Peter Drew

Must learn to type quicker! 🙂

I think a commonly available focal reducer would provide this effect, a "positive lens rather than a " negative" one. 🙂

I've just ordered a ZWO ADC from FLO. I have a large range of telescope types and apertures to try it on so look forward to the experiments. 🙂

Probably a combination of all of those things. Beginners are usually inspired by unrealistic advertising or seeing pretty pictures which, as you have suspected, have been heavily processed. The planets that you have seen are currently very low so it is difficult to get a good view. The friend's telescope is a good one and capable of better than what you have seen so far, it just needs good conditions. I wouldn't jump straight in with a large telescope, it will suffer with the conditions, possibly more. 🙂

I had my dream job for 35 years, self employed telescope maker. Still in the same job now in retirement but no pay! 🙂

Do you mean "how to attach a telescope mount to one? If so, all you have to do is fit a plate to the bottom of the mount and then rawlbolt the plate to the pier. 🙂

I was 28 at the time, my first wife was probably not interested enough to have stayed up and we had no children so not much of a family event to latch a memory to. We did have a B & W TV and so I did watch it. Happy birthday Gina, hope you see the next landing! 🙂

Had a good session last night from 10.30pm until 1.30am. Perfectly clear sky, better than Saturday night. Struggled to find the comet at first due to how much it had moved since but easy in 15x70 once located. Easy to see naked eye by midnight, it didn't appear noticeably fainter, probably because of the better conditions. I used 15x70 binoculars, SW 150ED, C8 SCT and 16"SCT. All gave great but different views so no "winner". The 15x70 gave the widest view so framed the comet best, the 150ED, as you might expect, gave the cleanest image, the C8 gave a brighter image than the 150ED and the 16" gave the closeup view of the coma, very bright but no hint of a nucleus. Overall, a memorable night, I think the equipment enjoyed it as much as I did. I could see the comet naked eye through my grubby windscreen on the way home! 🙂

I wonder what your wife calls me!

Yes, you're correct, you will need to move the new focuser down the tube by the difference in order to reach focus. Whether you need need a larger secondary depends on how generous the existing one is, slightly too large is preferable than too small. 🙂

A simple method that often works and worth trying is to unscrew the objective barrels slightly. Usually, this causes the image to move and if you are lucky, enough to correct the problem. Removing both barrels and swapping them sometimes gets things closer. I have the same model of Bresser binocular and it is really quite good despite its cheapness. 🙂

Just back home after an unexpected session thanks to the first clear patch today. The comet was a lot higher this week, a bit fainter than last Saturday but still an easy naked eye object and spectacular in my 50x300 binocular telescope. 🙂

I think its got to be some form of artifact, the area is popular at the moment due to Jupiter so if it was a comet at that brightness I'm sure that we would be aware of it by now. 🙂

Quote. "My present dome is perfect, in size, colour and form except for the leaks". So 3 out of 4 aspects covered. I would urge you to retain your masterpiece and do whatever it takes to weatherproof it. To use a third party replacement would be defeat, a word not in your lexicon I suspect! Third party domes have also been known to leak. 🙂

This is the way I used for fixed height wood tripods. (last paragraph) Works well. 🙂

I would expect it to be on a par with a good PST, nothing about it suggests that it would be a significant step up from one. The appearance and mode of operation will likely appeal to many. I look forward to hearing reports. 🙂

@ DaveL59. I have a 80mm F16 objective in a cell that you will be welcome to have if you think it would suit your purpose. It's from one of the generic refractors of that period. 🙂

It sort of makes sense. It would have a similar true field of view on most telescopes to a regular finder, the large exit pupil light loss probably would not impact too much on the aperture of the main telescope and if nothing else it would always be perfectly aligned! A bit pricey though. 🙂

It looks to me that the worm hasn't been engaging properly for some time. The radius of the worm should match the curve of the teeth on the wormwheel. The witness marks suggest that the worm has been running on the bottom of the tooth radius. The "flats" on the teeth at the damaged area could have been caused either by the worm overriding the teeth or the worm being initially tightened against the crest of the teeth on initial assembly. If this is the DEC axis wheel, just turn the wheel round 180 degrees so that the damage is on the opposite side. If you are handy with a needle file you could clean up the flats. 🙂

We ran a "solar day" for a couple of years at the Astronomy Centre, a combination of not much to see and low attendance caused it to fizzle out.

I thought material didn't have to withstand the temperatures as the plasma was suspended in a powerful electric force field. The problem with nuclear fusion I think has been that the energy to do this has so far exceeded the energy generated. 🤔

The trees and buildings actually make for a nice framing. 🙂

+1 🙂

Sounds like the Crayford focuser needs adjusting. The design should ensure that it does not tilt, if the focusing tube slips without the locking screw tightened then the other adjustments on the focuser body should address that issue. 🙂

I seem to have collected 1 Celestron, 1 Seben, 1 Vixen, 2 Baader lll, 1 TV 3-6 and 1 Leica. 🙂