Trikeflyer

I have a parallogram Mount and it does make life easier. I found some plans on line. I got my local wood yard to supply, cut and drill some ash wood timber to the required lengths. Got the bolts off eBay. I assembled it and it works a treat. I am no diy expert so if I can do it anyone can! you get the plans off google - I used Astro toms plans - http://www.astro-tom.com/projects/binomount/binocular_mount.htm . I just took the cutting list and plans to the wood yard and they supplied, cut and drilled - all i had to do was assembly. Cost me about £120 all in and holds my 15x70 Apollo’s like a rock. Steve

My two favourite eyepieces in my 12 inch revelation dob are my Morpheus 17.5mm and my Pentax XW 10mm. In fact they are my two favourite eyepieces full stop. I don’t think you will go far wrong with Morpheus range and they are really light weight compared to others. Steve

I was writing this when Kyle replied but I think we are on the same page. The practical challenge of magnification is atmospheric conditions especially in the UK and exit pupil size limiting the image quality and contrast. The theory and the practice are in my experience, very much different. You can magnify an object as much as you like so in theory there is no limit but the problem is the quality of the image suffers in less than ideal seeing conditions. There are occasions - like the last few nights when the seeing is so good you can really magnify things - especially the moon - people with 12 inch scopes are talking about magnifications in the order of 400x or more but nights when you can achieve that without image degradation are few and far between in my experience. Anyway the main point I want to make is that there is a practical limit and it varies according to many factors. An 8mm without Barlow will give 150x - a nice working mag and an exit pupil of just over 1mm - again reasonable so on its own the 8mm will be a good choice anyway. With 2.5 barlow this will be your theoretical limit of 400x - you will probably count on one hand the amount of times you will actually use this combination. Regarding specific eyepieces, it’s tricky to recommend because there are many factors. You will most likely get many recommendations from people on here. Steve

I agree with Louis. The polariser will be exaggerating any slight differences. Steve

Can you post a picture of the rdf Steve

Hey Stu - I know no Astro pun was intended and I know what you are saying but I couldn’t help but do a double take on your last sentence - just a thought - Is a little messier something like m71 😉🤣. Compared to a big messier like M39 😜. Steve

Welcome to the forum and thanks for the photo. Nice. I spent a good while looking at the moon last night too. Gylden valley stood out. Worth a look. Steve

You can get cheaper 2inch eyepieces but I think for what you want to observe 1.25 inch Wide field eyepieces will be ok. You might need a coma corrector depending on the scope f ratio - below 5 normally benefit from coma correction. Steve

I agree - I think Aperture is your friend on this one so I’d say biggest Truss tube Dob you can handle. Goto might also help you find them easier and dark skies will help enormously. I went to @ollypenrice’s place I France - magical trip and still my jaw drops at what I could see there - he has a 14in sct monster that is fixed and that was amazing on galaxies in a dark sky area. Personally I wouldn’t choose an SCT for this job unless it’s 14 inch plus, making it expensive and not that practical to move around. He had a 10 inch sct as well and comparing the views, we were both vastly underwhelmed by the 10 inch sct vs 14 inch - there was no comparison. Depending on your budget I’d say look at a truss tube David Lakehurst dob - used or possibly skywatcher 14 inch truss tube with goto. Steve

I don’t think it’s as simple. There are many factors involved in your comment “easier to observe” it’s not just related to magnification. As others have said, scope collimation with Newtonian, aperture and light grasp, focal length and the ability to use longer focal length eye eyepieces to get the same magnification as short ones do in short scopes - generally longer focal length scopes are more forgiving when it comes to optical aberrations, eyepiece quality, scope cooling. Then there are factors you cannot control - sky darkness - all objects are easier under a dark sky, seeing and transparency - local atmospheric disturbances can cause degraded observing, altitude of the object - Lower elevation means more atmosphere to see through - making the object ‘worse’. With these many factors. Involved, it’s not straightforward as it might seem. Make sure the factors you can control are sorted and get to dark sky if you can. Then it’s down to ‘how the atmosphere is on the night’ Steve

It was rubbish in the Midlands -glad you had a good night though steve

Oregon is a good brand

Welcome to the hobby Alan. Great scope you have. I live in Walsall Wood. Steve

Well the solar filter will definitely expand your observing opportunities massively and I think you’ll gain a lot with one of these https://www.firstlightoptics.com/solar-filters/astrozap-baader-solar-filter.html. Personally I think the light pollution filter and a moon filter isn’t going to expand your observing opportunities that much. So solar filter for sure. I have a light pollution filter and a moon filter and they don’t add that much to my observing. Another idea is an upgraded 8mm eyepiece like this https://www.firstlightoptics.com/bst-starguider-eyepieces/bst-starguider-60-8mm-ed-eyepiece.html My vote though would be the solar filter and the upgraded eyepiece - You may be able to get both for your budget. Steve

What’s your budget? steve

Hope you are OK, those targets will still be there when you’re fit again. Best wishes steve

I agree that a scope I’d better than bins for your situation. For the Moon and planets you’d be hard pressed to beat a MAKSUTOV. Very portable, lightweight and fairly bulletproof. This one with a great mount is slightly over your budget but you might get a used one for less or you may be able to stretch to this amount with the tripod included - no collimation and forgiving on eyepieces which on this one starter eyepieces are included. You might need a red dot finder for this https://www.firstlightoptics.com/maksutov/sky-watcher-skymax-102-az-pronto.html Without a mount this is pretty much on budget - the eyepiece is quite long focal length so you might need a Barlow or shorter focal length eyepiece but the red dot finder is included. https://www.rothervalleyoptics.co.uk/bresser-messier-mc-1001400-optical-tube-assembly.html You could use this on a camera tripod. I think you’d be hard pushed to beat a mak for the observing you want to do. Steve

I think the finder will be almost useless. I have this scope and the optics are pretty decent but the field of view is narrow due to the long f ratio. It’s a brilliant lunar and planetary scope with globular clusters, open clusters and double stars looking good as well. Forget any faint fuzzy deep sky stuff with this scope. I got frustrated looking for deep sky stuff through the eyepiece and not finding it due to the narrow field of view. I suggest some kind of red dot finder like a telrad or the smaller rigel. That will get you in the ball park part of the sky before reverting to the optical finder. A 15-25mm eyepiece works fairly well. If you go too short focal length eyepieces the views are dark due to the small exit pupil. You will need a dew shield and I find the mirror shift when moving the focuser can be a bit annoying. I had this as my first scope and it’s not bad. I ditched the go to mount as mine was rubbish - yours might be ok as it looks like it’s just motorised alt az Mount. I now mount it on a skywatcher star discovery mount. For the money you paid it’ll punch above its weight on lunar and planets. Look up Mike Weasner etx on google - there are a wealth of resources for this scope. if you need any more help let me know. I’d start by looking at the moon - you will be amazed. Steve

If you go into settings. Find ‘stars’ in the l hand menu. Select this and then a menu appears on the right allowing you to select doubles - image attached

So did mine

I use one of these on a clipboard with red acetate off eBay sellotaped on to dim the white led. Cheap but Works a treat. https://www.amazon.co.uk/Rechargeable-Portable-Brightness-Daylight-Included/dp/B078JJV7YN/ref=asc_df_B078JJV7YN/?tag=googshopuk-21&linkCode=df0&hvadid=375418948447&hvpos=&hvnetw=g&hvrand=9593595124716622557&hvpone=&hvptwo=&hvqmt=&hvdev=t&hvdvcmdl=&hvlocint=&hvlocphy=9041126&hvtargid=pla-441365112842&psc=1&tag=&ref=&adgrpid=83648335344&hvpone=&hvptwo=&hvadid=375418948447&hvpos=&hvnetw=g&hvrand=9593595124716622557&hvqmt=&hvdev=t&hvdvcmdl=&hvlocint=&hvlocphy=9041126&hvtargid=pla-441365112842 Steve

I wouldn’t use any commercial product on the mirrors. As pointed out, it might be a good idea to leave them, however if you do clean them, be careful and very light - don’t overdo the cleaning. My routine - seen on you tube you can search it online) is to run tap water over the mirror to wash of the debris, put some Luke warm water in a bowl with 1-2 drops of mild washing up liquid and with cotton wool just gently drag it over the surface - no pressure or rubbing just let the weight of the wet cotton wool do the work and only drag one piece across once. Then you will need distilled water - not just deionised - I use proper distilled - it’s expensive but used sparingly can last a while. Just stand the mirror gently on its edge in the dry bowl and pour the distilled water over the mirror to remove any detergent etc. Leave the mirror standing on its edge to fully dry. Do not be tempted to dry off any spots as they will smudge and you will be back to the drawing board. Once fully dry - re assemble. I’m sure everyone will have a strong opinion and their own routine - this is the way I do it and it seems to work ok for me. eyepieces can be cleaned as stated above with an air blower , some type of optical cleaning fluid like baader and a microfibre cloth. Steve

Andy, sounds like the 150 Dob in whatever form is the best route to go. Hope we’ve helped. Check out that local one, you may get an absolute bargain. Steve

Hi and welcome to the hobby. You’ll have many different answers to this as everyone has their views. There isn’t a right or wrong answer really. My vote would be for a dobsonian reflector for a few reasons. 1. You don’t want to do astrophotography 2. Reflectors give best bang for buck in terms of aperture per £ and whilst collimating has to be learned, once the skill is acquired it’s pretty easy and often only needs tweaking. 3. Dob mounts are easy but you do have to get into the swing of moving them - again an acquired skill but easily learned. For your budget you could consider a used instrument and possibly 200mm aperture, although you may lose a bit on portability, you may future proof a bit because 200mm aperture is pretty much a scope for life. I have no allegiance to this one on Astrobuysell - of course currently social distancing and location may prevent this choice as you would have to collect. Used examples come up here on this site as well. https://www.astrobuysell.com/uk/propview.php?view=158974 Your original skywatcher heritage 130 gets good reviews but I haven’t used one so can’t comment as to how good they are. These are just my opinions and as I say, you will have many words of wisdom from other members Steve

Where does the eyepiece go 🤣 I’m also an observer who enjoys cycling. Thanks for posting a great view. Steve