Knighty2112

Nice report Nick. Was planning to go out and observe last night, but tiredness and clouds stopped that. I’ll keep an eye out for those planetary underpants on Mars next time I observe it.  

Good going. Sadly too much cloud on the horizon here to try to see Venus and Mercury. Was hoping to get a shot of the moon through my scope with my dslr, but clouds piling back in again. 

By hole do you mean a hole through some clouds through which you could see the stars and the 5 shootings stars you observed? Further clarification of date you viewed this and the full sky conditions needed to help narrow this down for you please?

What grease did you use to replace the grease already in the HEQ5 Pro? Thought about doing the Rowan mount upgrade on my mount, but as I only do visual then not sure it will benefit me much. Might have a go a re-greasing it though. 

Well, Santa came down the chimney on Christmas Eve and delivered this little gem to me (I was a good boy all year, I promise!) Some nice photos of the earth and the moon in it, along with all the Apollo missions and earlier pre-Apollo test missions that led up to it too. Thanks Santa!  
 

Looks like it was in the December issue most likely.

2 hours ago, wesdon1 said:

Hi @Knighty2112

Thank You for your comments/advice, I really am grateful thanks!

Yes I am actually now seriously considering getting the Wi-Fi Dongle so I can control my mount with iPhone. One q I have for you, if I may? Do you know if it's possible for me to control my mount with the Stellarium Software/App that I pay for monthly on my iPhone? I love Stellarium, and have used both the paid for and free versions on my home PC and iPhone, respectively. If I have to, I will pay for Skysafari iPhone app too?

Yes the instructions made no mention of which end to connect the plastic/ferrous block to? I had had it connected the wrong way around for months and snapped one cable, and almost snapped a second one!! And all along, all I had to do to resolve the issue was reverse the cable!!?? I am still kicking myself for literally not seeing the woods for the trees, so to speak!!?? LOL.

Wes.

Sorry, posted again by mistake.

2 hours ago, wesdon1 said:

Hi @Knighty2112

Thank You for your comments/advice, I really am grateful thanks!

Yes I am actually now seriously considering getting the Wi-Fi Dongle so I can control my mount with iPhone. One q I have for you, if I may? Do you know if it's possible for me to control my mount with the Stellarium Software/App that I pay for monthly on my iPhone? I love Stellarium, and have used both the paid for and free versions on my home PC and iPhone, respectively. If I have to, I will pay for Skysafari iPhone app too?

Yes the instructions made no mention of which end to connect the plastic/ferrous block to? I had had it connected the wrong way around for months and snapped one cable, and almost snapped a second one!! And all along, all I had to do to resolve the issue was reverse the cable!!?? I am still kicking myself for literally not seeing the woods for the trees, so to speak!!?? LOL.

Wes.

Hi Wes. Sorry, I do not know if it will work with Stallarium mobile - star map app, but according to the blurb on the app in itunes stores it says it does;

I use a Celestron 6/8SE goto mount with a wifi dongle and control via Skysafari. The date/time and location is used from Skysafari, and as Skyportal is a slimmed down version of Skysafari made specially for Celestron it sends the same details across too to your mount. So as long as these are all correct on your phone/tablet then there should be no problem. 

Sorry, late to the thread. Glad you got it sorted out. Just looked at pictures of HEQ5 mount on FLO and it clearly shows the cable plugged in with the square part going into the handcontroller, and the other end into the mount itself. Pity that nowhere in the HEQ5 manual is this mentioned for users, or any pictures supplied. I use a wifi dongle with my HEQ5 pro mount  and control it via Skysafri Pro. The hand controller is just gathering dust now on a shelf. Not sure why but I find I get a much better alingment when I do it via Skysafari than I ever do using the hand controller anyway. 

Always good when you can gift yourself Christmas prezzies. Got a few astro related ones lined up for myself this Christmas too!  

Nice work Reggie. 👍🏻

Got one as a Chrissy prezzie to open on the big day. Came wrapped in plastic, so not seen any of the inside as yet, but seen some of the images on the web site for the book and they look great! 😀

I would say that this is faulty. If new I wold contact who you bought it off and get it replaced. 

I believe it is for quick easy release and to also help do a final tighten of equipment used with it. I have the same mechanism on an L bracket that I use on another mount (non goto).

What size EP did you use when you did your 3 star align? Always best to use a higher magnification initially to get the alignment more accurate, then you can drop it down after that with another EP if you want. Also, align the mount with the final way that the mount slews on to an object when slewing to an object, so if for example in its final movements it goes up, then to the right make sure your do your final 3 star alignment adjustments this way too to take out any gear backlash effects.

Glad someone got to see some sky above the solid cloud cover lately! 👍🏻  

If it’s anything like my 250pds only one of the smaller caps come off on the large lens cap. The other one as far as I can tell is just to assist in taking off the whole large cap off the scope when in use. As others have said the one that comes off if for reducing brightness of the moon, but also useful for when viewing Jupiter and Venus as these can be bright too when viewed.

More importantly why is it called a star also? Be interested to know the answer too!

4 minutes ago, garyR said:

Hi knighty,  I don’t know as dont use it with 1 ota.  It would be within the manufacturers limit of 6kg on one side ? But handbook does not mention individual weights so a ‘puzzler’ to me I’m afraid 

OK. Ta. Was just curious as I have an 8SE goto mount too.

1 hour ago, garyR said:

I received my AZ-GTIX from FLO Friday 18th November together with Skywatcher Startravel  120mm refractor + Synscan V5 Handset both to go on it. First Class 5 Star⭐️⭐️⭐️⭐️⭐service from FLO especially ALEX with Extensive Help & advice he has Given me, as I’m a “Returning” amateur astronomer in my later 60’s. When I retired 3 years ago I bought my first telescope in 50 yrs: A Nextstar 8SE. I really love the SE 8” ota but afraid I found the SE mount too ‘Wobbly’ & felt the ota was too heavy for celestron SE package mount. As I also decided I would like a wide field refractor, I thought this new AZ-GTIX would be perfect as only do Visual. I managed to get both Just Under its 10kg by using digital scales @ 9.9kg (5.7kg + 4.2kg) Exact including both ota’s & digonals & eyepieces & Finderscopes. It is Far more Solid and maybe twice as Stable with both ota’s carefully balanced than my Celestron 8SE mount = I’m a Very Happy Customer!

 

 

 

Does it work OK with the C8 on the mount on its own?

Remember that with a 25mm EP and the focal length of you scope (2032mm) that you are using approx 81 x magnification, whereas with the 9mm and 5mm you are getting 225x and 406x magnification. The sky conditions need to be good to get good views with higher magnifications like this, especially with the 5mm EP. If you used them in a shorter focal length scope you would probably get better views with the reduced magnification, so whilst they are not the best EP’s going they should be better quality that the standard 25mm EP supplied with the SCT, even though views might not suggest this in your scope. 

According to Wiki the centre point lies in Draco. Looks pretty close to the Cats eye nebula to me!  

5 minutes ago, Ratlet said:

Think tonight is going to be clear for a lot of the country.  Going to be WILD in here tomorrow lol.

Hoping some more folk will post some sketches lol.

Fingers crossed! 😀

Nice capture. Well done! 👍🏻