AstroMuni

This link might help you

Hi Armaan, I have the same scope and I have seen the bands on Jupiter visually. They are faint and could vary depending on the light pollution in your area too. Using the phone camera is a bit more tricky and does not always give you the result you expected. BTW, can you see the moons of Jupiter?

From looking at the specs of this mount on the internet, it suggests its a Go-To mount. This would mean you should be able to get it to slew to any object and track it too! The Synscan app should help with this. Or is there some other problem here that is not clear...

Hi Viktiste, I have the same scope and dont understand what you mean when you say scope has to be horizontal to open polarscope. You need to rotate in Dec axis to open the Polarscope and then lock this axis. Now rotate in RA axis to get 0 on top. If you are very particular that the zero should be on top when the counterweight is pointed downwards you can tweak the reticle to align it 🙂 Does your reticle have Cassiopeia and Big Dipper on it or does it have a clock face? Ref using Finderscope - we are tring to align the RA axis to Polaris and not the OTA, and the Finderscope matches OTA.

Hi Kapil, Welcome to SGL. I have the 130EQ and its not a bad beginner scope. The mount is not the best and shaky, so at higher magnifications (eg. while looking at planets) the smallest touch will cause a jitter that takes a couple of secs to subside. Do NOT buy the MD version as the tracker motor is more of a pain than advantage. The eyepieces that come with the 130EQ are very basic and you will need to set aside money for getting better ones. The red dot finder that came with mine (a few years ago now) was rubbish and I ended up buying a Telrad. But I had heard that Celestron has changed the finder in newer scopes, so you may not need to buy another finder. After adding all these extra accessories I have enjoyed the scope and even managed to take pictures of the moon & Jupiter using a phone camera, by using an adapter attachment to the eyepiece. If you are cost constrained then you should get more value for money with a Dobsonion. So something to consider as well. Here in the UK the Skywatcher brand is quite popular. I notice that the link you have provided sells Orion branded Dobs and my understanding is that these are essentially Skywatcher under a different name. A couple of factors to consider before you embark on buying a scope - are you interested in visual or astrophotography : these can impact decisions for EQ vs Alt-AZ/Dobs mount, manual vs computerised. - how far do you have to carry the telescope to setup for viewing: the weight of the scope + mount will matter - And I retiterate, set aside budget for extras 🙂 Its a bit like buying a printer - ink catridge costs as much or more than printer Similarly eyepieces can be expensive in this hobby. Good luck and enjoy.

I dont know how tight your budget is, but set aside funds for buying good eyepieces. I started my hobby in a similar way to you and found out the hard way that eyepieces can cost a lot as compared to the scope 🙂

The Skytee-2 is AZ https://www.firstlightoptics.com/alt-azimuth/skywatcher-skytee-2-alt-azimuth-mount.html Have you considered the Skywatcher AZ-EQ5GT? This has both AZ and EQ functionality.

Have you considered the Celestron StarSense for Skywatcher mounts? https://www.celestron.com/products/starsense-autoalign-for-sky-watcher-mounts Several of my friends have it and swear by it. Its expensive but does the job. On a different note, assuming you dont wish to spend that much, the EQ6-Pro is a very good mount. Have you done the initial 2 or 3star align process? Ref your question on how to align when on equator, if you google for "polar align without polaris" you should get loads of links. Several of us have the same problem, i.e. cant see polaris even though we live up north 🙂

Thanks TerryMcK

I have recently acquired an HEQ5 PRO mount and now trying to control it via PC. I have read up about EQMOD thro ASCOM (EQASCOM) for Windows and the INDI-EQMOD driver for Linux. Looks like they are not the same drivers even though they share the EQMOD name. What are the major differences in functionality (if any) between these two?

This picture is without any processing other than cropping the image and adjusting brightness, contrast using the std Photos app on the iphone.

I had bought my 130eq also for same reasons for my daughter, but its now become my hobby 🙂 The mirror on yours is a similar size as mine so you should get lovely images of the moon and Jupiter and Saturn once they are visible during at more convenient times (atm they are visible in early morning). You could also get your son involved in taking pictures through the camera phone. I am attaching an image of the moon that I took using an iPhone 8 held next to the 23mm eyepiece by a £10 holder.

Try this site. It gives more realistic images https://www.stelvision.com/en/telescope-simulator/.

I was going through the same challenges last week and finally managed to install EQMOD driver and INDI on Linux Mint as I dont have a Windows PC For those who are interested just follow the guidelines here https://www.indilib.org/devices/mounts/eqmod.html

So the guide camera needs to take samples at less frequent intervals compared to the main camera? Correction: I think its the other way around 🙂

I have a basic question on guiding. I have read about guiding and the options; the options below are taken from https://agenaastro.c...hotography.html - A separate guide scope and guide camera - An off-axis guider that splits off light collected by the main telescope, but which directs the light to a separate guide camera that detects a guide star somewhere in the same field of view as the main object that's being imaged - A dual-chip CCD camera on the main scope with one chip for imaging the main subject and one for the guide star - A specialized dual-sampling CCD with some pixels designated for guiding and some for imaging the main target. My question is why do they need multiple sources to achieve this? And why cant the image from the main camera be used as the source for the guiding.

Definitely not user friendly. And there are positions when it gets in the way of movement of the OTA :-(

Hi, I have a Motor drive for the 130EQ and when I attach and switch it on it drives the RA axis. But once its attached its very difficult to move the OTA in the RA axis manually. Am I missing something? Is there a way to easily couple & decouple the motor so the OTA can be moved manually? Is there someone who uses one of these motors who can help me pls.

Try this simulator https://www.stelvision.com/en/telescope-simulator/ Its pretty realistic for visual viewers. Tools like Stellarium seem to give you colourful images that you are unlikely to see with naked eyes and a pair of binocs or telescope.

I suspect you are looking at the 20mm erector eyepiece? From one end you can see the erector prism and it feels like you are looking at glass.

Hi andib479, I have the exact same telescope. If you cover the front of the telescope with a piece of white paper, remove the eyepiece and look down the hole where the eyepiece fits, can you see an image of your own eye? Also, as someone else suggested, its easier to try out your telescope during the day using your 20mm erecting eyepiece. BTW, just looking through the eyepieces, you wont get a focussed view of the moon. What you could do is place the eyepiece close to a wall in daytime and you should be able to get a projection of your window on the wall.

Got the manual from https://inter-static.skywatcher.com/upfiles/en_download_caty01440173393.pdf. Is this the correct one Alex?

I am a newbie so ignore if what I say sounds illogical ... What you have said above sounds indeed odd, because it Moon is above head, Jupiter would be higher up in horizon (not lower) would be my guess??

Looks awesome. Look forward to hearing your experience with it

Hi, I have had frozen shoulder before and it is curable So dont make hasty decisions - its still a few months to the dark months in UK, so you should be able to recover by then. Suggest you visit a physio and then religiously follow the exercise regime that they prescribe!