Cosmic Geoff

I am surprised that you managed to use the telescope at all by forcing the mount around by hand. That can't have been very user-friendly.  When I dismantled my SLT mount (which may or may not be similar), I could not see any signs of a horizontal slip clutch, and it can't be turned by hand if moderate force is applied.  

The proof of the pudding is in the eating. 🙂 If you power up the mount and try moving it horizontally and vertically under power (without trying to complete the alignment procedure) you will be able to see if it moves smoothly and quietly (in which case you should be able to use it as the makers intended) or if it stalls, makes odd noises etc (in which case you have a problem).

If all seems well, then download the full instructions for the mount and work through them.  You need to enter various settings correctly, and then try an alignment. Note that the one-star and solar system alignments are the simplest to do, followed by the two-star auto align. There require that you be able to recognise the alignment objects. The three-star align is intended for people who can't identify three named objects.

If the mount is damaged, Sky-watcher parts from 'Astroboot' may be mechanically compatible.  In the worst case, buy a new mount of your choice and mount the scope on it.

Used C8 SE SCT? Lighter and more compact than an 8" Dob and has GoTo.

Different (better quality) eyepieces  would improve the performance, and shorter focal length eyepieces or a Barlow lens will increase the magnification,  but don't expect too much. As the name suggests, the 70mm Travelscope is meant to be portable, and it is best used for wide fields of view and low magnification.  As it happens, I have a 70mm vintage telescope that performs very well (for its aperture) at high magnifications, but putting together its equivalent today (with mount) could cost quite a lot of money.  I spent around £200 on a mount for this long scope. 

18 hours ago, alan potts said:

Keep it up and try slight longer exposures, try an get a good Polar alignment too.

I'll keep trying and hope to get something before this Pluto region is lost to twilight later in the season.

Here are some EEVA-style images made with a 102mm f5 Startravel, SLT mount and ASI224MC planetary camera. I don't claim that they are very good, but would point to the modest equipment used (the camera cost more than the OTA did) and the fact that these are single exposures of about 5 seconds.

I have previously tried imaging globular clusters with a C8 but the results were dire.

One should also compare them with the eyeball view through a telescope of twice the size.

I also tried imaging the region of Pluto, but on interpreting the result it appears that I missed the planet's position and also was not giving enough exposure to pick out objects that faint.

Impressive work, and with relatively short exposures.

It is worth pointing out to novices that even if the GoTo mount incorporates clutches, that does not mean that the mount is going to be very usable as an unpowered mount.  Generally no mechanical slow-motion is provided. The fork mount of the CPC800 for instance incorporates horizontal and vertical clutches, but the horizontal clutch has little practical use and the vertical clutch is useful for placing the OTA vertically for stowage at the end of a session. The OTA is not balanced. 

6 hours ago, Buzzard75 said:

Yes. GoTo is not required to operate a mechanically driven telescope. You can operate it in a manual mode simply by disengaging the clutch locks and moving it to whatever area you want to view.

This is not universally true. You need to read the small print.  Some designs do not include clutches. As a guide, German equatorial mounts are likely to include a clutch.  "Freedom Find" mounts can be declutched and moved without losing the GoTo setting.   Other mounts, including the Celestron SLT and SE mounts cannot be moved at all except under power and there is little point in trying to use them without the GoTo alignment.

Well, a C6 SE will easily break down into three sections: telescope , mount and tripod.  But note that I can pick up a complete C8 SE assembly and carry it outside through a doorway. (or I used to be able to before my right arm started giving me problems). The C6 tube will be lighter than the equivalent aperture Newtonian.

As for astrophotography, please note that the C6 SE will be useless for deep-space astrophotography and a pain to use for planetary imaging. The mount is only intended for visual use (and to be portable).  If you are serious about astrophotography you should just buy something else, either in addition to the C6 and SE mount, or instead of.

A Goto telescope would certainly make it easier to find objects in the sky, once you master the setup, which has to be repeated each time you take the outfit outside and set it up for use.  I should point out that some people just don't get on with GoTo scopes (though I wouldn't want to use a big scope without it.)  There are ways of simplifying the setup procedure, such as using the Starsense accessory, or a GPS module (or both).  If you know the sky well enough to identify various of the brightest stars, you can use a 2-star alignment which is quicker than the 3-star and gives the same result. Doing a 2-star alignment with a GPS-equipped mount is fairly quick and painless.

Yes, you could get a C6 SE or a C8 SE, and both are excellent outfits for visual observing, and also light and compact.  I should point out though that you can buy GoTo Dobsonians, or Dobsonians with digital setting circles, which might be cheaper.

As for collimation, I have three catatroptic scopes - two SCTs and a Maksutov. I had to collimate one of the SCTs when I bought it second hand about two years ago, and have not needed to touch the adjustment since, and the other two not at all.

Newbies tend to assume by default that they can image with the same sort of telescope used for visual observing, but this is only true to a limited extent.

You may imagine that you need a large aperture for imaging, but you don't - see the link here for image of M31 taken with a 30mm finderscope.

You may think that a visual mount is adequate for imaging, but in general they're not - the requirements for imaging are far more demanding.  You can buy an expensive SCT on a GoTo mount and find that the mount is useless for deep-space imaging.

Saturn imaged in visible light and infrared (IR850). Altitude about 14 degrees, indifferent seeing.

Captured in Sharpcap, 5000 frame video for visible image, processed in Registax6.

CPC800, ASI224MC, ADC.

Here is a EEVA-style image of Neptune and apparently its largest moon, Triton. I had been trying to image planetary nebulae before aiming the gear at Neptune, and noticed a faint smudge below the severely over-exposed planet. It was possibly easier to see at the time than on the processed image attached (between planet and arrow).  It seems to match the position given by Sky & telescope's Triton Tracker.

At around mag 13.5, Triton would normally be beyond the reach of a C8 used visually even in ideal conditions.

Image is inverted, taken 12Aug at 22.40 UT.  CPC800,ASI224MC, flip mirror. Gibbous moon.

Update - since posting the above I have determined that item 1 above debayers to mono with GRBG (the setting previously used for ASI120MC), mono with GBRG, false colour with BGGR and true colour with RGGB, so I hope that's the problem solved.

It still does not make sense to me.

Last year I took some snapshots of planetary nebulae with my ASI120MC camera and Sharpcap v3.1. These were .png files and I had no problem debayering them in PIPP to output colour TIFF files.

This year I tried the same with my ASI224MC camera and the results remained obstinately mono even when I repeated the snapshots on a second night.

In the end I connected up both cameras in my kitchen with the fisheye lenses and got the following: (I have omitted the settings which seemed to make no difference). All with Raw8

ASI224MC:

.ser selected (defailts to .png for still: Mono 😥

.png selected: Mono

FITS selected: colour with GBRG debayering

TIFF: unsupported compression error 5

ASI120MC:

.ser selected (defailts to .png for still: Colour with GRBG debayering 🙂

.png selected: Colour with GRBG debayering 🙂

FITS selected: Mono

TIFF: unsupported compression error 5

To me these results make no sense at all.  I presume there is some way of converting a FITS to a .jpg or TIFF if I need to do that for distribution?

(Also note that the debayering setting apparently differs between the cameras.)

I have done planetary imaging with a C8 SE. Trust me, you do not want to do this.  The OTA is great, but get a C8 OTA and put it on a proper imaging mount like an AVX or a Sky-watcher Synacan. Or get the CPC800 package.  The SE mount is a visual mount, but from an imaging point of view there is too much vibration and lack of stiffness, too much backlash and poor tracking.  Don't go there unless you already have a C8SE and just want to give planetary imaging a try.   As for deep-sky imaging with a SE - ROFL! No!!

As for the 200p, only if you must.  Personally I'd much rather use a C8 as the depth of focal range makes attaching sundry imaging accessories so much easier.   I can't identify the FLO deal, but for imaging it needs at least a HEQ5 Pro Synscan mount.

For deep sky imaging you don't want either of these scopes, but a small high quality refractor on a heavy duty imaging mount.

I think that my C8 SCT performs better than my 8" Newtonian.  Certainly some people may think otherwise, on trying other pairs of instruments.  In any case, I think that with good instruments the difference should be minor.

There are a number of other reasons for choosing one or the other - initial cost, size and weight, convenience of use when observing, depth of focus adjustment, cost of an adequate mount and so forth. 

Potentially fixable by re-flashing the firmware but needs some research to determine if firmware is available, etc.  I have had to bring my SLT mount back to life twice by re-loading the firmware.  Not recommended for the techno-phobic. Check with nexstarsite. com for guidance.  You can find decode of any error messages online (or ask us).  Also beware of power problems (bad plug connections).

If the handset (or mount) is really dead it may be time for an upgrade to another telescope and mount. 

No mount? Be aware that the cheapest suitable mount for it could cost around £100, and you could possibly spend a lot more without over-mounting the scope.

Wavseeker- I urge you in the strongest possible terms to stop looking at high-end scopes like the 12" Dob and the 6" Evo SCT, and buy or borrow a small inexpensive portable scope and get some practical experience with it.  After that you can make a sensible decision on what sort of scope to get next. 

And don't imagine that anything other than a specialist scope on a heavy mount will be much use for astrophotography, even if you spend a lot of money.  You can put a fork mount GoTo on a wedge but few people who have done it seem to think this is a good idea (unless one is talking about permanently mounting one in an observatory). 

3 hours ago, -philip- said:

and the WiFi through the phone app seems simpler than Goto.

That remains to be seen. The wifi mounts are still GoTo and I presume you still have to do a 2 or 3 star alignment.  Also having a wifi link instead of a length of curly cable is something else to go wrong. 

I don't see why you are ordering a 127mm Mak with Wifi when you did not get on with the GoTo on the large Dob.  Likewise the Startravel with Wifi you mention in the post above.

You mention the C8 SE in passing.  This is (for a GoTo) very quick to set up and also lightweight - you can just carry the whole assembly outside and start aligning it.  Should be lighter that a Dobsonian of the same aperture. It's even quicker to align with Starsense (which increases the budget even more).

As it happens I have both a 127mm Mak and a Startravel and they are completely different in character - one is good for high power viewing (double stars etc) and the other for widefield - not very good on planets though the bundled barlow seems to improve things a bit.

Good luck with getting focus without using an eyepiece. 😐  Every time I use a (planetary) camera, I start with focusing on the target via an eyepiece, make a coarse adjustment to accommodate the difference between the focal planes of eyepiece and camera, and then put in the camera with the telescope aimed at a really bright object that will be picked up even if well out of focus.

I need the eyepiece in place to align the GoTo anyway.

7 hours ago, Louis D said:

They are now no different from Agena Astro and FLO in having no physical retail presence, so I don't understand why that makes them shady. 

Unlike Optcorp, FLO give their full physical trading address at the bottom of their opening webpage.

Thanks for the info on Optcorp - I have not heard of them before. 

Destination countries may also charge duties and handling fees on incoming telescope gear, and hold the goods till the fees are paid.

Your thread title includes 'Starsense' but the picture shows a Nexstar+ controller.  These controllers are not the same.

If it's a Nexstar+, flashing the firmware using Celestron's CFM software should sort it.  It's a bit of work - you need a connecting cable (an exercise in itself) and some software including CFM installed on your laptop. You should find help on nexstarsite.com.