Craig a

That’s a big hole you dug, mine is nowhere near that size, 15x15inch 2.5ft deep is all I’ve done today, one cubic meter of concrete weighs approximately 2.5 tons there’s no way I need that much 😂

Thanks for all your reply’s, my landlord is a good bloke, he doesn’t mind me pouring a concrete block, it’s not massive anyway, the spec Altair state is the hole needs to be 15x15 inch and 3 feet deep, I’m not going down that deep 2.5 feet is enough where I live our ground is like concrete anyway that deep, my landlord let me build a solid block foundation for the aviary that my Harris hawk lives in, he even gave me the foundation block for it as he had some in his garage from an extension he built on his own house 

After doing abit more research it seems that wooden piers only work in drier locations in the world as the timber will swell and shrink with the weather and in northwest England we do get quite wet so I may just save up abit longer and just bite the bullet and get the Altair sky pier, i will dig the hole tomorrow and fill with concrete ready for the pier when I press the buy button, I will keep posting updates here on how it’s going 

Thanks for the info but if I can I’d rather use the timber route if it’s doable I seen people on a internet search using timber but most bolt 4 lengths of 4x4 to create a 8x8 pier but was wondering if one 7x7 square post would be sufficient to carry my rig stable enough for imaging, I just don’t trust the concrete block I’ve seen at our local builders especially when a heavy rig is moving round the sky, before now I’ve had concrete block just break in half in my hands on jobs 

Hello everyone I’m thinking of building an outdoor pier but at as low cost as possible, I’m living  in a rented house so what I build would need to be easily removed if something happens and we move out, I was thinking of the Altair sky pier but at over 600 quid with the mount adapter it’s abit on the expensive side even if I can just be unbolted and moved, my rig is the neq6 with a 10 inch Newtonian riding ontop, I was thinking would a 7x7 inch treated square post used for hanging farm gates off be ok? They are about 40 quid and I could make my own pier top plates and buy the neq6 adapter, if anything happens I can just saw it down at ground level, I also only do imaging from my rig if that helps? 

That’s a beauty,  galaxys are my fave 

As above for me too 😅

Could be a a couple of things, can you post an image of your flats that may help people diagnose what the problem may be if there is a problem, the idea of flats is to correct any uneven feild illumination so they may be correct, does the problem still show on a calibrated light frame? 

I also own the Quattro 10 with carbon tube and collimation is difficult, at f4 room for error is tiny, I bought a concenter sight tube and that helped massively in getting the hardest part correct and that is the secondary, it’s a great bit of kit for that. I also struggle if there’s a wind outside at 1000 mm a breeze would ruin subs, I recently bought the starizona nexus coma corrector/0.75 reducer that brings it down to 750mm and f3, it’s not cheap but first impressions are good (only done 1 test so far though because of weather). 
for a remote setup I personally would go for a refractor being low maintenance like a esprit or similar depending on what you want to image.

Super image and the faint extended nebulosity is showing, will I turn to stone if I look too long?

I should add this is the second time in as many imaging sessions this has happened and it’s still only using 23 out of the 35 I normally take 

Hello everyone, ran into a problem in dss, the other night I was imaging and at the end I fired off 35 flat frames but when I load them into dss and register it is showing it will only use 23 of the flats even though it’s showing there’s 35 loaded into the program? Any body have any idea why this is? 

I got the rail kit for my neq6 last year, easy to fit and works a treat, altitude adjustment is now a piece of cake even with my heavy rig riding ontop 

I think you’ve done excellent on this with a dslr, and 24 hours total now that’s dedication, don’t think I’ve even had that much for the last 6 months 😂 

That’s a lovely haunting image, I think it shows how cold space is it reminds of waking up to a hard frost, spectacular 

Holy smokes Peter, that’s the best image of this area I’ve ever seen, that bit of pinky blue really gives the image a little extra against the dusty areas, superb 

I would think it needs to totally obscure the clips, when I researched this everyone who installed one on their Newtonian totally covered the clips, not sure how much it affects the f ratio of the scope but I Carnt be much my clips only just protruded onto the mirror slightly, I ended up siliconing my mirror to its cell and cut the prongs off the clips and used the rest of the clip assembly to put the mask on, I noticed collimation would change slightly depending on where the scope was pointing, siliconing the mirror to its cell should help it keep its collimation no matter where it’s pointed now 

10 minutes ago, AKB said:

Looks great.

Where did you find this?  All I get when I search is Bahtinov masks….?

Thanks!

Tony

Here you go 

https://www.teleskop-express.de/shop/product_info.php/info/p12358_Wega-Primary-Mirror-Baffle-for-Skywatcher-Newtonian-130PDS.html

Sorted, mask arrived today and I’ve painted it Matt black and installed 👍

3 minutes ago, bish789 said:

Have to try and work out a fix for that, or bite the bullet and buy a Telegizmo

 

Worth ever penny 

3 minutes ago, bish789 said:

Only potential problem is if there's any electronics on the setup, then any moisture could wreck them.

Other advantage to the Telegizmo is the foil lining, which being a Yorkshireman would look to use an emergency foil blanket first before putting the cover on.

If only I was rich enough to have an observatory

On a warm summers day under a dark cover it will get very warm very fast, that’s why I chose the telegizmos because it’s almost white 

5 minutes ago, bish789 said:

What kind of cover did you use?

I've just bought a big barbecue cover for my setup, and allegedly its windproof, waterproof, UV resistant etc.

Only thing showing is the last few inches of the tripod feet.

Air looks like ut will circulate so that can't be bad.

I use a telegizmos 365 cover, it’s very good, I use rechargeable silica dehumidifiers under the cover as extra protection it’s cream coloured to reflect the suns heat so the mount doesn’t get too warm under there melting the grease, it’s also foil lined to reflect the suns radiation, I use the skywatcher pillar mount to the cover is tight around the central column when I’ve tied it hence the silica dehumidifiers in there 

I can vouch for FLO flocking material I did my skywatcher 10 inch f4 newt about 5 years ago and that lived permanently mounted outside under a cover for months at a time seeing hot and cold weather and the material never budged, it’s good stuff 👍

To be honest I’ve always doubted not having the clip touching the mirror as the scope moves through the sky collimation would change, on my 130pds I’ve recently siliconed the mirror to its cell well not silicone but grip bond pro, it’s an adhesive but stays abit flexible for thermal expansion, I put the clips back in but not touching the mirror as a fail safe but to be honest grip bond pro shouldn’t fail, the mirror is firmly in its place, I used penny’s as spacers between the mirror and cell and took them out after it was cured, I’ve read arguments for and against this Meathod but the mirror will not move in its cell now so I’m happy 

9 hours ago, Newforestgimp said:

Thank you 👍

Im coming round to OAG I think after doing some more reading this evening, so think I might be investigating which OAG & filter drawer to get. Thinking the ZWO OAG and the Altair filter drawer.

The zwo OAG is a good choice, set it up during daytime on a distant object if you can see one then do final tweaks under the stars