Franklin

I would, an EQ6 with a 10" newt aboard is a lot of weight to be bolted into 5" of concrete plus you don't know how strong the mix is that was used to pour the printed concrete area. I'm sure there will be others who can advise on the physics behind it.

At last, hooray!

😁Yes I agree and it can cause confusion when trying to put a date on things. Decals seem to have gone in trends over the years and Vixen were influenced by another well known Japanese telescope manufacturer in that department.

That depends on what diagonal it is and if it has any provision for adjustment but if the views look the same as before then it's probably ok. An easy test of diagonal collimation is to lock the scope with a distant daytime object (such as a pylon on the horizon) at the edge of field using a high power eyepiece straight through and then, without moving the scope swap to diagonal and the same eyepiece. Any misalignment of the diagonal will cause image shift. You could try this on a centered star if your mount tracks.

Every amateur astronomer should own a good old 4" refractor, they're great. Here's a few I've had, all Vixen of course😁. FL102S F8.8 SD103S F7.7 A102M F9.8 A105M F9.5 and currently the ED102S F9

Check the collimation, the fall may have dislodged the mirror/prism.

I very peculiar arrangement, like a huge stalk! When I had the MkIV zoom and zoom barlow I would only use it with the 2" skirt which helped but then you had to be mindful of it making contact with the diagonals mirror. There's info on the Baader site about the zoom barlow specs and how it is optimized for use with the zoom. I had the Q-barlow at the same time and couldn't see a difference visually. Both good barlows.

Sign of the times I guess, I see your point and I agree, the StarBook One controller is very intuitive to use and you can reverse the function of each button as well so their direction matches the view in the eyepiece, neat! In-built red light torch on the back which can be dimmed right down and comes in useful.

I don't know about in Japan but in Europe the SX2 mount only came with the SB1, the SB10 was an expensive upgrade. If you wanted SB10 it came as standard with the SXD2 and the SXP2 and the other bigger mounts. SX2 and SXD2 are now sold with wi-fi and the only way to get a new SB1 is with the AP RA motor upgrade package but even that has now been discontinued as the wi-fi adaptor and smartphone APP can run the AP now as well.

The new SX2 WL does not have the StarBook One with it, only the wi-fi plug-in adaptor. The StarBook One controller was never sold as a separate item but I have seen them available on the used market.

The best and cheapest way of filtering out the excessive glare of Venus, to help increase the contrast of subtle features, is to observe the planet in a daytime sky. In an evening sky be very careful if the Sun is above the horizon when searching for Venus, morning apparitions are easiest as you can set your scope tracking the planet whilst still dark and then wait for the Sun to rise.

According to the catalogues I have the FL102S was last listed in 2003 but the ED102S and the ED102SS continued and were listed in the 2004 catalogue. The 2005 catalogue shows the first listing of the ED103S F7.7 which later, in 2018, became the current SD103S.

Guess I'll have to make do with this ED102S F9 from the same year, I'm not complaining!

The new SX2/SXD2 wi-fi mounts are not new at all, they are exactly the same as the originals supplied with SB1 and SB10. You can still use either wired controllers with the new wi-fi mounts. Likewise you can get the wi-fi adaptor to use with an older mount.

The final run of the Vixen FL102S F9 from 2003 in Sphinx/WT livery. 30 years of hunting down Vixen scopes and I have never seen one of these anywhere but they must have made at least one, as it was photographed for the 2003 Vixen catalogue. I'd sell all my scopes to get my hands on this one but I think it's probably just a dream!😁

Rub it in why don't you!😁

This and other SGL member images of the visually elusive galaxy M33 are invaluable. I've struggled to see it from my light polluted skies but I managed to detect it with averted vision the other clear night and this image shows quite clearly the star patterns that I used to find the correct area. From this image I can now see the extent of this face-on spiral and it's absolutely massive, it's spiral structure goes well beyond the stars that I used to home in on it. Wow!!!

When I had a pair of those I tended to stick with lower power eyepieces, pairs of NPL30, LVW22 and SSW10 and they all came to focus ok. What I did find was that smooth nosepieces worked best so I ended up using SLV25 and SLV12. Vixen do say that 10mm and below is too much for the design but I tried a pair of SLV6 and they merged ok but at that power the CA began to show from the achromatic objectives. Superb for scanning star fields at low power.

Good, that should clear it up with time.

Put a dew heater band on and leave it. When it's cold outside with a lot of moisture around, as it was last night, I put the lens caps on before I bring the optics back inside and leave the dew strips running for a while. There's nothing worse than bringing a freezing cold bit of glass from outside into a warm house, it will instantly fog over. By putting the caps on you are trapping some cold air against the glass which will then warm up gradually and hopefully not form any water droplets but evaporate away slowly. I keep a desiccant bag inside the dew-shield, trapped by the aperture cap so it can't get free and touch the objective and a desiccant 2" insert at the eyepiece end. Never had any problems when doing this.

Nothing like a bit of Ha to take your mind off the hedge-trimming duties!

Despite the seeing being up and down throughout, last night was probably the best night of the year so far for me. Light pollution yes but crystal clear and cloudless for 12+ hours and still clear right now with Venus high in the morning blue sky. Spent a lot of time on Jupiter which had plenty of detail to offer with the 115 and 6mm SLV at 148x. Had a good hour or so on doubles in Orion and of course M42. The young stars of M45 looking like diamonds with the LVW22 at 40x, I must give the Pleiades more power and explore the many doubles that are embedded in this cluster. M1 with averted vision was detected but like M33 needs darker skies really. First signs of frost on the lawn, I need a roofless shed or something!

Reminds me of that "Close Encounters" film!

Well I found the correct place, thanks to @Nik271's directions and with a combination of averted vision and moving the slo-mo side to side I could see the faintest hint of a ghostly glow. At least I know the star field now for when I can get to a proper dark sky. Jupiter looking etched again, began observing just as one of the moons(Io?) came from behind the globe.