tdinneen

Hey Peter. I’m in a similar position as yourself. You make any headway on evaluating the various hosting services. Or maybe you already got yourself setup? Tom

The Avalon Fixed Flange you get with your Linear does indeed support the relatively standard M8 x 129mm (I think it's a Meade standard?). Here's a diagram of it from Avalon Tom

Thanks Vlaiv. So I’m correct (…ish, I took central obstruction to be % of volume not diameter) albeit you explained everything I was trying to say in your first sentence 🤪 Also explains why everyone likes those big scopes even though they end up matching them with big pixels. Tom

Apologies if I’m just rehashing questions and answers that already exists in likely multiple threads but I’d like to understand the roll / balance of aperture, focal length, resolution a little better. Assume I have a 5” refractor that has a fl of 900mm and an f-ratio of f/7.0. With a 3.8 micron camera that’ll give me an image scale of 3.8/(900/206) = 0.87”/px. Now assume I also have a 10” reflector with a central obstruction of 30%. With a reducer I can get this down to let’s say 1800mm at f/7.0 (rounding numbers to keep them the same). So if I bin the same camera at 2x2 I get the same image scale of 0.87”/px. That means I’ll have the exact same resolution as the refractor. So there’s no win but….am I right in saying that the reflector will gather light ((10/2)^2 * 0.7 / (5/2)^2) = 2.8 times faster than the refractor . So although I’m not gaining on resolution (and loosing on FoV) I’m getting a much improved SNR (2.8 / sqrt(2.8) = 1.67 times) for the same exposure time by using the reflector. Tom.

I doubt I would have been as patient if COVID were not in the middle of all of this. Communication with Nathan was pretty good up till March or so. Although there was an almost complete lack of communication since then with Gareth I try not to judge and would not force anyone to travel to install something had they not felt safe to do so. No idea if that had anything to do with it but I'm over in Dublin, Ireland which complicates the matter. Everything is effectively open again so I was hoping to get a call soon. I'm guessing Steve didn't get his deposit back because of cashflow issues. Makes no sense otherwise. Why ignore a court order if you can just return a deposit. If he had started building the obsy that would be different but he hadn't by the sounds of it. With the CCJ and my wild guess at cashflow problems I suspect that's it for HOUK... and my deposit. I hope I'm wrong. Shame for a business that had at least a solid reputation up till recently to go out like this.

I paid a deposit of £1990 on the 26th of September 2020. So I'm over a year waiting now. I was told it would be installed before Christmas. Last email from Gareth was in June to say he was talking to Nathan the following weekend and he'd be in touch after that with delivery dates. No communication since. In fairness Nathan was always good at keeping me in the loop and very nice to deal with. But as we know he left in May. I understand Gareth's under pressure and has had some difficulties but I too back the sentiment that it is so sad to see a good business have it's reputation damaged like this. All it takes is 10 mins a month per customer to just ring or email them to keep them in the loop. It really shouldn't have come to a CCJ, it's a separate issue and likely has to do with cashflow but really he has nobody to blame but himself. I'll have to go down the same route myself if this continues for much longer.

Anyone found an adapter to connect a Polemaster to the AstroTrac 360? In the manual it identifies the screws on top of where the polar scope goes (but not used for anything) as '3 x electronic polarfinder mounting'. Doesn't look like the old Polemaster AstroTrac adapter would work? I could fashion something up but would prefer something made for the job. Tom.

I got in just before you Graham. Ordered the end of September and I’m still waiting. I really hope they can get through whatever backlog they have and we get these installed in time for when things kick off again in August.