotates 90 degrees and drops down, locking the panel into place.

I apologise for my terrible drawing skills, but I've done my best "artistic" impression. Any idea what these are called?

Super thread @JamesF, I'm on with building one of these at the moment. That's a lovely box you've got there - 3D printed at home I take it?

Those diode legs were rather large, as you'd mentioned in another thread. I managed to drill out the PCB with a 1.3mm drill to fit them on the board, rather than having flying leads

Anyway, great job - can't wait to see the finished product!

5 minutes ago, bingevader said:

Sorry to disagree, but behind all the county security we still get the odd advert like this, or for scantily clad singles in the area (!), in our primary school where the browsing history is totally clean and legit!

A lot of advertising is based just on location, age demographic & so on.

The DHT series are, IMO, pieces or rubbish, unfortunately. Not made for long term use in outside conditions.

I've had more success with the HTU21D of late. Far more robust.

They are a little more expensive, but you get what you pay for

https://shop.pimoroni.com/products/adafruit-htu21d-f-temperature-humidity-sensor-breakout-board

Circuit boards for the home build dew controller (Rob Brown's). Excellent service from JLCPCB, less than excellent service from DHL. Still, they found their way to my work after a few days of suspense... Really looking forward to getting on and soldering it all up

@JamesF We install switches at the end of the travel to prevent our operators overrunning the rails - could be an expensive incident otherwise 🤔

@Gina wow! Those are cheap - I use rather bigger versions of these at work. I hope that these ones from Amazon come with the small plastic insert that prevents you losing all the bearings should you slide them completely off the rails!

4 minutes ago, JamesF said:

One thing to watch out for: I found the leads on the diodes I bought were too thick to go through the holes in the PCB.  At the suggestion of another SGL member I soldered them to fly leads, covered the joins in heatshrink and soldered the fly leads to the PCB.

Thank you James, I shall watch out for that. The PCB arrives next week - hopefully the diodes I already have will fit. Their legs are pretty slim 😊 If not then I'll have a go at doing what you did.