Captain Scarlet

Shortly after getting it, I placed my az-eq6 onto its tripod and went inside to get a counterweight. As I was fiddling with the bar to slide the weight on, the mount started to topple off the tripod - I’d forgotten to clamp it on! I dropped the weight and quarter-caught the mount before it struck the concrete. A couple of bent dovetail bolts, easily replaced, and it all seemed good thereafter.

A couple of weeks ago I finally got around to fitting a new secondary mirror, a Hubble Optics 1/30 wave, to my 300p Newtonian. Last night was its First Light. Moon not up until the early hours, 21.6-7 on the SQM-L in the event, and a forecast that had been coming and going all day, with a band of cloud undecided whether it was going to interfere at 8pm or midnight. I set up anyway during the early evening with the 12” newt on one side of my AZ-EQ6 and my 6” Intes mak plus some weights on the other.

As the light faded, things were looking good and as it happened the band of cloud only stopped play around 2330.

I’d prepared a list, including Tegmine aka zeta Cancri which came to my notice from others on the forum mentioning it; the main open clusters in Auriga again, M36, 37 and 38; M84 and the rest of Markarian’s Chain; M51 and a pair nearby, M63 and 94. There were others on the list but as the evening went on I was aware of the sky getting progressively snuffed out from the North West. It became a race and I had to abandon some of the targets over there and concentrate further South-East.

First up was Venus, obviously. It’s getting more and more interesting these days, it’s still high for a good 3 weeks and because it’s swinging around in its orbit to our side of the Sun and towards us, it’s getting increasingly “phased”. Although now rapidly losing altitude, even on 3rd May it will still be 27 degrees up half an hour after sunset but only 22% phase! Exciting.
Anyway, the view of the planet last night the best I’ve yet seen it, at 40%. It was so clear of CA and glare, and so sharp that I dragged my wife out to see. She was unimpressed, saying I’d shown her much better views of the Moon before, what was so special about this one, and why so small? I had to explain that it wasn’t the Moon, it was Venus. Then she was impressed haha! I am seriously looking forward to seeing it get slimmer and slimmer over the coming weeks.

Having got the obligatory Venus out of the way and having spent more time than anticipated on it (on her? … or is that only for astrologers?), I moved on to a forum-inspired target, a system or star called Tegmine. I’d read the name from various places on SGL but hadn’t properly absorbed what actually it was. I deliberately didn’t look it up, except to find its SAO number, to leave it as a surprise and see if I could discover for myself what the fuss was about.

Sure enough it was a nice double, a few easy arcsecs separation, but I could see at medium magnification, 150x, that one “end” of the double seemed very slightly different from the other, perhaps a very slight elongation? I put in the 6mm for 250x, and the difference was slightly more apparent, so I went for the Delos 3.5mm, 430x. My God, there they were, plain as day, three dots, two very close together but definitely a separation. Lovely. The seeing must have been good. Definitely one to note for the future and I now understood the fuss. I’d loved to have spent time trying with the little Intes as well, but I was aware of the approaching clouds and left that for another time.

Next, I went for some of my Auriga targets, M36, 37 and 38. M37 was first, I wanted another better-informed look at that remarkable much redder star in the exact centre, and there it was again, knowingly this time. Very nice. M36 and 38 also good but I moved on from them quickly.

I skipped Auriga’s “double-double” (SAO 58502 and pals) and moved South to M84 as a starting point to “cruise” Markarian’s Chain. I found the initial trio, M84 M86 and NGC 4388, and not having time to identify any of the others, simply dabbed the “left” and “down” keys on my handset from time to time for galaxy after galaxy after galaxy to heave into view: mesmerizing. There were so many of them! Next time I’ll concentrate on the area with a chart, something I’ve not used yet.

I could see time was running out, as Auriga was now becoming engulfed, so I moved on to M51, and was treated to, by a very long distance, the most spectacular view of it I have ever had. Not just 2 cores (and so bright!) but highly evident spiral detail, most unexpected, and far more than I would have guessed would be visible from simply looking. After spending some fascinated time on that, I quickly moved on to nearby neighbours, M63 and M94, both galaxies. I hadn’t knowingly researched these (I still haven’t though I shall) so didn’t know what to expect or what I was really looking at, I simply “ticked” them and moved on.

By now I had minutes if not seconds left so I finished with a quick view of Izar, a double in Bootes, new to me, very nice, and packed up for the night.
As I mentioned, this was First Light for my new high-quality secondary mirror on my newt, 70mm for 70mm, very obviously better-made from its general finish, and without the extra-spike-inducing straight edge to the silvering that all the Skywatcher ones seem to have. Did it make a noticeable difference? Who knows? My views of Venus were breathtaking and glare-free, but so they were from the Intes. Stars were generally lovely and Tegmine was still crisp and well-defined even at 430x, and the view of M51 completely blew me away. So I’m happy with whatever contribution the mirror made to all that.

Thanks for reading, Magnus

Likewise I “did” Tegmine last night, prompted by your mention of it. On my 300p with 6mm it was fairly clear the one was more like a line at 45degrees than a single star. With my 3.5mm at 430x it was an obvious split. 

I took in M37 tonight as well. Having vaguely noticed it a couple of weeks ago, I took particular note this time of the prominently red star right in its exact centre.

M

My Skymax 180 is 29 turns stop to stop...

I noticed the same thing via a vis reduced field of view from that expected, which prompted me to do the calculations of effective focal length of my Mak 180 in combination with knowledge of the focal lengths of the individual mirrors and mirror separations etc. It turns out that the effective focal length doesn’t vary slightly, it varies A LOT.

If I add an external focuser, in my case a Baader diamond steeltrak,  FL becomes just under 3000mm, rather different  from the nominal 2700mm!

I'm still doing the calcs and will post separately in due course, but the same will apply to any moving-mirror-focus scope.

M

Superb topic.

skytee2 with both 150 Maks. Count 2

az-eq6 with second saddle with 300p plus Mak 180. Count 2

eqm-35 with 200p. Count 1

Manfrotto and pan-tilt head with Kowa 883. Count 1

Report, bento geared head plus Leica Televid 62. Count 1

I have enough eyepieces to go round, with the spotting scopes having their own.

put me down for 7.

Edit: breaking news: make that 8!

i could just about get my LZOS 105 onto a Slik Tripod I have...

i sincerely hope Catherine doesn’t read this...

1 hour ago, andrew s said:

Do they do a light weight one which will take a typical photographic pan head? It would look good in the conservatory with the Kowa 553 which just happens to match the paint. 

What am I saying I have become infected by this thread.

Regards Andrew 

PS it was a serious question. 

"Report" I think is their photographic line. I have one with a Benro small geared head on it, which you can just about see in one of my pics on previous page holding up a target...

18 minutes ago, newbie alert said:

Is the mak like collimating a sct?

yes and no.

No because on a SW-style mak, the secondary is a mirrored spot on the rear of the front corrector lens, and is therefore not adjustable. You're instead adjusting the primary mirror to get the diffraction rings right. And also no because the adjusters, at least on my 180, are each a pair of "push-pull" or "release-adjust-lock" screws (2 descriptions of the same arrangement).

Yes because the diffraction-ring process of doing the adjusting is more or less the same: find out which of the three screw positions is the appropriate one to adjust, and adjust accordingly.

I collimated my SW mak 180 two nights ago. It was surprisingly easy and made an appreciable difference. I pointed it at Polaris at 450x mag, observed which edge of the (exquisite - seeing was good, I think) diffraction rings appeared the most squashed by putting my hand over the edge of the front of the scope to see where the obstruction appeared and therefore which colli screws were closest, adjusted it by trial and error until the "squashiness" got smaller and also changed orientation, moved to the new closest screws, and so on. I had the synscan handset in one hand on v fine adjust to keep Polaris centred as I made the changes.

Good luck...

My Planet, a Uni 8 and a Report for more lightweight duty. (Plus an extra un-pictured Uni 18 for my EQM-35). The Berlebachs make the difference between the stuff being allowed to live inside and "on view" as opposed to having to be "tidied" away.

amazing

26 minutes ago, Neil H said:

Yes OO VX8L

 

It is only with the 40mm 

20mm or 15 mm does not show it 

Nothing to worry about, in that case...

The secondary shadow will become more apparent at very low magnifications, such as you might get with a 40mm eyepiece, which is very long by eyepiece standards. At twice the mag, ie a 20mm, that logic would dictate the shadow disappears, which seems the case here. Short version: it’s just a property of the optical system.

Cheers, Magnus

Thanks Stu. I like observing the Moon but have not yet got around to learning any of it so I can follow what others are pointing out. Time to start I think.

Stu, is the Plato crater the barely-perceptible circle in your 1st pic towards the top left-of-centre? When I search for high-res images of the Plato crater I see craterlets that must be quite a nice test of scope and seeing?

I quickly took my Intes out last night and was getting very satisfying views at 350x-ish. But i was concentrating on the largest most obvious crater in that pic with three proontories in the centre (what's that called?).

What you’ve circled and labeled as California Nebula is in fact the Alpha Perseii Cluster, aka Melotte 20. It’s a lovely open cluster.

cheers, Magnus 

Just now, oymd said:

That looks very smart!

So, do you move your primary mirror all the way back, and rely on the crayford to achieve focus?

Did you try imaging etc?

The external focuser has quite a limited range, only 2.5cm, so i use the coarse knob on the back of the scope itself (which has much bigger range) to get me into the ballpark, and then fine-focus on the external thereafter. This scope though has a more-or-less flop-free integrated focus mechanism different from the SW-type ones I think, so flop isn't a problem for me.

if you're planning on that focuser upgrade, I'd go for the Revelation one, which is identical in all respects except for the Revelation Astro branding on it, and the price. I got one myself for my 6" Intes, and it's sitting in front of me right now. I'm very happy with it.

https://www.harrisontelescopes.co.uk/acatalog/revelation-sct-crayford.html 

On 22/03/2020 at 10:00, Littleguy80 said:

... I’d been up until 1am observing comets so the alarm came hard at 5am. ...

Good God. Well done. That alone gets my admiration!!

M

1 hour ago, Paul73 said:

The M86 chain under dark sky has got to be one of the finest sights in the sky. Very jealous. But I enjoyed the writeup. 😁

Thanks for posting

Paul

Yes I can't wait to get out again. I just want this vicious NE wind to die down!

I would have loved to have spent some time in the M86 area and moved along the line, and it wasn’t even that late. But the scope was shaking in the wind and the wind-chill was something else! 

1 hour ago, Stu said:

Lovely stuff Magnus. Sounds like an amazing sky!

M37 is the one with the red star in the centre, very noticeable when you view it.

The Moon was certainly stunning last night. Cloudy here tonight unfortunately for the conjunction with Venus.

Yes that’s just it! Brilliant.

... I also seem to remember viewing Algieba and  M44 Beehive as well during the evening. M44’s other name, Praesepe, is for some reason my favourite “name” up there...

After a few clear nights with only the time to take out binoculars, Friday night beckoned clear and it was time to dust off the SW 12" newt on my AZ-EQ6. Much of the early part was spent re-remembering the routine so it took longer than it should have done to get properly set up. I had a quick pre-dinner start-from-estimated-park-position look at the Moon through the 35m Panoptic which was just the right size for the field of view. Stunning crescent, and amazingly clear earthshine. So much so that I dragged my wife out to have a look "Oh My God!" was the gratifying response. The best whole-view of the Moon I've had.

I used only the 35mm Panoptic (43x 1.6degs) and the 18.2 DeLite (82x 0.75degs) and briefly the Delos 6mm (250x) for Polaris and Algieba.

After dinner after aligning on Arcturus and Pollux, I wanted to concentrate on Auriga, having spied through the bins on earlier evenings the diffuse patches that were M36, M37 and M38. These three open clusters were very satisfying at wide-field 43x, and I recall one having a redder star than the rest of the cluster in its exact centre. I can't recall which though. I moved between these three for a while.

I wanted a look at Castor (82x) which always pleases, and moved on to Polaris and its baby, which was bluer than yellow Polaris A by a greater margin than I'm used to. I star-tested on Polaris but it was getting rather windy so didn't get much joy there.

By now, nearly midnight, I was getting cold in an increasingly strong and cold NE wind, and I wanted to at least get a galaxy or two in before packing up. I chose M86 and was rewarded with the triangle of M86, M84 and NGC 4388 in the same field of view through the DeLite at 82x. I couldn't spend much time on them, the scope was shaking around so I called it a night.

It was a lovely clear night reaching SQM-L 21.85 by midnight. The main point was to get back into the groove of what to keep where to be able to deploy with minimum fuss next time. I have a replacement secondary from Hubble Optics 70mm (vs the OEM 66mm (I think) one) to fit later this weekend, so it was good to get to use the original on a clear night to see if I can tell any difference. I ordered the replacement secondary in early November to be sure of receiving it in time for Christmas. It eventually arrived at the end of February!

All in all, a decent night's appetite-whetting and some tinkering in prospect...

Cheers, Magnus