IB20

Maybe the Tak branded Starbase. Such a lovely achromat that it’s now cost me a 76DCU & Q extender, and will probably cost me a DZ and a Mewlon. 🙈 In terms of bad quality, bought a pair of rank Celestron 10x binos and a 4mm volcano top ortho that had crud in lens. In an attempt to take it apart and clean it, I’ve now made it even worse. 😒

Easy, a Starwave 102ED-R in perfect condition for under half price its new value.

For some reason I mis-remembered your post and thought you’d said 10pm. I’m out now and there’s not a cat in hell’s chance. Rhea, Titan and TYC 5807-0438-1 nice and visible though. 🥴

That is a beautiful scope.

Yep LED lights, my local council did reduce their brightness when I complained about light trespass into a bedroom though. 😁

I’ll defer to Don on the Nagler front. He recommended the 22mm T4, 13mm & 5mm T6. Tempted to have that really massive hand grenade one (31mm?) in there just for giggles though. Ethos wise, John picked the 6mm.

So here’s where we are at: Vixen HRs or TOE range (I don’t care, I’m including them all they are that good!!) 5mm XW 6mm Ethos 7mm APM XWA 9mm Morpheus 10mm Delos and a BCO for travelling 11mm Apollo 12.5mm Docter 15mm BST Starguider 18.2mm Delite 22mm LVW 24mm Panoptic 30mm APM UFF 35mm Celestron Ultima

If anyone wants a fantastic 12.5mm, there are two Celestron Ultimas available in the classifieds section. Wonderful glass; I love mine. Great for Ha too!

Clouded out last night but an earlyish morning start have granted beautiful views of a 12.6% waning crescent moon. A quick look on SkySafari showed that Venus wasn’t far away. After a bit of eye wringing, out popped bright Venus. Quickly got the 15x 70 bins out and despite the brightness of Venus saw its brilliant crescent shape; nice to have her back in the skies!

Boo, was clouded out last night too despite the clear forecast. 👎🏼 We’ll bag it soon, I’m sure.

I found it didn’t take much pressure to move the barrel and sometimes replacing the eye caps moved it. Perhaps I just had a loose outlier of a Delite?

Oooh. 😁 Do they have the same twist barrel mechanism as the Delites, as I wasn’t a huge fan of that style?

I thought I was going mad when I saw 4 moons then only 3. It didn’t even occur to me about the planetary shadow as it was quite far away from the limb.

So as I have no finder I was just cruising with the 102mm trying to find M11 in fairly early night skies. I happened across a very eye catching double. A horizontal pair of perfect white orbs with a fairly generous separation but appearing completely symmetrical in size and magnitude. Had no idea what it was at the time but it struck me with what a great double it was. Just searching SkySafari now and it was Alya or Theta1 Serpentis; I love just stumbling upon targets at random. 😁

Sadly, no. I thought about it but got so into the views with the 102 that time zipped by. I also don’t like handling the Tak if I’ve had a few, it’s on a much lighter tripod and mount and I didn’t want any clumsiness occurring. 🫣

Thanks @Louis D! I think you’d really broaden your observing experiences if you had a few more eyepieces to try. Your collection sounds a bit limited… 🤣

Jupiter, my favourite of all targets, is coming in to view. I told myself not to look at it until it’s in a better position later in the year. Well that lasted all of 5 minutes. The versatility of a refractor on a higher tripod compared to a low down dob has made it easy to get it in view. I honestly don’t know what to say, it is just the most beautiful sight. The GRS is just rotating into view and is clear as day. The banding is sensational. The Galilean moons are just huge, with lovely airy disks. I am a complete and utter 4” refractor convert. This is turning out to be the best night ever.

Without a doubt one of my favourite nights observing. The perfect temperature, a wonderful 4” refractor on the perfect mount, brilliant seeing, Saturn looking jaw-dropping (I’ve been viewing it for nearly two hours 😅😅), an impressed wife and a few beers. It doesn’t get any better than this.

The 4mm TOE on Saturn tonight is absolutely blowing my mind. How good must the 3.3mm be! 😲

I have to say, it’s a very aesthetically pleasing EP. I bet it’s even nicer to look through! What is it, 85°?

I adore the AZ75 too, this combo is a match made in heaven. I don’t even have a finder on and it’s a doddle lining up Saturn at 173x 😅 I used to think I’d need slo-mo for any planetary observing, well I don’t even slightly miss it.

Hopefully you have similar seeing as me, it’s still really balmy here. It’s like viewing in southern Europe. The 102ED-R is really earning its keep tonight. The 120 should be wonderful.

Haha, nah I’ve grown to work with them. For some reason no Televue eyepieces focus with my scopes unless I pull them out further than the undercut, so they no longer bother me. 😁

Did the astronauts on Apollo 11 have undercuts?

Wow wow wow. The seeing is exquisite tonight. For the first time I’ve had the Starwave ED-R take the 4mm TOE on Saturn. The Cassini division is beautifully clear at each ansae. Titan, Dione, Rhea, Iapetus and Tethys all visible along with HD211841. The image is just perfect, the banding and colouration a joy, the darkening polar hood clear and adds real depth. What a fabulous telescope! My wife came out and had a look, she even gave out a little “wow”. She no longer thinks I’m a weird nerd or a peeping Tom. 😅😅 The double double looked incredibly sharp in the 5XW, you could drive a bus through the gaps. Very, very, very impressed.