baggywrinkle

Simpley excellent

Visited them on Saturday to drop off a iOptron mount which needs some attention.

Jane and Neil have a very nice set up, good lot of stock on display and a very friendly welcome too.

Well worth a visit and from the mail order side there was no issues.

Excellent! many thanks. Heres a virtual beer...   LP

Great idea this...

Yes the lower the ep number the more powerfull.

Divide the focal lenght of the OTA by the ep focal length to get the magnification.

But as I said a rule of thumb for max power is roughly 2x the objective diameter of the OTA. The SE4 is roughly 100mm so 2x100=200 the max working power.

BUT it also depends on seeing. If the atmosphere is warm and there are lots of thermals then the image will wobble, increase the power and you get more wobbles and often blurring.

The 9mm should give decent views of Jupiter.

But in general terms work from low power upwards, you can then judge the deterioration, if any, as you increase the power.

Using the barlow helps, but it can mean a less brighter image (and less contrast)  as there is effectively more glass between the object being viewed and your eye.

Invest in a copy of 'Turn Left at Orion'

It has stacks of drawings which show what a visual observer to expect. Qualia's advice above is spot on!

The 4SE has a focal length of 1325mm so be careful with the use of the 4mm and 6.5 mm ep's and do not use them with the barlow as they would be too powerfull. The 4mm is over the top already, but hang onto it in case at a later date you get a different scope.

As a rule of thumb the max mag would be around 2x the objective so 200x

the 4mm = 330x

6.5mm = 203

9mm = 147

25mm = 53

Start with the lowest power and work up if the seeing is good. Max mag do0es not = best views

Low mags are often best for DSO but your scope has a  long focal lenght and more lended to planetary.

And welcome to SGL

I orderd an ST120 with and AZ4 mount before I came over to the UK.

This will be my grab and go when I finally move in May. All arrived safely, well packed and no damage.

I had a chance to set it up over the weekend, I am impressed by the solidity of the OTA. However TS could not arrnage a clear sky so I will have to mark them down on that ... ;-)

This is the second time I have ordered and they sent emails to confirm order and shipping, keeping me informed the whole time.

I will do a first light report when the skies clear.....

FLO get excellent reviews in here and I am not knocking them.

For that reason  I ordered a Heritage 130P as a grab and go to take back to Shanghai so I always have some form of scope there.

It arrived at the delivery address specified but sadly in a damaged condition. The secondary mirror was bent too far out of shape, the colimating locking screws were loose and there were damage indentations to the dovetail. The locking screw on the dovetail was loose too so it had been rattling around in its box.

The shippers were Optical Vision. I did contact them and they told me that they never check these before shipping.

I have emailed FLO with images and called and left messages on their answerphone but no replies. They did arrange a pick up but did not contact me, the first I knew was a phone call, lucky I happended to be in the office.

Not sure what is going on but I am dissapointed. So on my school report 'Must do Better!'

Sounds like a plan....

Impressive plan.

Playing Devil's Advocat ; what about reliability and when the system stops working?

Keeping in the shed would possibly improve the dew issue as the OTA would be adjusting all the time.

However dew is dew and if the conditions are right (wrong for the OTA) then dew will form.

It is all to do with  changes of air temperature and pressure and the fact that the OTA lags in time and temp with respect to the speed of change of ambient conditions. The OTA will be marginally warmer and that is enough for condensing conditions to occur.

I had about 9 months use out of the 6SE and then had to pack it up to send it on a boat back to the UK whilst I headed off to Shanghai for a while.

I am pleased with what I did do though. I thought I had an issue with poor focus/collimation, but that was my problem of making a dewshield and not spraying the inside matt black.

I have a SWED80 on an EQ5 which is lovely in its own way.

For planetary work and lunar the 6SE has the focal length to delivery some good magnifications. It is not bad on DSO.

It attracts dew though if not protected and I can see me investing in some heaters when I am back in the UK. The ED80 seems to stay dew free under the same conditions for longer.

I much prefer the goto system set up used on the 6SE compared to the EQ5 SyncScan. The 6SE is so easy on a 2 or even 3 star. The SW Syncscan needs you to know the latin names of stars and does not give the constellations they are in.

The 6SE AZ mount is stable and when the set up has been done I see no problem in tracking for long periods, of course that is not to say it can be used for astro-p work, but shorter exposure of 20 secs are easy and the results can be good. Again the 6SE is slower than the ED80 and has a smaller field of view.

Dislikes? Not many except that the handset drops out of its holder all too easily, for the sake of a small adjustment to the mold tool they could have put in a clip ridge to hold it.

I solved that by using double sided velcro tape. One piece on the hand set and the other side on different bits of the mount.

Be careful with the power lead connection if you are running off a power tank. The head rotates taking the lead with it....it can pull out and then you have to set up again.

I run it off a power tank and that cures the problem of using loads of AA batteries which when they run down affect the GOTO capability.

My other drip is that Celestron use their own style of mounting the RDF to the OTA, not by a dove tail which is a shame as that would open up more opportunity for other accessories.

More plusses; It is easy and quick to set up. If you are already downstairs I would say keep it fully assembled. I did and there was no problem for me to carry it out to the garden in one piece.

When I did take it into the Perth Hills it was easy to break down into two. I would lay the OTA with the AZ arm on blankets and fold down the tripod.

All in all a great 'scope and very nice to use. Trouble is I have got greedy, I want more light grabbing power and more shiny shiny things........oooh my presciousssssss.

Yes would be nice to hear...my 6SE has its 1st Birthday in December.

I am now looking ahead to my return to the UK late this year or early next year.

Many many years ago (1967-1971) I was a member of Norwich Astronomical Society (as they were then) and I am back in contact with them (or was as FaceBook is blocked in China). But what about other groups in the area?

My work will be based in Ely and I expect I will be living nearby either in North Cambridge or in and around Ely itself.

Any Ely or Cambridge people on here?

I am quite happy to drive reasonable distances for meetings etc.

Living down under the SCP star is a dim beast, so I do as best an alignment as I can and then go three star align. That list of stars will be very useful.

Great thread...thanks to the OP.

I have both the Celestron6SE and the SWEQ5 goto.

The 6SE is easiest to set up for goto as you select the stars, the SWEQ5 is a pain. I am adding an RDF to supplement the 9x 50 finder 'scope on the EQ5, RDF's might be decried by some but they are very usefull on a SynScan mount.