DaveL59

If I remember I might even give these a try tonight, assuming clear skies of course

pretty much any would show it, I was using an old Swift Audubon HR/5 last night which are 8.5x44 and it was nice and clear. Perhaps I'd have seen it closer in the 10x50's but then you have to be able to hold them steady.

So any 8x40/42 or up should do, depends on how compact and lightweight you need them to be for other use and budget of course.

Just don't go for any zoom types, they're generally not very good.

thinking more on the lens cell in this scope. Outer is brass with an inner ally (probably) front ring that are somehow secured together. Then the lens goes in and another ally tube inserted forms the rear lens ring. Now it's a tight fit into the brass and purely held by friction since it moves with some efforts twisting and pulling but doesn't come away easy.

On thermal coefficients I wonder if cooling the cell might encourage the ally to shrink a touch more than the brass and perhaps allow easier separation of the parts.

Just might work, maybe. Will pop it into the fridge for an hour or so later on and see if it makes a difference - if I can make room for it of course  

ooh, just bought an old Vivitar metal lens cap, 85mm ID which should do nicely for the existing brass shield and help protect the lens (or the conservatory from catching fire with the sun glinting down the scope!). 

ahhh the slippery slope beckons once more... 😄 

Hi Alan

Hikvision here too, but I set my router up as a VPN end-point so I can tunnel in from the phone and fire up the Hik viewer and check on the house/kitties. No open ports to be vulnerable that way, plus the CCTV is on it's own network segregated from my PC gear. Does your camera have the sort of remote server setup like the cheaper XMeye ones, in which case you could view it that way.

The issue for most is the router, ISP ones rarely have the features that business routers have, but worth looking to see if it will support VPN tunnelling into it. That'd be the more secure way to go really. Your work however may block you from being able to connect over vpn into your home network.

19 minutes ago, MarkAR said:

Might be possible to split the shield and solder a strip in to make it bigger.

 

Had thought that's a possible option, tho it's 2-layer, outer is brass and the inner white non-ferrous likely ally and that inner forms the front part of the lens ring. A matching ally tube fits into the brass very tight, forming the lower lens ring. I am thinking though it it comes to it to buy a sheet of brass and try making a replacement shield to suit a replacement lens cell. The inner would be flocked anyway after all, but how well I could roll sheet metal by hand is another matter of course, bound to look well amateur I expect but you never know 😄 

I might have another look at separating the lens holder/shroud in the next couple days now it's had it's first light outing with me last night then I can have a closer look at the lens. After that it'll be a while before I can try owing to the amount of effort needed to turn/move the parts. Kinda nervous to dig this hole any deeper at the moment though, given it's quite usable as-is do I risk rendering it scrap until I have a lens I can replace it with...

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  

1 hour ago, Cosmic Geoff said:

You could blank out the chipped part of the objective with black tape etc. That should improve the contrast. I did this with a vintage Ross 40mm scope that arrived with a spall at the edge of the objective. The aluminium lens cell and glare shield parts would not undo - somebody already tried.

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?

29 minutes ago, Stu said:

Or just be REALLY quiet and she will never know! 😴😴

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  

2 hours ago, groberts said:

Ah why didn't I think of that?  Great thanks Lee - I wonder what powered means? 

Graham 

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.