DaveL59

fingers crossed then 🙂

sadly is a lot of thin high cloud here tho I can see the moon and jupiter occasionally un-fuzzed by the cloud cover. the others Saturn, mercury etc have already passed behind the trees and rooflines so no chance there. Not even worth going for a drive as the clouds pretty much obscure everything at the moment. C'est la vie...

All solar system's planets visible in night sky - BBC News yeah with the cloudy skies, maybe not but we might get lucky 🙂 Thinks I can forget mercury and venus from where I am tho, my SW view is all trees and my shed lol

I have ended up with a fair few I guess, tho nothing in the high-end nor full sets per se. The TAL100RS came with a nice set of TAL plossls down to 6.3mm and the TAL-M and 1 also came with their 32mm russian size 25/15mm's and being TAL are very usable. I did buy some Vixen NPLs 30/20/10mm which I enjoy using as well as a TAL 40mm. I've a number of barlows too, mostly TAL x2,3,4. Then I was given a set of 0.965's from a member here to go with the old vintage 3-inch scope. I've added a couple old orthos as well as SVbony zoom 8-24 & 7-21 (latter will go with the LT70AZ Starsense when I pass that to my daughter) but I've so far resisted the SVbony 3-8mm zoom. My scopes are mostly 1000mm FL so don't really need that extra high power I think. In part I bought to see the difference without breaking the bank (all bought used), the Vixen's for a modern coated lens. The zooms (bought new) tho make it a much easier night, no need to swap things about and I guess I've used the fixed ones less since buying those.

yeah its good at that unfortunately, same with some other sites too. From every other angle that EP doesn't look too bad but it could have been opened up. One reason might be because someone got carried away cleaning and sprayed the stuff onto the lens of course, so had to to wipe away what leaked behind but that's just a guess.

Pretty sure I've heard others have used a suitable diameter can/canister, cut to give a sharp edge and used that to make the holes. Do be careful tho if the suitable canister is an aerosol as even "discharged" they will have some residual pressure. Don't rush cutting foam, slow and steady will always get better results. A hot knife might work well if you can get one to suit the job at hand.

surely something in brass/bronze would go better with the darker wood, Jeremy? 😉

Well too late for this year but it seems clearances have now been granted Virgin Orbit issued licences ahead of Cornwall space launch - BBC News All a bit of a let-down for UK regulations with how long it all took but at least we may see this launch happen in Jan-2023, start the new year off with a bang 🙂

I agree MLQ, you'd think if they were serious about this venture they'd have #2 almost ready to go and if they really have to strip and re-use then they can take from #1 to make up #3 or #4 so they can keep the push on the schedule. Be hard to explain the reasoning of someone else gets there first huh but I guess they think there's not much competition unlike in the Apollo era. Could they be wrong? maybe... As to another thread for #2, if someone wants to kick that off feel free, but if this really will be 2025 it'd be long since buried by then unless Mr Angry keeps us fuelled up with update rants on the tube.

I think for M42 on Nikon you'd need the adaptor that has a lens to correct for infinity but of course that'd also affect IQ. As noted, on some lenses you can tweak the lens to get there but that's not the case for all that many depending on your penchant for open-lens surgery 😉 Agree with John re the CA on the 16-300 tho it processes out OK and if you close the aperture a bit it helps with sharpness as tends to be the case with most of the super-zoom and even regular zoom lenses. For astro tho perhaps consider a Nikon prime in the 135mm range.

I guess the answer would depend on what you want to do with it and budget. If you fancy wildlife then the Tamron 170-600mm is decent, go after a mk/v2 model tho as that one's better than the original v1. Just check that it focuses OK across the zoom range (AF that is). Not cheap, usually >£500. If you want to see what it's capable of there's many shots in the photography section from folks like @johnfosteruk and others. If you just want a reasonable all-in-one, the Tamron 16-300 is also good if yours is an APS-C sensor. I have both but on Sony-A mount. Can't say much on Nikon glass as I've never used those but I'm sure others will be along to advise.

I've done that often with the little Tal-M where you need to slide the finder outward to remove it from the optical path between eyepiece and secondary mirror. That said even with the barlow and extender in circuit the wee finder gave surprisingly good views, only giveaway was I'd be thinking "is that it, thought it'd look bigger... DOH!" 🙂

very much "some day" it seems 😞

here you go

Probably most/all fruit has lower acidity tho I was surprised when my dentist told me off for drinking so much apple juice vs orange. Didn't realise it was more acidic. Didn't change my consumption much tho I have more switched to smoothies now. She's still not impressed 😄

has she told you yet that fruit have feelings? 😉

ugh so I've been slowly poisoning myself for the past 40 years then? 😢 I'd bet tho that a lot of so-called AI just googles and picks based on some ranking which answer to give...

are you thinking of printing a base for the part you unbolt from the LT70 or to replace that part? Some here have removed the foot from the LT70 and fitted that onto a plate with a small dovetail attached to it. No need to 3D print anything with that method. Others, myself included made up a carrier for the phone that we could then mount on another scope, leaving the original as-was and this works well also.

Well Orion splashed down nicely just now, lets hope all the telemetry and other data bear out so they can try it with people aboard next time 🙂 Funny it just started snowing here as it splashed down, wonder if it triggered that on its way down 😉

Anyone notice this was happening?

Sadly the shed here is falling to bits, but I rent and Gina's is way too far to make it viable even if I had the transport to attempt it. This garden isn't suited to have a RoRo anyway come to that. Hope someone does take it tho.

Should perhaps just load it all back up on the carrier jet along with the satellites and go elsewhere to launch them, close the doors on UK space ops and not look back. What a farce, they had the chance to come out looking viable but snatch defeat from the jaws of victory. Heck Iceland changed laws etc to get that UK launch attempt done and we're sat doing nowt as usual 😞 PS - not digging at the spaceport folks BTW, they've done great getting set up, we know where the fail is, the usual place...

oh dear, just a day later and... Virgin Orbit: First UK space launch from Cornwall faces delay - BBC News So still buried under red tape then. Now looks like it could be after xmas, which of course could add a personnel problem getting them back into the country with the strike dates so far announced 😞

Yikes that was lucky indeed, shows how valuable having an RCD in circuit can be.