McNewt

My luck was elsewhere last night. The clouds cleared just in time for Mars and Moon to rise just above the tree tops. Unfortunately the seeing was quite poor. Mars just resembled a snowball edged by some atmopheric dispersion. I held out for a couple of hours exploring the Moon, but had to call it quits becasue of the equipment dewing up. The tube was dripping, eyepices dewed up, the telrad was rendered useless. I still have high hopes for the perfect view. Colder weather is coming fast which usually means better seeing.

Thx! The one thing that is not superb (yet) is the balance with the setup as seen in the photo. The CC8 is a bit back heavy, add two long focal length TV eyepieces and it gets a little bit unwieldy. I need to tighten the alt axis a bit too much for my liking. I have a longer V-style dovetail and a balance weight to be fitted on the refractor side. Need to do a bit of drilling first though. The scope rings have metric threads, but he the dovetail is UNC.

Indeed it is. It is fitted with a Mach1 adapter, though it is possible to change it to fit for example an EQ6 or AZ100 for that matter.

Sorry for the mess. Flooring to be done.

Telescope Express have these https://www.teleskop-express.de/shop/product_info.php/info/p78_TS-Optics-Dust-Cap-for-1-25--Barrels--male-.html

Interesting thread. Following. I have an 80mm refractor with limited in-focus. All of my eyepieces will reach focus with a Baader clicklock diagonal, but some just barely. This made me scratch my head when looking for a 2" Herschel prism as these tend to add a longer optical path than the Baader diagnoal. On searching for a solution I noticed that the Baader Morpheus eyepieces supports both 1.25" and 2" fittings with the same barrel so in 2" "mode" these will sit lower in the diagonal potentially gaining back some of the lost in-focus travel. I'm adding the Explore Scientific 92 degree eyepieces to the list of "problem solvers". Though, for the time being I cannot justify starting on a new eyepiece set.

Are you able to keep this configuration reasonably balanced when you are using a heavy eyepiece? I also have the TS 8" CC, which is rather back heavy. Adding a diagonal and a long focal length eyepiece and an extender for the focuser I need to tighten the alt clutch on the AzMaxLoad a bit too much for my liking. Perhaps the AZ100 is a bit different in this regard?

Jeez. It is big. I wonder how you look through such a big eyepiece. I imagine you grab hold of it with both of your hands and put your entire face up against the eye lens. I believe this is the video https://youtu.be/b-N2ksV32pI .

Yup. That's where my brain hurts. It got the AzMaxLoad for its simplicity. No electronics that needs to be powered and get in the way of what I'm actually out there for. I also love the idea and feel of having a fully analog rig that allows me to see things that are so immensely far away. Yet, having the option of adding the DSC makes the AZ100 so compelling. You don't need to, but you can.

If I didn't already have the APM AzMaxLoad I would be all over this mount. It does add encoders and it does add slo mo controls. Still, I cannot justify another purchase at this point. Maybe I'm just battling some kick in of gear acquisition syndrome... in public.

This one was waiting all day at home. It is quite a bit heaver than the Baader 2" mirror diagonal that I have. First light has to be some daytime spotting judging by the weather forecast.

Ahaa! *LOL* I must be tired. I didn't see it.

Oh yes. Report please! It is raining and all miserable here so I'm relegated indoors for some armchair astronomy. £49 is a great price.

1. When you have the laser in, if you bend it gently from side to side. does it move? Slight movement usually makes the laser go all over the place. 2. Is the secondary centered in the tube? I have a 130mm newtonian that, initially, was impossibe to collimate. When checking the placement of the secondary I discovered that the opening end of the tube wasn't round. After having fixed that the collimation process was quite a bit easier.

Yup, I need to pulled the trigger on one of those. It looks very nice. I'm not drooling. 🤤