jock1958

Hi and welcome to SGL. Passed Al Khobar a few times in the late 90’s travelling between Al Kharj & Bahrain, great part of the world if you want clear skies!

Great, if ain’t broke don’t fix it 👍

Hi @JeremyS have marked & labelled the bits I mentioned in my post above, have also added some more thoughts on the design and operation which I hope will be of use to Scopetech Zero owners.

Yep agree with you Neil, also Saturn 🪐 & Jupiter are in a good position where I live in South Wales, in last couple of weeks I’ve had some cracking views of the gas giants through my 4” refractor mounted on a Skytee 2 & AZ4 Skywatcher tripod.

Thanks Jeremy, that’s the top hats I should have marked them before I hit the send button. Pic of typical top hat bush below

Haven't been entirely satisfied with my slo mo controls especially in azimuth which has been intermittently stiff in operation even after adjusting the brass locknuts and tension screws on the worm drive housing, so bit the bullet and stripped it down. Note: mines second hand with no warranty! Its fairly straight forward and only tools required were a small Allen key & torx bit. On strip down I found all the components extremely well engineered and lubricated with either lithium or graphite grease mainly on the worm shaft and gear wheel and other specific areas. The design is clever and from what I can see it works on a simple slipper clutch design (with the aid of nylon washers) so when you tighten the friction knob it basically clamps the mechanism together which engages the slo mo control worm drive but also allows you to move the mount by hand. One thing I found there was no grease between the brass top hat bushes x2 and worm gear shaft which resulted in the shaft and top hat bushes rotating together in the shaft housing which was giving me the occasional stiffness that I mentioned above. This can be checked easily without stripping down by marking the top hat bushes (inside of white nylon washers) with a felt tip pen and rotate the slo mo control, worm shaft including locknuts should rotate top hats should remain stationary, see pic below. Once stripped down I slid the two top hats inwards and greased the contact areas of the worm shaft and ensured the outside surfaces of the top hats and worm housing were de-greased. Before fitting the worm shaft into the housing I put a few drops of thread lock on the outside surface of the top hats to stop them rotating which so far has worked a treat. Re-assembly is fairly straight forward, but take care that you don't over tighten the three small torx screws that holds the silver circular clamping plate in place, I tried it and axis was quite stiff to move (found these screws held in with thread lock). I haven't any info on the torque loadings of these screws so I nipped them up with some more thread lock. All in all I'm very happy with butter smooth operation but like I said I wouldn't have attempted this if I was the first owner with it still in warranty. Some pics below of it stripped down.

Your new set up looks brilliant Jeremy. These small Taks punch well above their weight as I found out with my FS-60Q, with a mix of great looks, portability and sublime optics, what's not to like! How you getting on with your Scopetech Zero? mines still a bit stiff on both axis even after adjustments, wonder if they pre-lube them with same sticky stuff they use in the Skytee 2 🤔

Thanks for sharing Dave, your right its a very unusual design. Times like this that you wish you could wind back the clock 😩 I know it’s of no consolation but looks to me that OO did a very tidy job in converting it into a classic refractor!

Love mine, bought it second hand a few years ago and like you removed that sticky glue and replaced it with standard wheel bearing grease, needless to say it a made massive difference. Although I only use my 4” F9 refractor on it I’ve no doubt you could comfortably double the load with spare capacity easily.

Spent a good couple of hours following the Ganymede transit from the middle to the eastern limb using my Tak FC-100DL & WO BV's. I've only seen a few of these transits but what struck me was how clear and sharp it was and how quickly it moved, also Is it me or is the GRS fading in colour? its looking decidedly like a Farrow & Ball pastel shade that my wife likes so much!

First night its been clear down here in weeks so know how you feel @old_eyes luckily my house was well positioned to blot out the moon whilst I concentrated on Ganymede's shadow transit of Jupiter, Saturn was well positioned and looking pretty good as well.

Ha ha reminded me of Trig always calling Rodney...Dave in Only Fools & Horses 🤣

Excellent and very detailed write up Dave, like you have never seen the propeller in M13 🤔

The world of binoviewing won’t be the same without the legendary Denis Levatic but entirely understand that family must come first. He was particularly helpful when I had some quires about my WO BV’s. I too wouldn’t hesitate in buying his last BV’s if I had the funds!

Congratulations on reaching the big 50k @John your posts are always well written, exceptionally informative and to a level we can all understand!

Very nice report. Checked out this area for the first time last week thanks to some inspiration from a fellow SGL'r. Even though it's fairly low in the sky up here I had some surprisingly good views of the nebulae regions through my Tak FC-100DL, 31mm Nagler & UHC filter!

That’s good to hear and it seems the SSV is a better bet than the III.

Maybe it’s just me and being a bit fussy but did read somewhere that it’s possible to swap the battery for a lower voltage one that makes it dimmer 🤔 must admit though you can adjust the telrad brightness down to being just able to see the target rings which is great for fainter objects

Unfortunately I’m a bit late to the party on this one, at one time or another I’ve mounted my SSV on both my Tak FC-100DL & FS60Q. Recently I’ve gone back to a straight through finder on my FS60Q and Telrad & RACI finder combo on my FC-100DL, but as already mentioned would still like a small lightweight RDF for my FS60Q. No doubting the excellent quality and build of the SSV as alluded to by @Highburymark for me though I found the lowest setting of the red dot not quite dim enough and tended to obliterate faint targets in comparison with the Telrad, YMMV though! Couple of pics below of the SSV mounted on my FS60Q & FC-100DL.

Been looking for a smaller red dot finder for my Tak FS60 and came across this one from Lacerta. Haven’t bought it as I’m unsure whether it’s any good or not, doesn’t seem much feedback on it 🤔 https://www.365astronomy.com/365Astronomy-Deluxe-Multi-Reticle-Red-Dot-Finderscope-Metal-Body-RED-GREEN-LED-wide-base?search=Finder

Went out again on Saturday night and weapons of choice were my 4" Tak FC-100DL, 31mm TV Nag, TV bandmate UHC filter, Sky & Telescope pocket atlas & Turn Left at Orion, using the lower line of stars in Ophiuchus as pointers I quickly found the M17 Swan then panned down through the open clusters of M23 & M25 to the M8 Lagoon. The UHC filter makes a big difference and apart from making these targets much easier to spot they also show off the nebulosity extremely nicely, the only flies in the ointment were the low angle, quarter moon, neighbours house and relatively poor seeing etc etc! Thanks again for your tips and inspiration I shall return to this area asap.

Thanks for those reports. I’m totally unfamiliar with this part of the sky as it’s usually too low from my garden, anyway with my Tak FC-100DL & 24mm panoptic I used the stars in Ophiuchus as pointers and managed to locate open clusters M23 & M25 (I think?) but like you said couldn’t discern the shape of the tea pot, I think it was too low and seeing at that altitude wasn’t the best. I shall return to this area in the next few days whilst the weathers good and hopefully bag some those nebulas!

Thanks for that, it’s also being covered on Bloomberg HD Sky News channel 502

What a cracking job, brilliant!!

Yep that’s the one, tempting but it’s a case of look but don’t touch 🤣