Pixies

Managed to get it as close as I can do with the hubble artificial star. I bought that ages ago (from here) but have never been able to use it as my other scope's minimum focus distance is just too great. But at about 10m it's fine with the wee Mak. It's so odd seeing the diffraction rings with no disturbance. I'll do a proper star test when there's a clear night (hopefully in 2020 sometime). So thanks everyone for all your help. I now have a working Skymax-90 for very little cash. I love this forum!

Oh - it was so far out, I needed something to get it close. I've got an artificial star, so just about to fish it out of the man drawer.

It's proving hard to collimate with the o-ring being as hard as bakelite! I'll have to get it done roughly until I can get a new o-ring. Just checking - it's a case of using a cheshire to get the cross-hairs over the eye hole? Then a star-test. I'm doing it without the star-diagonal in place. Is that OK?

Thanks both of you, It's all gone back together fine. Now time to collimate it. That star diagonal. It is pants, isn't it? And I wonder why the gold parts on this Mak? Perhaps it's quite an early one.

Did that ages ago.....

@JamesFJust missed your post. Yep - I see how it works now. I'll add some PTFE to the threads and a 'little' grease to the seal to see if that holds it in place. I assume then, if I tighten it up when I screw the end cap back, I will then no longer be able to 'tighten' the collimation screws, as there is no slack left to adjust.

Well. I bit the bullet and unscrewed: The threaded part (which obviously fixes to the OTA) is what the collimation bolts are attached to. So the outer plate must move slightly during collimation adjustments. It does appear to be attached to the baffle tube. So the opposite of the 180

The black primary mirror end is loose/wobbly and the sealing ring is split. With the ring in place, it keeps the black end piece (not sure what you call it) relatively secure. I'm not sure what would normally hold it in place. There are 6 bolt heads - 3 big and 3 small - these are the collimation adjusters I understand. I have never had a cat up close before. The sealing ring is hard - is it plastic, or was it softer rubber that has perished? Anyway. Is this knackered or can it be fixed? I'm sure one of you have had these things in bits before. Cheers

Nothing is 'essential'. If all's well, you scope will be fine for you to start observing. There are plenty of things you can get to improve it, but not essential. However, you might want to think about having something to help you collimate it in case something gets knocked out of alignment during shipping. The simplest would be a plain old collimation cap (£8 from the site sponsor). Otherwise a Cheshire collimator, which costs more but does make collimation a little easier.

I have the Baader Hyperion Zoom, which I love. Just bear in mind that with these zoom eyepieces, the field-of-view decreases as the focal length increases. I.e. the view narrows as you zoom out. If you need to use a wide-field EP as a finder, the zoom won't be much use for this. If you are coming from a position of not having any other EPs, you might need to consider a separate wide-field one.

Hi. Some good reviews here: https://binocularsky.com/binoc_reviews.php @BinocularSkymight be along later to give you some advice. Also - don't forget about the specific binocular forum here: https://stargazerslounge.com/forum/133-discussions-binoculars/

A standard tripod 1/4" fitting, I beleive. It's the old one with an eq-1

I have an old Velbon, but about to get a 90 Mak and don't fancy the eq-1 that's coming with it. It'll fit on my current tripod, but I'll be looking for a beefier one and wondering about a good head to match with it.

Hi, Can anyone here recommend a pan/tilt tripod head that is particularly good as a small telescope AltAz head? Something available second-hand would be my preference. Looking to kill 2 birds with one stone, as the saying goes.

I found the best upgrade I've done was to replace the straight finder with a RACI (right angle, correct image) finder and a Telrad. There are multiple threads discussing this arrangement, and I think that there will be several more posters along shortly, to suggest the same thing. You can use the Telrad (or Rigel Quikfinder) to find the starting target, then on to the RACI to start star-hopping. Because the RACI displays the sky as you see it (and as sky charts show it) it does make star-hopping much easier. Your Bortle 5 skies won't be any issue with finding these things. M101 is going to be the hardest to find, but M81 and M82 are relatively bright - but small. Here's how I find them: Start with Ursa Major. There are more stars than just the 'big dipper'. With Bortle-5, you should be able to see them all. Find the 2 stars parallel to and beyond Dubhe and Merak, follow their line to a small bright triangle of stars. The telrad would be good for this. Then with the RACI, follow the direction back along to the bowl of the Big Dipper - almost like the way the triangle points to - until you find another bright pair of stars These two stars are good indicators to the location of M81 and M82. If you have the stars in the finder view, you should have the galaxies too. Switch to a low powered eyepiece and hunt them out. Remember - in the EP, the view will be reversed. If you have a pair of binoculars, you can test out the star-hop before you use the scope.

Excellent (the scope, not the clouds). Did FLO say what they had to do?

Cool. The small cluster you saw is the Pleiades - it is a good binocular target. The Hyades is good too - larger and less dense, around Aldebaran in Taurus (half-way between the Pleiades and Orion). A bit further east is the Beehive cluster in Cancer. Theses are all great in medium bins.

Here's a previous thread. And includes a link to a manual: https://www.telescope.com/assets/product_files/instructions/29370_07-09.pdf

The Baader Classic Orthos might be another good consideration. A tenner more, but they have the same 50deg FOV as the Vixen plossls

Kill your dark-adaption too. I keep the lights on around me. And you have to sit comfortably at the eyepiece for a good length of time, in order to catch the moments of good seeing. Slowly your eyes/brain will start to distinguish features. You'll need 100x magnification plus, too. I would say. Your scope is 650mm focal length? Perhaps a higher powered EP than your 10mm would be suitable. Higher magnification will dim the planet slightly too. I've had my best views at 150X - 200x recently. You won't necessarily need an expensive EP, though.

http://sweiller.free.fr/collimation.html#chapter5

That looks pretty good. The reticle program is called "Mire De Collimation". Google it for the link.

That's perfectly circular. just slightly off-centre, but we're being fussy now. You can either fine-tune it or head back to the next stage.

get the Cheshire closer. Is still looks very slightly oval, with the bits marked in blue wider: You just need to rotate the top (in the picture) away from you just a wee bit. Does that make sense? If you get the Cheshire closer, it will be more obvious. But you are nearly there.

Just get the Cheshire tighter and tighter towards the secondary. You should end up with the circles almost touching - then you'll know they are completely concentric. Like this: (There is a gap between them) Yours still looks the same to me: It can be frustrating. The first time I did it, I gave up and came back the next day - then got it straight away. Get the Cheshire a little bit closer, then try loosening the secondary a bit and watch down the Cheshire as you manipulate the holder and see how it looks as you rotate and tilt it.