great_bear

OK - I found my solution! As an experiment, I screwed my WO Binoviewer OCA lens onto my 6mm Delos (via an unwanted filter with the glass removed to help with the fussy 1.25” threads). The results were more than impressive - startlingly good in fact. So, I’ve effectively built my own 5mm Delos! 😁 Problem solved! - for me at least…

If you haven’t fallen in love with eyepieces, you just haven’t met the right one yet. Don’t worry - you will one day, I promise… 😉

That’s why a have a dual-pronged approach at home. I have a custom-mirror 150PL which I throw onto an AZ4 sitting atop a Berlebach Planet tripod - a set-up which allows me to observe in few seconds. My main telescope is a Mak 180 Pro on an HEQ-5 Pro but I was getting fed up with overcast skies. So now I ‘cheat’ nature by being up-and-running with the 150PL before the skies have had a chance to cloud over! 😊 If the clouds don’t come - and I’ve already got some observing in, then I take a break and set up the Mak for the night’s worth of guided observation.

Not really - when I did an inflation calculator on Delos from when I was buying them, the current price is about £100 too much. There was a time in the UK when Delos and Pentax XW were about the same price - but just look at the price difference now…

I’m on a break in Bournemouth at the moment, and - since I wasn’t especially planning on doing any astronomy, on my way out I just absent-mindedly grabbed my old Revelation 80ED Spotting Scope I bought from Telescope House about 12yrs ago. I’d long-since written this off for astronomy use - bad light scatter around the stars, poor focus, difficult to control etc. so I was very surprised what a good session I had with it last night with none of those issues. I think the issues I’d had with it in the past must have been down to: Bad luck Inexperience Poor tripod With regard to (1) I suspect that by chance every time I’d used it it must have been a foggy night, because last night I had no issues with with scattered light or poor focus whatsoever. For (2), viewing technique is important - if you don’t look through the supplied zoom eyepiece at the correct angle, there’s a lot of distortion, but get it right, and it’s just fine. For (3), well - I have an irredeemably bad Velbon tripod I use with this. Completely pointless. Ironically I’ve got a much better, astronomy-focused (slo-mo handles) tripod at home I purchased but somehow never used with this (it’s lightweight but a bit clunky and awkward to transport) Anyway, in summary it looks like I was wrong to write-off spotting-scopes as an astronomy tool. When time, planning and luggage space are in short supply, there’s definitely a useful role they can play in astronomy for grab-and-go non-critical observing.

It’s a completely different issue. Second-hand is good for items that are no longer available or stocked (such as the Baader Microguider Eyepiece) and the quality of second-hand goods is highly-variable. There is negotiation to be had (although I will concede that people purchasing sets of ZAO-II eyepieces for the sole purpose of taking them off the market and re-selling at crazy prices is dishonourable) But there are many things you don’t want to buy second-hand. If I know an eyepiece will be a keeper, then I’ll buy new. I can (and have) bought Tele Vue eyepieces to investigate what they are like (such as the Plossls which I found I disliked) but once I’ve made my mind up (as I did with Delos) I want guaranteed units straight from the factory. It’s a different thing completely.

Is that what caused the embarrassing saga of the Tele Vue DeLite eyepiece launch in the UK? The marketing materials said it was a “smaller, more economical” alternative to Delos, yet some UK retailers were selling both at more-or-less the same price at launch time. It meant the marketing materials made no sense.

I’ve been thinking about having a refresh of my eyepiece collection. However, just as I’m comparing relative price differences (at FLO) someone seems to have pressed a “Hike!” button. - HD Orthos now > £90 ?? - Delos now at £419 ??? Seriously? - I understand that times are tough, but hey - they’re tough for everyone - not just retailers. Eyepiece upgrades are not an essential purchase, and price hikes at this scale are enough to freeze anyone’s upgrade plans.

I’m looking to see if anyone has (or could take) some close-up photos of the seat safety mechanism on the black SkyWatcher/OVL Observing Chair? I had one of the original, unsafe ones (actually, if I’m honest, it was me who got the unsafe ones taken off the market by reporting it) but I am looking to see if there’s a way I can make and fit whatever solution was finally adopted to make it safe. Thanks in advance etc. Jeremy.

You really *must* report this - as UPS have a very good reputation which I’m sure they want to keep!

Due to my mirror disaster I'm delaying further eyepieces purchases until later in the year - will report back at that time though...

A while back I bought a telescope that was put together by @johninderby with an excellent 1/12-wave mirror from Orion Optics. However, recently this mirror was starting to cloud over with a weird blue haze that simply wouldn't clean off - nothing I did made any difference: - so I sent it off to be re-coated - I packed it up in a very robust way that guaranteed that it would be safe, even if someone were to throw the parcel across the room. I was satisfied that pretty much nothing anyone could do would damage it in transit. Just to be sure though, I stuck lots of "Fragile" stickers all over the box on every side, so "Fragile" could always be clearly seen from all angles. I needn't have bothered. The thing "disappeared" before it even got to the local depot: - and even more frustrating, being a telescope mirror, there's no compensation 😞 I have been notified by the courier that it is officially "lost". When I looked into this kind of thing, I was shocked to see how bad the state of parcel delivery is in this country! Undercover investigation reveals everything from widespread theft of interesting-looking parcels to staff throwing, kicking, and otherwise deliberately mishandling goods in transit, and - as revealed by Joe Lycett with hidden cameras on Channel 4 - clearly-labelled and easily-deliverable parcels being sent off in batches to have their contents auctioned off on a regular basis. There's lots I can say about this situation - none of it particularly nice or productive - so I won't bother saying it, but it is deeply upsetting. I've ordered a replacement 1/12th mirror from Orion Optics, but it's a special order and doesn't come cheap. Ironically, as I was going to the Bluedot Music Festival when I sent the mirror off, I could have actually dropped it off in person on my way there, but that simply didn't occur to me at the time. Oh well, you live and learn I guess, but it's very sad - especially since whoever has "accidentally" taken possession of my mirror likely has no idea what it is or what to do with it so it's probably already in a skip. 🤬

That’s the problem - these types of Samsung cameras are chosen for LIVE astro viewing (direct from the video output port) as the frame integration is done live by the camera itself - so nothing can be done about dead pixels. This is clearly a sensor issue - and as such, if this is an ageing effect it would happen to any brand of camera that used these imaging sensors - it is not a Samsung specific part. - and since the issue is the same on used and unused units, ageing is not an unreasonable assumption. Glad to hear that this doesn’t affect all cameras - it would be interesting to hear from owners of these cameras or others with the same sensors, how they are holding up today.

(this is a follow-on from another thread, but I the information is important enough to warrant having a thread under a new title) I recently tried to recommission an old SCB-4000 but upon testing it, I found that with sensitivity turned up, it was splattered all over with dead pixels - which I thought was either mishandling or age. However, when considering purchasing a replacement, I figured it was worth trying an inexpensive experiment first - since my wife suggested that I was unlikely to have mishandled my camera (she knows how obsessive and careful I am with my astronomy stuff). So I found a brand-new SCB-2001 on ebay and purchased it for a few pounds. It's essentially the same model as the SCB-4000 except with a 1/3" sensor instead of a 1/2" sensor. To my delight, it was unusable. That may seem an odd thing to say, but that was the purpose of the experiment: What I found was that the brand-new, unused, but very old SCB-2001 had exactly the same quantity and distribution of dead pixels as my old SCB-4000. Clearly my wife's hypothesis was correct - that I did not cause the damage through mishandling - it was merely the sensor degrading with age - even on a camera which had never been used. This has saved me from being in the awkward position of spending a lot more money with the hassle of a (perhaps argumentative) product return process, and so it was well worth spending a few pounds on this simple experiment. So the take-away for me here, is to not to purchase a second-hand astro camera if the model is more than a couple of years old - even if it is only lightly used. As for the two SCB's that I've got I'll sell them off cheaply on ebay, with a note to the effect that it's only high-sensitivity astro use which they're unsuitable for; for lightweight basic CCTV duties on the default settings they work just fine.

Quite the bargain! My new one cost over ten times that amount! (and the box went in the recycling immediately after opening - it isn't glamourous thing that you'd want to keep - just regular brown cardboard)

My Berlebach Planet (which arrived a couple of days ago) came with a note in the box about this, printed in big red text.

P.S. Would a replacement SCB-4000 be equally likely to be splattered with dead pixels too? Is it a known problem?

So I turned on my Samsung SCB-4000 this evening having not used it for literally years. Well, it’s had-it basically. It “works” but with sensitivity turned up, it’s splattered all over with dead pixels (either age, or quite likely improper handling by me under bright light conditions). Even with sensitivity off under daylight conditions, dead pixels are clearly visible. Should I replace it (about £50)? - or alternatively are there much better and more modern options that I should be considering? The use-case is that I am in a heavily light-polluted environment, and I want to watch video live as deep-sky objects reveal themselves on some kind of 12v battery-powered display screen. I’d really like a self-contained solution rather than involving a laptop. Thanks in advance, Jeremy.

That’s great, thank-you!

Yes, that sums up my feelings too.

Well it will be coatings - of course. My question was why - and howcome it doesn’t affect normal operation?

Because that eye relief is REALLY bad on the shorter Plossls, and the range stops at 8mm. Oh - and weight! - some telescopes (such as my wife’s 130P SupaTrak) are really not built to take Delos et. all.

So I cleaned - or more correctly - de-dusted my 2” quartz dielectric diagonal today (I’ve not touched it for ten years) and I was struck by its pale smoky-blue colour. I remember when I bought (from new) I was a bit freaked out by this smoky appearance, but folks here on SGL reassured me that dielectric mirrors do look smoky-blue under casual inspection, but in proper use at 45 degrees no such colouration occurs (this certainly seems to be the case). What I don’t remember however, is any explanation as to why dielectric diagonals look smoky-blue under casual inspection. Can anyone enlighten me?

Now that is a VERY astute point. I am in the same boat as the OP - same FL for the same scope weirdly enough - and whilst I was set on a Delite, this thread had me considering the Pentax. But parfocality? Darn good point there. It bugs me already that the Delos 17.3 isn’t parfocal with the other Delos, but having to refocus whilst at the other end of the focal range - whilst chasing a target at high magnification? Hmmm yeah, that’s possibly a dealbreaker for against the XW for me.

He says "that is a reputation these scopes have" - so a bad batch maybe? Certainly not the kind of issue you'd expect from Tak...