jetstream

what are you going to look at primarily? the article said the contrast booster removes most all CA but reduces transmission and adds a yellow cast. It would be good for planets IMHO but my natural no experience guess would be to use the semi APO

How many teflon glides are in this focuser? from me: The adjustment is now done and the Tak focuser is now buttery smooth. I loosened the 3 glide set screws until I had backlash and drawtube side play. The set screws were then slowly snugged up until both the backlash and side play were "just" gone. For me there is no need (yet anyway) to delve into the bottom plate area as there is a nice relationship between the glides and the rack & pinion backlash. As a test a hvy Baader/Zeiss prism diag and 30mm Es 82 were put vertical in the scope- no problem holding it at all. Tonight we'll see how the Binotron 27's make out."

Mine too- the TSA 120 adjusted up nicely, smooth as butter and no play.

M13 is a bright object and might show as a smallish fuzzy ball at low power in your 100mm and upping the mag will resolve more stars. The propeller feature can be tough and personally find that there can be a smallish sweet spot mag wise. Highly recommend playing with magnification on this one.

Yes, thank you Robin. Its great to hear this from you- most say aperture cannot give brighter images etc visually- actually most start off believing it until "corrected" by others. Excellent info about the photons and how the image is formed, I did not realize the image is built up this way in our brain. The 24" gives so much more detail than my 15" it really puzzled me until now. Both the scope builder and optician said it would surprise me. I also have a 200mm f3.8 for comparison. Now for the exit pupil... I know there is a sweet spot for nebula, my favourite objects with and without filters. So if I maintain a "proper" exit pupil range of say 4.5mm to 5.5mm could it be true then that the smaller exit pupil has more photons available for my eye? ie packing more in the disk? Edit: just thought about it...the photon level must be dictated by primary mirror aperture so the same number must pass through the eyepiece(s). The smaller exit pupil must have more concentrated photon levels?

Congrats! In the image of M13 do you see the "propeller"? another great feature in this fantastic spray of stars.

Living around animals means interactions with them, we don't mind it here and in fact like it. For the most part the predators have their traditional prey and its only the odd ones that become a problem. About 50 miles away in farmland very few cattle are taken by wolves, again their main prey is deer (and moose by me). We have Lynx as well- they make wide loops and focus on where large groups of animals (unhealthy) have exploded and they bring things back under control. We had a wild rabbit problem 4 years ago, they were everywhere- until a Lynx set up shop for a couple of weeks. One of my very favorite animals is the Owl- they are here now and at night I'll sit on the deck listening to them hoot back and forth as I watch the stars. Hopefully some wildlife can be introduced over there Iain, the farmers could make it work and protect their livestock.

Me too... I find the best approach is keeping an absolutely open mind, placing my own thoughts in the archives and building the archives up more. The end result is usually pretty good and thanks to those that help.

Thank you sir! I have been wanting (needing) a confirmation of what Ive noticed and what some other various and serious astronomers have told me. Packing more light into the exit pupil or however we want to describe it. This idea seems to send some into fits and they always refer to mag at exit pupil as the only factors. I have to say that fast f ratios and large apertures under dark skies give absolutely remarkable views. I cannot believe what the 24" shows, maybe around this aperture crosses the line or something light wise, view wise, eye brain wise etc etc. I truly appreciate you helping me along again Andrew, @vlaiv too. I hope you guys continue on in the thread- I might be a few posts back trying to absorb but I'll be here.

Sounds good and I hold this view but- do you think its possible that the larger aperture can give "brighter" images due to the aperture itself? Bartels believes in throughput or "entendue". More waves and resulting photons or whatever? Sorry if this is a redundant question. In my scope jumps I went for 1 stellar magnitude increase- I had to use something as a gauge- but my 24" f4.1 seems to blow the doors off the 15" in unexpected ways, M1's detail for example or the Veils. Is this all due to increased magnification at the same(ish) exit pupils? I never thought there would be such a difference Andrew. Btw, back to the brain filling in info- an optics acquaintance said there no way I can see "real" red or blue in M42- that it is an illusion from exposure to the bright green I do see and that the brain fills in the other colours some how. Oddly enough where I see red or blue is in the right places from images I've seen. No clue but the colours are there for me now but were not at first.

I can say this John- any twig snap, crack or unusual sound has my attention. Just before ice out a couple weeks ago I woke up to the sound of wolves screaming...sounded right under my window. Turns out they chased the deer through here and killed it 500 yds away. I found the remains the next day on the sled. Wolves howl but they also scream...its horrific. One timber wolf crossed my path on the road walking last fall thankfully he was hot on a track and only gave me a brief look-at 25yds or so. They are huge. I do love it here, my home it is.

Well it does work sometimes but there are many many cases where it doesn't...there is zero chance I'd be the tester on a grizzly. I truly hope I don't ever have to try mine out either!

Yes, I have bear spray- works if their not mad- doesn't work on grizzlys, thankfully none of those here. We won't talk about what that bear was doing as it was standing over the woman... but there is a reason they wanted to find the others. Bears can pattern themselves on food by observing other bears ^^.. and they have food location memories. They can remember single trees or houses or anything else and can be passed down by generation, hence repeated visits in certain locations. Here its my dads berry tree- I can't bring myself to cut it down.

Thanks so much Vlaiv, Andrew and yourself are helping immensely and it is much appreciated. I will go over this info repeatedly. To fastrack to my aperture question which you and @andrew s can answer- will an aperture of say 8" contain the same information an aperture of say 24"? I might think it would if the photon level in the smaller is enough to form the same image? Are more photons or light packets in the larger aperture? can and will this be seen by the eye? Many believe in "light grasp", I'm undecided as traditionally most serious observers think in terms of magnification at a certain exit pupil level, which aperture is a component of. My 24" might be changing my mind a bit...

One of my own "experiments" to see if what I'm seeing is this filled in data or noise or... was my pursuit of IFN. Which I do see, for sure. However my view was tainted by the fact I looked at Bartels sketches first- strike one against. However I do not see the IFN excatly as he does + one for the observation. I first reported 6 years ago seeing a bunch of patches of "liquid grey" nebulosity, very very faint. As I have observed more and more some of these patches have names attached to them for example around IC1318. The Pleiades is another example of seeing some really faint things- it can be stark in appearance, the so called "Bubble" and is beautiful. I don't see it quite like Bartels but a colleague of his confirmed my description of it. One of my main goals is to understand the nature of light, photons included as pertains to visual astronomy. If I wreck my eyes I do see noise in the sky even after partially adapted and in my case it results in the inability to see very faint objects. Now for aperture...

Is this right Vlaiv? I'm actually shocked at this- excellent info. Ah, youv'e uncovered part of my desire to understand photons and how many to form an image...! I agree about the filter and want to know more about this. I can say we can wreck our eyes during the day for night use later. Not sure how it happens. Polarized LED lighting (my 65" TV) absolutely wrecks my eyes - including the filter. It is incredibly amazing what I see through a scope when things are right with the eye/brain system. Some physicists say it has to be noise- but it is not and a few others see this too-very faint background patches (dust etc?) all over the place, richer in areas than others. I would like to understand how to ensure the filter will work through technique and also if it can be enhanced somehow... thoughts? I also need to know more about aperture and light streams or packets...

Thanks Niall! The bears have woke up and are roaming around all hungry now- they are more of a concern to me than the wolves. There was a real tragedy that happened about 8 miles from my house last year and highlights the nature of these animals. We had one break into my house last year- ripped the window screen and lifted the window. It was one of the young ones described and it would circle the house after attempts to scare it. It was wrecking the neighbours stuff too. Many want people to believe these animals are not dangerous but you need to know which ones are and the behaviour they exhibit if they are problem ones...most big black bears are not a problem. We had one around again last week... https://www.startribune.com/minnesota-woman-identified-after-she-was-killed-by-bear-on-rainy-lake/559381372/

I wonder why and how this can happen?Does the lens "shrink" the objects apparent size and by this seem brighter? So as gravity warps spacetime I wonder what happens to the streams of light that are following it? are there photons in the mix? Entanglement...isn't this just the bees knees of puzzlement. I also wonder how much of a light stream or photons the eye brain takes to form an image- I would presume that we need a steady stream of light to do it. But then again I think our brain stores images viewed through a telescope and each viewing session builds on the next. Another scope aperture question after this ^^ lol!

Your image showed me perfectly the effect of stray light in the scope, which can bounce around and is something I take great care in controlling.

Excellent link- thanks Chris. I'm glad I'm not the only one wondering about this!

Is it possible or likely that an object could look different from a slightly different viewpoint? Can gravity have an effect on what we see or image with respect to the light wave stream and photons of an object? If so would this be static or an ever changing dynamic?

Oh yes, I like to hear ideas on this. I have a dog eared copy of QED and a more dog eared brain lol! As the light travels through space, near and around objects with gravity and finally reaches us is it a true approximation of the object at the instant of time we imaged it?

I am going to retire from the thread having gained more pieces of the puzzle and this quoted piece is a very important concept (for me). As is "diktat" in reference to accepted resolution definitions. As I learn more and gain observing experience I seem to embrace that some limits are not hard and fast- it is quite enlightening. Thanks Andrew.

No Well kind of. I was just thinking simply if I go up one unit and over to the apertures MTF curve its different than if I go up a unit and over to the red line. Of course they meet at "1". I do appreciate the thoughts on this Vlaiv.

Excellent, another piece of the puzzle (well puzzle for me) enters the picture. Further thoughts appreciated- what can be the effects of this regarding the graphs or visual observation vs the graphs?