Nakedgun

~ I waffled on buying Orion Mini Giant models when they were still made in Japan. Nothing quite like a missed opportunity. .

~ Quite a handy scope-side atlas. Perhaps it's my monitor, but the cover should be blue, rather than grey, as it appears here. .

~ Shopgoodwill find. Star test must wait till this damnable weather improves. .

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~ It must have been preordained - the transparency and seeing that night was the best during the entire month. .

~ On Christmas Eve the sundown gathering of the Moon, Venus and Mercury was enjoyed from my driveway by neighbors from several households, one family having recently moved in next door. Christmas night the new folks came over to my backyard for their first telescopic view of the Moon, Saturn and Jupiter (they had to depart without observing Mars, alas). You can imagine their excited reactions, and perhaps they'll now have a deeper appreciation of the night sky. .

~ Nothing except cloud bottoms to be seen here for the next 10 days, at least. .

~ Nothing like the feeling of having a completed collection. .

~ Glad I wasn't there in 1516. D'ya s'pose they woulda hurt? .

~ I had neighbors from four households in my driveway this evening watching through binoculars and a spotting scope. Sky still bright, a plane passes over the 4% Moon at center: Venus about to set near ridgeline, Mercury difficult to make out, right of Moon: Near setting, Mercury an easier target: .

~ Is that the Report tripod? In the photo it appears a bit overmatched by the load, but that could be the impression given by the angle of view. Perhaps try a set of vibration suppression pads? .

~ I will try tonight, and let you know. 😁

~ I must stop reading any of your reports using the FS128. My heart still grieves the moronic decision I made to sell mine, some years back. .

~ I believe I will. .

~ I swear, TEC built them like tanks! .

~ The toys we acquire in pursuit of this hobby come dear to us in many cases, and it's tough to admit you've made a boneheaded move which nearly resulted in the destruction of a fine optical instrument. My TEC MC150 mak-cass has rings bolted to a Losmandy D-type dovetail plate onto which I have added an ADM Vixen-type adapter. Tuesday evening I mounted the scope on a non-goto CG-5, tightening down the mount's locking bolt securely, then loosening it enough to slide the whole thing forward just a bit to offset the weight as I would be using a binoviewer, then re-tightening the locking bolt again. Next I rotated the R.A. axis to horizontal to balance the counterweights, and watched in horror as the scope pried itself out of the CG-5's saddleplate, dropped three feet and thudded onto the concrete slab! You can imagine my thoughts and emotions at that instant.... I heard no glass break and as I reached down to pick it up my mind raced - HOW?! How could such a thing have happened?! Not only had no glass broken, the finderscope mounted atop the OTA was not damaged, the diagonal with eyepiece was still intact, the ring-handle attached to the rear of the OTA was undamaged, as well! So, what's going on here? The scope fell in such a way that the impact was absorbed by the detachable steel dewshield and then the aluminum rings, which are felt-lined. The OTA never touched the deck. But why did it separate from the mount? I pushed the Vixen dovetail plate forward just enough that the rear portion of the mount's saddleplate was no longer wedging the dovetail. I mounted the scope again and checked operation, finding the collimation off just a teensy bit, but now the secondary holder could be turned in the meniscus by hand. I phoned TEC today and was relieved to hear that Yuri would walk me through the process of re-tightening the secondary by hand; it would not have to be shipped back to them. Dewshield a tad worse for wear: DON"T slide the Vixen dovetail, slide the Losmandy dovetail, stupid! To say a valuable lesson was learned would be understating the case considerably. . .

~ Tuesday night I set up to observe the planets with my Borg 90FL on a non-goto CG-5, after some earlier trauma with another scope (a report I'll post elsewhere). Seeing was forecast as fair, with some moments of poor thrown in just for irritation. Saturn: getting low but able to sustain powers up near 200 when things settled. Neptune: at highest power (217x) still just a blue dot, but I don't go after it regularly so it was good to see, again. Jupiter: all four big moons seen, and some patterns in the equatorial belts easily discerned, no GRS till much too late this evening. Uranus: I spent quite some time under my light-polluted skies with 6.5x32, then 10x50 binos putting together the star-hopping patterns to be followed in my 24mm ep to arrive at this pale blue/green dot. It has been poorly placed, of late. Mars: by now, the cold is penetrating my clothing so I was glad for an easy target, though my 90mm had not the light-grasp to make features more than guessed at, and some brightening by clouds at the pole. That's it, I'm done. .

Welcome!

~ This older (2014) camera body needed a lens to reach out with. At least, that's what it said to me.... .

Discussion here:

~ Just about every manufacturer will make something at the price-point you're looking at. By all means, if you can visit a retailer who stocks a variety of them, try a few on for size. Someone else's favorite may not turn out to be your own. In any case, make sure a good return policy exists. Good luck. .

~ Wait. Isn't this the "longest-thread-title-in-the-history-of-SGL" thread? Just wondering. .

~ Last night (Sunday) I took out the trash and was shocked to see a clear sky! Weather forecast had rain on the way, and the afternoon cloudiness attested to that very probability. Mars was almost directly overhead, so I scrambled to get my 80 f/7 refractor, photo tripod, and a new set of eyepieces rounded up and outside. At least, I could get the ep's tested before the forecast ten-days-of-clouds arrived. First took a look at Jupiter, already well-west by now, and the seeing unsteady with all the optics still warm. Went through all the new f/l's, one by one, then moved over to M42 and did the same thing while everything cooled. Now, it was time for Mars! Elevated the rig straight up and was dismayed to find the Crayford focuser adjusted too loose to hold the diagonal/ep - it slowly drifted down - too quickly to make a useful observation! Then, I see clouds drifting my way. Yikes! What to do?! I decided to lower the scope down to catch the Moon, at least that way I could test the ep's on a bright object, which I did, one by one, then barlowed them, one by one, to get an idea whether the ep acquisition was a good one. It was. And, the seeing/scope cool-down allowed a fine view up to 204x. OK, now to grab up the rig, head into the garage and find the correct size Allen wrenches to adjust the focuser. A few iterations later the drawtube now stays put. Take a look outside....cloud bottoms as far as the eye can see. The scope I failed to optimize beforehand: .

~ Let me be the third in line to recommend the 8x binocular with ~40mm objective as the place to begin looking. .

~ Is this ep available under other brand names? .