Carbon Brush

Have you contacted Pulsar for their comments on re-finishing the dome?
If they come up with a recommended material that is beyond DIY application, you can still use a local specialist to do the work.
Cheshire to Norfolk is going to be quite expensive shipping.
While Pulsar want to sell new domes and accessories, they will only be able to do this if existing customers can maintain their purchases.
Just a thought.

Echoing @F15Rules comments on Russian MAKs.

I have been very impressed by the views through all the Intes scopes I have used. Mechanical build quality is in a different league to the Chinese stuff.
The only 'problem' with them is that they are heavy compared to the Chinese stuff, so more demanding of the mount.
I suppose it comes down to....Do you want views or be able to use a cheap mount?

My (20Kg) MN78 Mak newt is permanently installed.
My (lightweight) 12Kg TAL200K is not well used.

I am in the 'get a MAK' camp given your description.
Have you considered a Bresser 127 MAK?
I have not used this particaular scope. But have been impressed by the quality of their refractors when placed against similar Skywatcher product.

https://www.firstlightoptics.com/bresser-telescopes/bresser-messier-mc-127-1900-maksutov-cassegrain-ota.html

Fans are a very variable quality item. A lot of people offer them based on size, airflow and ££.
Life expectancy, noise and vibration only becoming apparent if you look deeper!
If ££ is more important than life or noise... Look no further than the fans in a lot of consumer items.
Vibration can come from badly balanced components, or a poor brushless drive method.

The fan offered by FLO is a known name. Part of the Sunon range with bearings to reduce noise and vibration, with long life.
At first sight £17 seems a lot for a little fan. But it comes with the connector (not flying leads that you need to terminate) and it does the job well.

HTH, David.
 

Another one here following with interest.
I was thinking about parting with my (rather bulky) 12" solid tube. But I see an interesting alternative.

At risk of incurring wrath....
the CW moves up and down inside a piece of plastic drainpipe under the work bench, Fred Dibnah would be proud.😊
Sorry I disagree. Fred would have used a sash window lead weight inside a cast iron downpipe🤣
The (smaller Meddings) pillar drill we have at work had a broken return spring last year.
As it is only about 45 years old, Messrs Meddings provided a replacement!
But next time it breaks, I will know what to do😃
 

The OP has not been back to view any of the responses.
Make of that what you will.

I would add the usual cautions about an inexperienced buyer considering 2nd hand goods.

The auction price is going to be very high. What with auction house fees, their packing charge, then shipping cost.
The bottom line is way way more than the bid price.
All for a (small) scope that may have problems.
If I lived a few miles from the auction house, I might be tempted to pop my head around the door. But online, based on a single photo - no thank you.

I once bought 'new' Celestron MAK scope from Amazon Warehouse for about 2/3 of new price. Customer return - fully checked, etc.
It had a big blob of grease easily visible inside the corrector plate. Very poor packing. Need I go on?
Fortunately Amazon took it back for refund without argument.

When building my roll off observatory, I used an up/over garage door opener.
This was decided after a shoulder injury. But once tried, like car electric windows and central locking, it became a 'must have'😁
Essentially a low voltage (24V) motor with gearbox coupled to sprockets & chain giving linear movement.
Keeping the track the right way up to minimse water ingress and greasing every so often has kept it working since 2008.
The roof slides off to park over a pergola.
You could use the same principles to move a complete shed.

The first thing to remember whether moving a shed, or a roof, is strength.
Standard sheds have strength only when all sides are inplace, and a floor, and a roof.
The box is nailed together on all sides. As soon as you remove one panel strength, the whole thing becomes floppy.
Easily demonstrated with a cardboard box and parcel tape.

A further consideration is wind. A standard shed is held down by the bikes, mowers, etc. on the floor.
You need extreme weather for it to blow away.
A roof on castors, or even complete shed on wheels is a different proposition. It can easily become a sail.
You need to include something in the design to ground anchor.
My roll off uses 8mm pins on the roof that engage in holes in the top rail when the roof closes.
A similar scheme would work on moving a complete shed. Or use turnbuckles to something in the ground.

All the above problems/complexities are negated if you wheel out a scope.

Good luck with the build.

David.

Hello and welcome to SGL.
May I suggest you post something in the welcome section? Tell us about your interests in the hobby?

I think your first task is to check the Maplin PSU properly.
The phrase 'for years' appears in your post and power supply capacitors degrade.
Check voltage off load, and into various loads - like car bulbs up the rated current.
If you see more than a few tenths volts difference from light load to full load, the PSU needs attention.

Next step is to check the integrity of the lead. Cigar to DC plug? Two known problem areas.

Finally, as you were earlier reporting a blown board, surely these events cannot be unrelated.

HTH, David.

Another option is to use two scopes on the mount. If the mount will handle the weigth.
Though your scope selection and EQ5 may be pushing it.
Check the scopes are aligned to each other beforehand.
Scope A is set up for solar. Scope B is set up for 'dim' viewing and focus checked before the session.
Align to the sun using scope A, keeping scope B capped.
Slew to Mercury and uncap scope B.

Depending on how well the scopes optical and mechanical axes are aligned, you could align to the sun on Scope A.
Then slew to Mercury and swap to scope B using the dovetail fixing. don't disturb anything else.
You can check for the alignment in daylight on a horizon object.
Put Scope A on the mount and centre an object of interest.
Swap to scope B and see if the object is still centred.
If necessary, shove packing pieces (plastic/card) inside the tube rings to introduce a small angular shift.
Cheaper than buying guide scope rings😁

I have been thinking a little more on this one - but have not seen the programme.

The benefit of using the sun for alignment is that it is near to Mercury.
This means polar/level misalignment, or mount errors, result in a smaller error when slewing to Mercury.
The Moon could have a big separation from Mercury, allowing mount errors to be significant.
On the right days, the moon can be near to Mercury.

On focussing. Before startng, take note of a focus position for the planned eyepiece(s) looking at a distant horizon.
This can be done using a steel rule measuring focus position, an inbuilt focus ruler or a number of focus knob turns from the end stop.
This all depends on the focusser type. Of course if you are wealthy enough to own an electronics focusser......
A Baader film filter on/off won't shift the focus position. So a focus on the sun is OK.
At the other extreme, swapping a Herschel wedge for a digonal produces a huge path length difference requiring the check mentioned above.

Do let us know how you get on.

I wonder if years ago (when I knew even less about the sky than I do now) I missed and gave up on aurora viewing for the same reasons.
Nothing obvious to see.
A primitive (20 yers ago) digital camera has awful sensitivity. Prior to this, using a film camera doesn't yield instant pictures!
Should I have snapped away in the dark with a film SLR hoping to view coloured pictures days later?

I think the 'which buttons to push' answer  depends on the version of EQ5 controller. The age/revision and whether it is Skywatcher, Celestron, Meade, Bresser, etc.
The general principle would of course be to pop a solar filter on the front end of any scope. Or if suitable a Herchel wedge on the back.
Having centred the sun, slew to Mercury and remove the wedge/solar filter.

HTH, David.

Take a look here....

After the spectacular showing last Friday/Sat this has been something of a conversation point with non astro people. The internet has been alive with images.

I found though a few people thought after looking there was nothing to see. Really?
Our eyes resolve colour only at high light level - daylight. At night we see monochrome.
If you have only seen the coloured aurora pictures in books - that is what you expect to see in the sky.

For example after waking early Sat AM I momentarily thought 'no aurora visible'.
The appearance was of high level thin cloud masking the stars.
After a few seconds my astro head started to work. Why is the sky so bright all over with a (long set) moon and the sun still hours below the horizon.
Aha - it is the aurora!

For anyone without experience of the night sky, what can we do to help?

The advice is Just grab any camera (standalone or phone or tablet) Point it hand held to the northern sky and leave the shutter open for a few seconds.
If the picture shows a weird colour sky, there is an aurora.
At that point you know whether to reach for your tripod and start taking serious pictures.

Anyone else have other simple ideas for the next one?

@Celerondon Nice package for diagnostics. Easy connections for a non technical user.
I have seen similar products with different connectors to suit various applications. Larger for solar panels, etc.

I suppose I say 'multimeter' because I have used them for all my adult life, so they are my first tool out out of the box.
 

I don't know this mount, I am assuming it has DC motors, not stepper motors.

Your first step is to determine what fault you have. From the report it could be.
Power supply shutting down.
Drive electronics shutting down.
Motors being asked to drive into a stiff (not free running) gear.

Do you have a basic multimeter? If not you are very much in the dark.

Connect an ammeter to the supply. Run one motor at a time moving only the mount - no scope or weights attached.
A high current draw is a clue to something sticking.
Monitor the supply voltage when moving the motor - see if the voltage drops.
Try running the supply into car bulbs as another check on power delivery.
Tail/side lights take about 0.5A. Brake/indicator lights about 1.75A.

Hope something in there is useful.

David.

I might buy a tent from Millets. Correction. That was until this report.
Given this twaddle, can I trust them to supply any advice or product?

Another wedge to consider is the Lacerta wedge. Easily purchased from 365astronomy in the UK. No idea about your purchasing.
There are several threads on SGL in the solar section about different makes of wedge and Brewster angle vs 90deg.
At the end of the day everyone seems to have been happy with whatever (known astro name) kit they have bought.
I have yet to see 'I wish I had bought Brand A instead of Brand B'.
 

We can all discuss these differences and appreciate how things change with latitude. But not everyone is like this.

On holidays near the equator....
I have immediately noticed how late afternoon the sun descends almost vertically to the sea. No scraping the horizon!
Darkness falls very quickly.
The sun ascends on one side of island, climbs vertically overhead and descends on the other side of the island.
None of the other (northern hemisphere) visitors I spoke to had noticed any of this. They just moved loungers to sun/shade as necessary.

Again on a near equator holiday. Where are the recognisable (northern hemisphere) stars? 
Let me locate Polaris to get started. Drat it is scraping the horizon. No way can I make it out.
Never mind. Look the other way (south) and enjoy the (never seen before) sights😁.
Again I was on my own noticing this. It was an island with little light pollution.

In Egypt on a night dive away from built up areas I remember orange skyglow from a town around 50 miles away.
I also remember how it suddenly got very dark when the (near full) moon dropped behind a big hill.
That has to be the measure of a clear sky. Again nobody else noticed.

Apologies for the ramble.

 

My observatory build (2007/8) was my best astro spend.
Power on, roof back, view. The scope is on the aligned mount and at near enough outside temperature.
When cloud, rain or cold take their toll it takes very little time to park, close roof and lock up.
OK a condensed scope and mount can benefit from a blast by a hair dryer. 5 minutes.
But going back to this outside setting up for serious observing - no.

Yes away from the house. A west facing brick wall can be a good early evening radiator.
Tumble drier, bathroom, kitchen or boiler vents are awful air disturbance devices. Yours or others nearby.
Thermals fom a roof some distance away can be problem.

Then of course if you or a neighbour are growing 'certain substances' in your loft that require lots of warmth and didn't invest in insulation🤣
I believe some such installations have been located by police helicopters using infra red cameras!

This is a good excuse to buy a second scope😁. Something completely different like a long FL refractor.
If both scopes give poor views, blame the sky. Or maybe get a 3rd scope just to get another opinion?

Seriously though. The sky quality does vary by location and sometimes by the hour.
I have had 'bad' scopes that have fixed themselves a couple of hours later.
I have also had scopes that worked great early on and apparently degraded later.

Don't go jumping in and looking for problems until you have consistently seen the same problems (like collimation) a few times.
Tube currents vary over seconds. Atmospheric turbulence varies by the second. Pinched optics change slowly with temperature. Collimation is permanently present.

HTH, David.

48 minutes ago, Cosmic Geoff said:

Then set the correct time and date (in US format, not UK).

You may be surprised to hear how many people have been confused by USA date format.
03/10/24. It that Oct 3rd? March 10th?