Ruud

Altogether it is an amazing idea and the concept is proven. Congratulations!

I do hope it works as planned!

Hi, I made them in Geogebra. It's a freeware tool used in maths education.

32 mm Plössls have a long eye relief and may take some time to get used to, especially when the exit pupil is close in size to the user's pupil. Kidney beaning, however, should not happen with TeleVue or any other Plössls as they tend to have well behaved exit pupils. (Kidney beaning comes from spherical aberration of the exit pupil. Until the first generation Naglers this was a rare phenomenon.) Could it be blackouts that you're seeing? I have a 32mm GSO Plössl. Had some blackouts at first, but got used to the eyepiece, and the blackouts disappeared. I think you too may get used to your 32mm Plössl. Here is how blackouts occur. With long eye relief, steady eye placement becomes difficult. The movements of the eye cause blackouts in which the image disappears from one side to the other. When the image is partially illuminated, it is as if a curtain is drawn over one side of the image Here is how kidney beans occur With kidney beaning a kidney shaped shadow forms between the centre and the edge of the field, while both centre and edge remain fully illuminated. Kidney beans arise from even subtle eye movements, especially with larger exit pupils. When the eye movements get larger, blackouts will also occur. Below, a kidney bean occurs as one of the red rays can not enter the eye, yet the more extreme off-centre green ray still can. (The brain inverts what's on the retina, hence the shadow appears below the centre.) Fortunately, spherical aberration of the exit pupil is, to a large extent, a thing of the past.

Wow, John, that is a beautiful telescope!

I love Stuart Gary. He is an outstanding science journalist. He clearly specialises in astronomy and often the guests on his show, professional astronomers, mistake him for a colleague. I've been listening to him for many years. I was very distraught when the ABC cancelled Starstuff, his radio show, which had been Australia's highest rated science show for many years. The show was sacrificed to 'horizontal programming'. Fortunately many people emailed the ABC asking them to reconsider, which led them to continue with Starstuff as a podcast only. The show was also broadcast on radio in the USA. Stuart did the research, production and presentation, the ABC lent him their facilities to make the show. End 2015 the podcast was discontinued because the ABC had stopped supporting it. Again, a great number of people emailed them to let now how much they regretted this. This time Stuart decided to continue with the podcast by himself. The ABC would not let him use the name Starstuff (even though the term was coined by Sagan), so Stuart chose a new name for the podcast: SpaceTime. I listen to every episode of SpaceTime using iTunes. That's two episodes per week!! SpaceTime, like Starstuff before it, is the best astsronomy podcast out there. I also enjoy the Jodcast, an astronomy podcast made by students of Manchester University, and the Weekly Space Hangout by Fraser Cain on YouTube.

The video shows the problem well and your accent is very intelligible. I think Brian is right. Good luck, and be careful as Brian says.

It looks great, Jim. I believe you when you say those legs are solid as concrete! I'm curious. How do you put the scope on top?

It certainly looks solid. I hope it works well. One of the advantages of this adaptation is that you will be able to use a proper star diagonal. I think that the erecting prism in the C70 may be this little telescope's weakest link. I'll cross my fingers for that functionality you don't want to lose!

I have this little scope. I use it with a 32mm GSO Plössl and for a finder I use the tube of a pen, like this: Thanks for the thread. I'll bookmark it!

Many thanks, Martin, the atlas is huge. Enormous. Overwhelming!

I really like this tip by L8-Nite: http://stargazerslounge.com/topic/254918-custom-made-eyepiece-case/#entry2781119 It teaches how you can use empty spray cans to make holes of the right size in foam. Wonderful, simple and effective! I suppose you have to make sure that the cans are really empty before you do this. Thanks to everyone who shows their eyepiece cases here. I visit regularly to have a look at them. Wouldn't want to miss any!

a few more wheels on it and you'd think it is a locomotive. What a thing!

That's an amazing collection of cases, Dave. We need more pictures, in which you open them all, case after case.

Hi Andrew, the slowly moving stars are satellites. The most obvious are the International Space Station and the Iridium satellites. The Iridium satellites can show very bright reflections of sunlight, and for the ISS you can subscribe to the Spot the Station service of NASA.

Lovely case everyone. With such well protected and cared after eyepieces, I would not hesitate buying second hand from any of you.

A wonderful instrument. Congratulations, Alan!

Hi all, we're close to a hundred pages now. Does anyone else think it would be a good idea to start a new thread "Show us your eyepiece case(s) part 2" ? Cheers

Problem solved, and a great solution it is.

Hi, I wonder if the observation is incompatible with a quad copter or a Chinese lantern.

Olly, Tim, it's magnificent ! Thank you for putting so much work in it. What an accomplishment !

Ah, thanks.

You certainly are a master in the art of foam cutting, and yours is a wonderful case with beautiful eyepieces, but what is that thing at the bottom?