The Sailor

Came out this evening, a nice clear sky and next to no wind, a big difference from last night :). Thanks to Astroboot I was able to get my guider attached with the rings during the day and after an alignment I was able to calibrate everything. After a good look round the sky I attached the guide cam, a Meade LPI and checked if the work I had do so far was okay. I sent the mount to Vega, spot on in the eyepiece, turning round it was with satisfaction I seen Vega on the cam screen on the laptop, great, all was working and after heading in for a coffee it was good to see it was still on station after 20 min. So, what next, well the Canon has to come out soon and have to start putting all the money I spent to good use :) Well back out now and enjoy the rest of the night :).

Ha ha, yes Isabelle you are so right. It looks like, with the wind and clouds at the moment, reorganising will be all I can do, oh and spend money :D. Jim

Spent the day playing about in the obsy and garden, worked on the composting in the garden :D, and in the obsy I worked on what to do with my spare mount. Was not able to sell it so I have decided to use it in two ways, the head will be used in the obsy with a camera on it, already tested and both mounts work together in Stellarium at the same time :). The other use will be as a Grab n Go, bought a 12v pack for this at knockdown price so happy there. It's been a clear sky today so looking forward to a good nights viewing later :). Well thats that sorted, clouds snuck upon me, never even got a chance to start up the mount :(, still another day tomorrow :).

Isabelle, I used to look at the night sky and think the same, insignificance, but now, well I just enjoy it knowing I can't do much about it :). Life is like that, it throws these things at you and make you think. Jim

Setup just after dusk and alignment went well, up to now have added two more Messiers to the list. Been quite an enjoyable night so far, no wind and the temp is nice, the clouds that threathened earlier never got to me so been clear so far :). At the moment I am using the refractor for the Messiers and the SCT for wandering around, just looking and taking it all in, no cameras or webcams, plenty of time later. Right, coffee break over, back out :). Well I got just under another two hours out of the evenings viewing, in the end it was the clouds that got me. A good night was had so can't say I don't see much :).

Ohhh revisits? Nooooo, am retired from that now, just gardening for me :), travelled most of the world, seen many places and met some wonderful people, happy memories :). Jim

Nice one Isabelle, only ever made it to the outside myself, had far too many things to see to do a stopover, good you had a nice time :). Jim

Good to see you back safe and well :) Jim

Did wonder :D Jim

Rich, As I read this you are saying that you Polar aligned at the bottom of the garden and them moved the telescope to the top of the garden. If that is so then you are not aligned, each time you move the mount it has to be realigned so if you aligned at the bottom of the garden that is where you will have to do your stargazing from. Once you have Polar aligned you will have to align at least three other stars to give a good fix, once that is achieved and you have everything correct you should be able to send your mount to any star you wish. Jim Jim

Opps, sorry Rich, that should read Meade LPI and it is attached to SW Startravel 80 on top of the SW Evostar 80. I have thought of using a finder as a guider but have discounted that at the moment. Have to say I do look at my complete system all the time and change it to see if I can get the best from it and only this week I done a complete change with how I operate. I might have to do a schematic of all this to ensure I know where it all is and what it does :). Jim

Have to say I am suprised at the quality, much better than previous years, but... still some bad ones. As for Deadwood, did laugh but they were good... for once :). As it's raining I am watching this fortified with a bottle of wine, well at SWMBO insistance, just to shut me up :D Jim

Over the last few months I have found that Stellarium has been so power hungry that I could not get any other programme to work on the obsy laptop whilst it was running, one of the reasons which I did not do much remoting. This week I decided to reinstall XP and see if I could change anything, but no, still the same. After a bit of thought I decided to see if I could run the hub direct from the house, installing the wi-fi on the laptop gave me a spare cable, so putting USB boosters on the cable and connecting the mount to the house laptop was easy but a mightmare getting the USB/Serial to work. The orignal one refused to work but a spare one I had solved the problem. Booting Stellarium on the house laptop and configuring the port I watched in anticipation for the ring to appear, it did, next was to send the mount to a target, again it worked. With a wireless keyboard and mouse and a remote monitor in the observatory I can now remote the house laptop to it and use it for guiding and use the laptop in the observatory for camera work without a problem. It's been raining most of the morning but did not worry as I got a lot done, now for clear skies :)

The night started out with rain in the air but turned out okay and so opened up and aligned. It was great to have the 2" barlow, thank you Sy, was a great purchase, the Messiers were wonderful to see and wandering round the sky was a dream. Cloud cover beat me in the end and ended the night on a good note.

Neil, this is a focusing problem rather than the camera settings. A question, when you focus with the camera can you go either side of the focus? Reason I ask, if I use my Canon with a diagonal I cannot focus but if I go straight without the diagonal I can get focus okay, just a thought. Another, do you have "Liveview" with your camera or is it just through the viewfinder? Jim

Looking at the moon last night I would not have used a filter, actually very rare l do :) . I have to say that my OTA is only 80mm and the sharpness I seen took me aback hence my returning to it now and again. No photos taken last night but I understand where you are comming from with the camera. Neil, if you get a chance tonight maybe try it without the filter and see what happens :). Jim

Neil, I did not like to say anything regarding that but yes I was showing it to my better half and did mention it was not as clear. Are you getting a sharp image through the eyepiece, if so, when you change over to your cam/camera, what are you seeing on your screen? Jim

Nice one, did look at it a few times last night, really beautiful. Jim

I think this couple were out to ruin my night :(, although the mount is practically silent in moving I did not use it and went indoors leaving it latched on to Andromeda and waited for them to go. So an hour and a half later, all silent, I ventured out and decided to do a tour of the heavens, was able to see 6 out of 10 of the target Messiers, Andromeda came out of the murk of the town light pollution at 0315, this was my first sighting so went to bed later a happy bunny, a good night all round.

Thanks for that :), good that it's nice night, first night that my old bones have allowed me to stay up. Have had to curtail any movement at the moment, a couple have decided to set up camp down by the back wall, don't really want to advertise myself to them :(, hopefully they will not last too long :D

Been a good day, after making the new solar filter for the Evostar 80 left the mount on solar tracking for the rest of the day, all went well and then closed down for the evening. The local club is having a lecture, off to that and if the clouds stay away will return to the fight :). The night is warm, no breeze so will be staying out as long as possible. Have been going through a list of targets, all Messiers and all going well. With the night as it is I have decided to stay up and hopefully get a first peek at the Andromeda Galaxy for this year.

Decided to check out my Grab n Go gear and done some sun spotting. This is the first time for using it and it proved simple to setup, no leccy or any cables, just plonked it on the ground and a manual search for the sun. Turned out well for it's simplicity, a Meade Telestar RB60 on an EQ3, end shield off and a solar filter on, only problem is keeping track of the sun, no nipping indoors for a cuppa :) so SWMBO done the catering :). Just looking at the cloud cover on the net, doubt if there will be any clear sky tonight, but we can always live in hope :) As an afterthought, the Grab n Go gear is all secondhand and bought from various sources, recycling at it's best :).

Not so much gazing at the sky last night, spent most of the time gazing at the handset!! With the wind playing about the last week I spent the time fixing all the cables in the obsy, bundling them neatly and moving them so not in the way during observing. Well whatever I done had a disasterous effect on last nights viewing. Each time I got align done for some reason I lost power to the handset, there was a loose connection and this caused restets. The serial connection seems to be the culprit at the moment but last night I decided to pack up rather than fumble around out there so this morn will be the time to test, shake rattle and roll the handset and see what happens, I will also see about new solar filters for the rest of the OTAs :) Well redone the serial connection, put straps in to keep it together, shook the cables and the handset and all seems well :).

Ha ha, lovely one :). Jim

Chinese lanterns, yes a pain, gave me a fright first time I seen one, thought it was a plane on fire. With no wind it had got quite high and running in to get SWMBO we both looked and wondered untill she said look, and there rising a few houses down was the damn things, hate them :). Jim