FrankRyanJr

You're welcome! Out of curiosity, how bright would you estimate it? / how far ahead of the ISS? 

Hooray! Congrats. I've clouds here (as usual). There are a few more passes over the next week that are even better placed. 🙂 

Actually you don't need to subtract anything for this timing as it's calculated for the toolbag itself. 

https://www.n2yo.com/passes/?s=58229#

It's showing a decent pass at 5:30 this evening 

Somehow I've only just heard about this so I'm going to give it a shot tonight (looking clear here).
I remember seeing the other toolbag satellite for m a few years ago and that was pretty neat. Bino object apparently.

https://youtu.be/DyWQX-q4Qj0?si=EQudOuuuoeq_YXCL

Starting around this time, I've been asked every year for the last 30+ years from at least one person what is the best scope to buy someone for Christmas/Holidays.  Usually the budget is around $250 so I have a stock answer! 🙂
No.1 rule: Do not buy them a hobby killer!

I'm interested in hearing what others think of my take on it. 
In short (the long is below) if they are new to astronomy I simply recommend binos and a book. I know, it sounds hella boring but I've seen so many times kids and adults getting gifted scopes that literally destroy any interest they had. 

Quote

 

Selecting the best astronomy gear for a novice under a budget of 200-ish can be a rewarding and thoughtful Christmas gift. However, making the right choice is crucial to ensure the recipient's budding interest in stargazing doesn't fizzle out.
Here's a guide to the what I think is the ideal piece of equipment for various age groups and interests:

Under 14 Years Old: - For young stargazers, it's important to keep it simple and user-friendly. - Avoid German Equatorial Mounts and traditional long-tube telescopes as they can be cumbersome and challenging for kids. - A better option is actually a compact and robust 'Spotting Scope' with a handle for easy pointing. - Top of the list must be a good pair of 10x50 binoculars with a tripod is an excellent choice. Pair these with a good beginner's guide to observing the night sky with binoculars and this is what I highly recommend.

Above 14 Years Old: - As the novice astronomer gets older and more serious about the hobby, consider an 8-inch Dobsonian telescope. - Dobsonian telescopes offer the best value for money in terms of light-gathering power. - Remember, in astronomy, it's not all about magnification; the size of the mirror matters for detailed observations. - Anything smaller than 8 inches may limit the ability to see faint celestial objects, especially in areas with significant light pollution.

Limitations of the 200-ish Budget: It's essential to manage expectations when working with a tight budget. A quality 'go-to' or motorized telescope is out of reach in this price range. Telescopes in this category with motorized features typically compromise on optics or mount stability. Instead, prioritize the quality of the optics and the overall build of the telescope, even if it means forgoing automated tracking.

Additional Considerations: Contact you're local astronomy club for recommendations on gear / shops. Stress the importance of patience and practice, as astronomy can be a challenging but incredibly rewarding hobby. Consider gift options like astronomy-related books, stargazing apps, or a red flashlight for preserving night vision during observations. Keeping warm while outside is also super important so consider, a hat, gloves, scarf as the other 'observing accessories' as I can tell you from experience, these are needed!

In conclusion, the best astronomy gear for a novice under $200 ish depends on their age and level of interest. For young beginners, a pair of binoculars will spark their curiosity, while an 8-inch Dobsonian telescope provides excellent light-gathering power for older enthusiasts. By keeping the equipment simple to use and basic, the right balance can be struck between gear and learning. The key is to foster a love for the cosmos and encourage learning and exploration in the night sky rather than battling with gear and giving up.

Have extra cash to splash? I think the perfect scope for the ‘serious about visual astronomy’ young adult/adult is a 10’’ Dobsonian. It will still be in the realm of ‘easy to use’ / ‘move around’, have a very respectable light gathering ability and deep sky objects really begin to get exciting at 10’’ with the right combination of eyepieces. Starting off I’d recommend just getting a decent set of branded ‘Plossel’ eyepieces. As you gain more experience and want to get the best from your gear, your next big purchase will be one or two good EP’s (that may well cost the same as the scope!) but you will understand why when you use them. Before you spend any money, again I strongly recommend that you join a local astronomy club as you will get the best advice from them.
Clear skies!

 

(YT vid)
Don't gift 'Hobby Killer' telescopes for Christmas! Do this instead...

I tried out the new star tracker from Move Shoot Move called the 'Nomade' (Not affiliated with them but was sent a unit to review so just putting that out there) and have to say I'm super impressed with this little tracker. It's the newer version of their 'Rotator' unit that was pretty decent but had some flaws. The company are really good at listining to feedback from those that know best... Astrophotographers! Lol.
Anyway, I found it very easy to set up and use and perfect for traveling. Definitely one to watch.


https://youtu.be/HCzHXYILjmM

Sounds great. Does it totally 'red light' the whole phone. 

With the prevalence of controlling your scope via your cell phone (genuinely I'm not a fan of this. I like the tactile push button feel of a good old hand controller!) making sure the device doesn't play havoc with your dark adaption is key.

I know that you can set phones / apps to 'night mode' but what I've found is it's never perfect and sometimes depending on the device there is an indicator light or power light that does the damage.
I went old school on the problem and it's been working great.. for years. 🙂

It took me a while to really appreciate just how powerful and really, necessary fully dark adapted eyes are for observing! We spend al this money on gear / EP's etc but sometimes forget that the most crucial optical instrument we own are sitting right um... above...our noses. 

So I made a 5 min vid that may help if you're inclined to use these kinds of devices while observing. 

https://youtu.be/fdzmElPm8C4?si=pCc4pLzyqHlSoGdc

On 07/09/2023 at 09:48, Mr H in Yorkshire said:

This may be of interest, https://astro-gadget.net/gadgets/control-of-telescopes/dobsondream8

 

I have used these (minus the attachment hardware) on my 'drive to' motorised binochair (q.v.) and can fully commend them. Service and delivery was good, communications and advice was superb. Aleksander has moved the company to the west of Ukraine and seems to be operating as normal. 

Looks like a great option for Orion scopes.

On 07/09/2023 at 09:27, keith5700 said:

Ok. I emailed Romer with a similar question, and just had a reply from Eric.

they no longer sell the kits in pieces, where you have to buy certain parts to finish.

They will in future be sold as complete systems.

But they will not post to UK, due to future service problems, so not much use anyway.

Oh no. Sorry to hear that. 

A few of us from our astronomy club organised a trip to try and see the Northern Lights in Norway. 
Two of our group had been before and so we decided to rent a car rather than use one of the many tour companies to look for places to observe from.
You're not really chasing the lights, you're chasing clear skies! 
We kept the costs down as best we could by booking an air b&b (which turned out to be a great place) and staying for 3 (ish) nights. 
It's a total gamble on seeing them or not, it could be completely clear but if there is no aurora activity then obviously there'll be no show. 
OR it could be a Carrington event kicking off but over a blanket of cloud then you'll be denied also. So you'd need to make peace with that before you go. 
We scored by timing our stay to coincide with some strong storm activity that happened to hit when we were there along with finding some clear sky's at a really nice location. 

I put together this vlog of our trip, shows the locations we went to and the night we finally got to experience and photograph the lights. 
Hope it may help any of you thinking about going or organising a club trip. 
 

After 4 years manually operating my GSO 16'' (Also branded as StellaLyra / Zhumell Z series)
I finally decided to try and add some motors for tracking. I built an EQ platform and it works well but it's big and cumbersome for travelling to my observing site.

I came across these guys 'Romer Optics' and they had a 'push to' kit for around 100 bucks. This goto system looked the business and it worked with my GSO (also works on Aperura AD8" ~ AD16" and Orion SkyLine Dobs), so I ordered it. It worked great!  BTW the kit doesn't work on 'Obsession' type scopes or scopes with spring tensioners.
To counter any white light from my phone/tablet I use a reusable red film, cut to size like a screen protector that makes everything red on screen. 

Romer then announced a few years ago they were working on a 'GOTO' version so I kept an eye on the development of that. 
When they were ready to ship the parts I ordered one of the first kits. Between work/family/life I didn't get around to installing it until this summer. 
At this point they had added a few upgrades like dual speeds and some other power parts that Eric (the main guy at Romer) sent free of charge when I enquired about them!

I've little to none electronics / robotics knowledge but Eric was super helpful via Messenger chat with any questions I had. 

A word of warning. It's very much a DIY 'hands on' affair! 

I recorded the build as I did it and put together an 'instructional'/'review' type video of the project. It may be help anyone that is considering options for motorizing their Dob.
I've been using it a few weeks now and very happy with the tracking and the goto with it. There are a lot of improvements that can be made especially with the App but Eric seems very eager for feedback and I've no doubt,
they will keep improving it. 

Clear skies! 
Frank
 

Well, there was not a comet's chance in Hell of seeing it with the naked eye from my local (Bortle 2) spot last night. With the almost full Moon up there it was like observing from the city. But even with the moon washing out the sky, through a 16'' Dob with 18mm Ortho you could make out a fairly compact nucleus and fan shaped hint of diffused tail.
It's moving quite fast out of the Solar System. In the space of about half an hour it had moved from where it was in the center of this sketch to where the arrow point ends.

Some friends stayed on later than me and saw it occult a star. Now that's something you just don't see every day!

Ok so it's no Hale-Bopp, not even near a Neowise (but yeah, better than ISON 😛 ) though this little green guy is getting a lot of press, check your expectations; it's a common garden barely naked eye comet, but of course it's still worth a look!

https://youtu.be/0Ml_zkrqnjY

I never knew what 'night myopia' was until one of our club members did a talk about it. After testing my eyes at night with a set of diopter flippers and getting a separate pair of 'observing glasses', it's made an incredible difference.

This vid shows what I'm talking about and how you can test your eyes yourself and get a pair of glasses cheaply. 

https://youtu.be/SCpk3I9qqbc

Excellent review. I'm looking to buy a 12" Sumarian Alkaid (2nd hand if possible) and replace the mirrors. 

Magnets! What a great simple idea. 🙂 

When I was starting out, I thought collimation was this really super-complex thing. Then when one of our astronomy club members showed me physically with their scope how to do it, I was surprised at just how simple it was! So I made a video as a basic guide for laser collimating a reflector,  in this case a 16'' GSO Dobsonian with a Kendrick laser collimator.

Obviously there's a lot involved in collimating and this video is not attempting to cover all those facets. It's intended as a quick explanation of the principle. I found that seeing the basics explained in simple terms without complication was key for me to then use that as a base to learn more. 

For beginners, there's a fine line between giving enough info to do the process correctly versus information overload. Once you get the basics down, it becomes clear over time the different areas that affect the outcome such as mirror springs, focuser slop, mirror quality, laser misalignment... the list goes on, they all certainly need to be understood but only by getting started and doing can you really learn. 
 

1 hour ago, Gfamily said:

Without wishing to diss your approach; I used a sheet of Proplex (box-wall sheets used as temporary floor cover by builders), which can be bought for about £5 for a 1200x2400mm sheet from Wickes DIY shops over here. 

Cut a suitable length / width and used sticky Velcro pads to hold hold the bits around the OTA.  Folds flat, so even less volume than a foam mat, and the Velcro sticks pretty well to the plastic so less need for jabbiness.

You could probably do half your astro society members' scopes with one sheet. 

Gosh no! This is what it's all about. I've never heard of Proplex being used for dew management but I'm certainly going to pick up a sheet of it! Thanks for the info. 

While I've purchased and use various commercially available dew shields I decided to try my hand at making one, mainly for saving on weight for air travel. Quite pleased with the result. Only jabbed myself with the needle a couple of times.  Hope.it helps if your thinking about making one. 

Hey guys. To give context, when I was checking out what others had done, I noted that everyone who had used the Celestron drive and either a 6 or 8mm bar was able to tweak the speed setting to find the right rotation rate.
My intention was to use off the shelf parts so knowing that it would be a case of trial and error. I reckoned that it was worth the punt on the EQ drive to test. (I got 2 cheaply on Wish before they added import duties). 
The biggest obstacle I had and still do is weight really putting these drives to work. If everything is balanced properly and the pivot point turns as smoothly as possible, then gravity and the right resistance between the bar and the arc means it's ok to track. It actually works fine with just a single drive on the downward but just before it levels out I have to switch on the second drive. 
This is a pain for 2 reasons. One, I have to set a timer to remind me to do it or else I'll be mid observation and suddenly everything starts drifting out of the FOV. Two,  I have to adjust the rotation speed for each when the 2 drives are working in tandem. Don't ask why lol. I've given up trying to figure out what's happening but I reckon it's the extra weight on the upward is requiring more torque so... yeah... not very scientific I know but hey.. I'm more of a practical problem solver. 

Having used the platform for a good while now. I have to say I'd never be without it. I do want to replace the 2 drive system with a single Nema Stepper motor to simplify things and because I'm just waiting for the night the other two fall on their swords and go to tracking drive heaven for a well earned rest. 

Hey all.
My first equipment review video for the Rigel Quikfinder -  Hope it's ok to share here! 🙂
I've used various types of view finders over the years on different model scopes. Each with their own pros and cons. I have found though that switching to a Telrad has made the process of alignment a lot easier. On larger scopes I have the extra bulk and weight is not a big issue but on smaller scopes where every ounce may count then this alternative is good to have! 

I hope this review is in someway helpful. 

Looks great aStone! I love seeing how everyone is adapting the designs to suit their needs as John says above. 

Yikes! I just bought this mount and find that the tracking 'jusdders' rather than tracks smoothly, even with low power eyepieces. 

I was told I probably needed to update the firmware but looking at this thread I'm terrified to even try! 

Has anyone ever successfully updated! First go? Lol.