DaveL59

hi Adam the DDNS is a handy way to be able to just use a web location name instead of finding your external IP every time, much as you'd type in stargazerslounge.co.uk which is very useful when trying to reach your home router from outside, when you won't be able to go find your new IP if it changed. There's a number of providers for this where you register, pick a name you'd like to use and have something on your home network send the external IP to the DDNS provider to keep it mapped if things change. So if you registered myskycam.dyndns.net for example your web page would then use that name to pick up the camera, tho more likely it'd need somethings like myskycam.ddns.net:9001 or whatever port you open for it. As I said tho, opening ports is a risk, as the firmware on these cameras is not bulletproof and soon stops getting updates. Your router will then also appear on web address probes as it would respond on the open port so an attacker could potentially identify what is responding and how to hit it. One option might be to place the camera in the DMZ (demilitarized zone) on your router, in which case that should be as far as someone can get and not be able to then jump across to your internal network... sorry more techy speak

Been thinking that same thing Geoff, I've some water based matt enamel and also some paint pens so I could carefully paint that section at some stage. Was very impressed with the view it gave though and it didn't affect the views of the planets or stars at all even panning across the affected area. Considering the age of it I can imagine the previous owner spent many a happy hour viewing the heavens above with this scope On reflection am also thinking along the lines of working some brass strip or half a brass munsen ring fitted to the wood carrier to tidy the overall look. Keep as much of the original as I can, as it were.

Hi Adam I can't help on the webpage but for the browser display, does the camera install an active-X module in order for you to connect to it and control it? Not sure which model you have but that's how mine operate. Unfortunately that limits what browser you (I) can use to configure them unless going via the NVR. Are you hoping to have effectively a live stream from camera to web page? Or a periodic refresh? Reason I ask is that for the web page to connect to the camera you'd need to open ports on your router and if you do have to you become open to probes and attacks from the web side of the router. For periodic updates you may be able to get the camera to send out an image via ftp, say every few minutes and then not need to open your router to the outside world. Downside is some website providers don't like a high rate of file drops and may block the activity. Another question - you say you have the camera's IP, is that the IP on your home network? To reliably connect from the outside world you would need the external IP of your router which may change unless you are paying for a fixed IP. You can work around this using a dynamic DNS provider to refresh the router IP address against a name you choose to assign, then have the web page connect via the ddns name that you set up. I use DDNS so that I can remote connect back to my home network when out and about but my router does support auto-refresh to the DDNS provider, not sure that most of the ISP provided ones will, probably not so you'd need a PC on your network to do that part. Hope that helps a little

as Moonshine has said, take a read of this post which will give you an idea of how things will look in a telescope It'll save disappointment when you do buy one and the planets are tiny rather than popping out of the eyepiece Even small they are an amazing sight, very much a wow moment when you see Jupiter and Saturn any time you see them not just the first.

Collimation checking against the stars looks good, scanned across to Jupiter and Saturn and finally found Neowise in the sky from the back garden, between houses, my first sighting of it and with these HR/5's no less. Very nice view comet and tail and nice and clear so I'm very pleased with the results of the repair, a real bargain pair of binos they've turned out to be 😄

so success on Jupiter and Saturn with the vintage 3-incher, very nice views in fact And to cap that I finally got to see Neowise from the back garden in the repaired HR/5 bino's too, so a good evening from my point of view. Couldn't locate Neowise in the old scope tho as I was aiming along the tube having taken the finder apart yesterday, that would've been great for the old lens, it may have seen Hale-Bop under its previous owner but that's ok, I'm sure it won't mind too much 😄 managed to take a pic with the bridge camera, had to up the ISO to get it and handheld propped against a fence panel hence very bright foreground

I'd note here that the older TAL-1 used a rack and pinion focuser but with push-fit eyepieces that were 32mm rather than the 1.25-inch (31.7mm) standard ones in more modern times. You can use a modern 1.25-inch but would have to use the barlow to reach focus. The helicals were on the TAL-M and Alcor and again a russian size 32mm eyepiece fitting.

So tonight I popped the EQ5 outside in the garden and bolted this vintage 3-incher onto it, hoping for some planets and to see how bag things are with that chunk out of the lens. Original brass EP of unknown FL and a Meade MA40 which are the only 0.965's I currently have. Hoping for good but bracing myself for marred views. So how did it go? Well, I've just seen Jupiter and 2 moons as they rose above the rooftops, nice and sharp with both the brass eyepiece and the MA40 0.965. They need refocusing when switching which takes a bit of getting used to with a drawtube, but WOW! Could even make out that the planet had slight banding. Of course it's now tracked behind the skeleton oak tree before I could try refining my technique. Then Saturn rose just above the rooftops and bingo, nice and clear too, can see the rings but without being able to push the mag obviously it was small, but the rings are indeed distinct from the planet. Couldn't make out any moons so far tho. Sorry for the lousy first pics from phone at eyepiece on this vintage scope, with no eyecups on either eyepiece its not easy to get the camera positioned well by hand and of course me focusing the scope with no glasses so would be a tab out probably too. I have to say that apart from when out of focus, that chip in the lens doesn't seem to aflict the image at all, quite a surprise. Tho I expect on a big and bright target like the moon that'll be a different story. Still, having planned that I could pop the Tal100RS on if it was real bad, I'm pleasantly surprised and very pleased. This old scope gives very nice views indeed, ta very much! So, for sure all is not lost on this one 😄

just read a post of yours from way back re the motors and gearbox on these, so I thought it worth repeating the comment you made then too... "Only manually control the mount when the motor is turned off so you don't damage the gearbox"

no worries John, there's a helpful bunch of folks here and its very friendly so if we are able to help we will try Good luck with the new scope and hobby, for sure things can be frustrating at the start but you've a very solid bit of kit there and once you are familiar with it I'd expect it'll reward you with some nice viewing. Out of interest, did it come with a selection of eyepieces? What year is it too? (should be on an info plate on the mirror end of the scope or the box if it still had the wood cases). When you start out use the larger numbered eyepiece first and then work down to the lower numbered ones, which is low to higher magnification. Also do try to get the finder scope aligned with the scope during the day on a distant target or it'll be difficult to get on target at night in the dark.

looks like the original, do you know it your scope is a tal-1 or tal-2? Not that I think it matters. You'll need to set the angle of the axis to match your location and then point that toward north so that tracking should follow the object you want to view. There's a few steps you may need to do before you go out and use it in the dark and often best to get familiar in daylight so it's a less frustrating experience when trying to find targets. The videos below may help to understand the basics of the mount and scope tho they don't cover the motor. That you'd just plug in and turn on once you have your target in view.

create a jpeg and drag it into the area below the text box, or you could use the snippy tool to select it and then just paste it into the text box, assuming winwoes OS that is.

Welcome aboard to the madhouse Sure, posting pics is always useful so we're sure what we are advising on and to help understand the issue. I've not had a TAL motorised mount, only the manual ones but had looked out for those in the past. The motorised unit I have is an EQ5 mount with a TAL refractor sat on it which doesn't help you at all.

others here say you can according to the instructions Baader provide. I'd just wear gloves when refitting mirrors to minimise the chance of fingerprints going where you don't want them

hi the TAL motorised mount just has a motor that runs at sidereal rate so when switched on the RA will rotate to track the target you've manually found to view. I don't believe it had any speed selections unless that is on the motor case on the mount. You will want to get the mount pointing roughly toward Polaris (North) so the tracking will work correctly. Do you know it it is the original TAL transformer or a replacement? From past reading the TAL one can be a bit uneven but a replacement transformer mod does work better. Can't recall the make now and likely no longer available but a search on here may find it. Oh, I'm assuming here that this is the TAL-1 or 2 reflector you have?

surely that'd only work on warm nights so your extremities aren't icy cold when you return to bed? For me I'll be trying for saturn and jupiter earlier (can't really be up at silly o'clock with an op in a few days) and give that vintage 3-inch scope a go. Should give me an idea how it would have been till the lens chipped which was a very sad moment. Still there's a chance I can replace it with another lens so am hoping it'll have a second life eventually

thanks Mark, yes I think the existing leather looks ok so will treat that with a clean and feed. The brass I'll see depending on the lens solution, not sure how a more recent 80mm cell would sit on the tube or if the lenses are just undersize of 80mm. The latter gives the option to refit as-was with great care, perhaps. Or if the cell is sized to fit over an 80mm tube then that could with but render the existing dew shield redundant and I'd need to try source a replacement brass tube to suit. Time will tell where I end up on this mystery tour but there's always hope Looking like the sky might stay fair tonight so far so am hoping I'll get a chance to point the new cloud generator at it and see some shiny sparkly things and get a vague idea of how it might have performed, maybe even see that elusive comet

worth checking the device handbook but powered may mean that one specific port can provide power to charge a device when the laptop is shut down. Useful to charge your phone for example.

Hi Baz if you want to be hanging the camera off the focuser to take photo's then the Flextube scopes may not suit too well, as they are helical focusers so the weight of the camera will drift the focus if it causes any rotation. Just a thought.

Hi Mark thanks but yeah, totally gutted. As soon as I heard that tell tale plink I knew the lens was toast. Spall goes around 1/3 from the edge in one large leaf. I'd tried to be so careful too, but that's the problem in some ways of this one. You basically have an ally tube inside an ally tube, very tight tolerance and fit. That's all that holds the lens in place, so working them apart just a little needed a lot of effort as I got it further apart that gave the lens just enough space to rock and catch at the edge and... drat! I've tapped the sections gently back together now so I can at least have a try of the scope once clouds permit. Daytime it looks pretty OK in fact which was a surprise, but I expect a very different result under stars or the moon. Be nice to get an idea of what it WAS capable of tho before my ham-fisted efforts and I have another go and maybe make the lens even worse. There's a possibility that its a single lens, depending on just how old it is, but I think it probably is a cemented doublet, certainly isn't air-spaced as the lens moved as a single mass and no sign of any spacers. Shame on that finder, I guess we roll the dice and sometimes get unlucky with our vintage purchases. The journey is fun though if a little heartbreaking from time to time. Think so far I've been pretty lucky given the number of binos and now scopes I've accumulated

Am starting to think ahead on this one now, in terms of what work to do in restoring it if (when) I can sort the lens faux pas. The finder cleaned up OK in terms of lenses and reticule, tho not as good as the TAL ones I have and paint is tatty. But the grey/white just doesn't fit in well with the brass and black leather finish. Perhaps I could respray the finder mount with hammerite gold and the finder in black? Too much bling bling maybe? 😉 But then the grey bits on the finder itself would be more of a challenge to strip off and paint. I guess I could change the finder shoe and use an RDF instead to a right-angle finder would likely be a better option. Or try find a brass finder... Was also looking online for brass munsen rings, not cheap but if I can get a suitable size and a dovetail bar that might make a nice mounting option in keeping with the scope's vintage. Might be a hard find tho as the OD of the OTA is around 82-84mm so not a regular pipe size. Would give me the option to use the EQ5 or remount the rings on the EQ2. I guess if I pad the rings I could even try this on the TAL-M mount... Internally I'd pull the paper in the OTA and flock I think but the OTA itself isn't in bad shape at all and I'd not want to lose the aged look of the scope, tho I might polish up the brass and see if I can lacquer coat it so it doesn't tarnish too fast. It's not a collectors item so I guess I could go mad and do something like swap the black leather for some rosso red leather but I quite like the black/brass look. Any thoughts folks?

thanks Mark, it looks reasonable I think, but you would notice if you looked closer as the steel is slightly higher than the ally so a slope at the join where I files the epoxy. But then I preferred to keep the ally as thick as I could get away with for strength

I did something similar in the el cheapo thread, used a CCTV module and dome and inverted it to see the sky. Be careful that water ingress doesn't happen as that causes a layer of water drops inside the dome. I added a large neoprene washer and a replacement clear dome on the one I modified and it's been fin for a good while. The smaller one tho unfortunately did seep, so I've since cleaned that up and used clear silicone between the dome and the metal clamping ring so that water doesn't find its way in and past the seal. So far that's worked ok too. Also Silica gel sachets to keep moisture level down, problem is monitoring those and replacement, but not seen any issues so far. Gina's solution with a jar holing the dessicant is a great solution to this tho but she's running a cooled camera. You might be able to tweak the CCTV module settings to lower the shutter speed and up the gain a little to pick out some stars but only the bright ones really as shutter just won't go that slow on these. What you get will depend on how dark the sky is around you, I was able to pick out Orion though and the Plough, video captured and stacked. Not that great compared to the output from a proper astro cam but more than I expected off a cheap CCTV module.

ok, After the disaster of yesterday and the vintage scope objective... nice to have something positive to post today Returning to this repair, so I smoothed and refinished the broken arm and resprayed the other to match, Looks reasonably good tho still a little rougher finish on the repair looking closely. It'll do tho I think. Need to sort a better set screw as this is flat ended and not gripping quite well enough. Might file a slot or drill the centre pivot to help it out. Still, on with the occulars and eyecups etc and you'd hardly know it'd been broken. Runs smoothly through the focus range at various IPD's and alignment seems good so far too. Will get around to doing a strip down and internal clean at some stage and fix the crack in the plastic dioptre eyecup, but for the moment these are revived and quite usable again, not too bad a result considering the issues with them when they arrived.

could try fashion one out of a milk bottle top, perhaps?