Starwatcher2001

... and that's how Alex became known as "The Dancing Astronomer"... 🤣 Glad you're up and running and hope that you have many more such moments as you explorer the universe. This can sometimes be a frustrating hobby, especially with the weather and getting kit sorted, but now and again there's a moment like this that blows your socks off.

I put a set of "Bob's Knobs" from FLO on my C9.25 yesterday and they make a big difference to the ease of collimating - not that you need to do it very often on an SCT. If the heads on the fitted bolts are starting to go, I wouldn't hesitate to change them. The instructions that come with them are comprehensive and easy to understand. Once they are all replaced (one bolt at a time), you'll need to recollimate. It took me around 45mins last night, but most of that was scooting around looking for a star that suddenly wasn't obscured by clouds.

Point the tube at a building or some such 1/2 mile away if you can, put an eyepiece in and see if you can get focus.

Welcome aboard SGL. Good to have you with us.

Welcome to SGL. Nice set of equipment you've got there. Hope you and your grandson get some splendid views of the heavens. Who knows, it might get the little fella hooked into a wonderful hobby.

Welcome board SGL and welcome back to astronomy. I've recently returned back to astronomy after a long break too. All your old favourites are still there :-)

That's a good tip Vlaiv, I've never come across that before. Thanks.

Currently Jupiter and Saturn are not very well placed in the sky for good viewing. The inclination of their orbit places them quite low in the sky for those in the Northern hemisphere. Therefore you're looking at them through a lot of atmosphere which spoils the view somewhat. As you might gather, the general state of the atmosphere can affect the view as well - often termed "seeing". If you observe the same object for a while, there may be periods when the atmosphere settles down for a short while and the image will suddenly improve. One night can be glorious and the next poor. On nights that seem poor it's worth looking for different targets like double stars, especially towards the zenith where the atmosphere is thinner. What you'll also find is that the more experienced you become with observing objects, the more you'll see - "getting your eye in", if you will. Some people find sketching what they see sharpens their observing skills and helps them see more. I find that describing the detail into a voice recorder helps me. Something else that will help is sitting down to observe. It's a lot more comfortable, helps you keep your head in just the right spot, and encourages you to linger longer on each object. I also understand it helps put less strain on the visual system. Finally, if you can avoid observing objects directly over houses or other concrete buildings, it helps. Buildings are prone to obsorbing heat during the day, which they radiate out at night disturbing the air - kinda like looking over a camp fire.

Welcome aboard SGL and astronomy. Good to have you with us. That's a nice sized Dob and with some practice and patience you'll be able to see a lot of the fine jewels that the universe has on offer. Being undriven, you'll need to learn the art of star-hopping from one object to another, which is a fun skill on its own. That starts with getting a good book (or maybe an app) with the constellations on it and getting a feel for where the constellations are, how they move night to night, and where the bright starts are. That gives you a backdrop to to pin the locations of all the cool objects on. Pryce has already given you a good one to go for, may I suggest M13 in Hercules is a good second one? That's a globular cluster (a ball of thousands of stars on the edge of our own galaxy) that looks like a snowball in smaller scopes, but will start to resolve into a beautiful collection of stars in your scope. If you haven't already, make sure your finder scope is aligned with your main tube. You can do this during the day by finding a distant object (chimney pot or some such) in the main eyepiece, and adjusting the finder until it shows the exact same object. There's three screws on the finder for that purpose. The Dob will show the object upside down, which feels a bit weird at the start, but as long as the same part of the object is in the centre of both the tube and the finder, you're good to go. It's always worth having a slew around during the day to get a feel for how it moves, but I guess you've already done some of that. Start with your lowest power eyepiece (biggest focal length number), when hunting objects, then when you've pinned them down you can move up the powers if you wish. At higher power the objects will drift across the eyepiece due to the Earths rotation pretty quickly, which means you'll follow them by nudging the scope. Again, a skill that becomes second nature. Looking forward to hearing about how you get on. All the best, Mark

I'm sure someone will probably explain it better, but the Skyliner 250PX has a short focal length of f/4.7. This isn't a fault or a bad thing, it's just part of the design. But it does mean that the light cone hits the eyepiece at steeper angle than longer focal length telescopes, and it's demanding on the eyepiece to get a good image. Good quality eyepieces might be needed to get the best from the scope, whereas longer focal length telescopes can often get away with eyepieces of lower quality. The upside is that you get a nice big mirror and plenty of light coming in, with a relatively short tube. This makes the scope lighter and easier to handle.

That sounds like a brilliant result all round. Well played. I think it's always nice when someone comes to the hobby via personal contact and help, and that they are more likely to stay with it. Thanks for the update, I've been following this thread with interest.

Hi Glyn. Welcome aboard SGL, and welcome to the wonderful world of Astronomy.

Hi. Good to have you aboard SGL.

Hi there and welcome aboard. Wow, I wish I'd bought something as good as that after a bottle of red. Good choice. As Vlaiv said, it's pretty damn amazing to be able to see this stuff with your own eyes rather than books or television etc. Welcome to being one of the few percent of people who do this. Some of the stuff that's blown me away: Craters and other features on the moon, Saturn's rings, cloud bands and red spot on Jupiter, watching Jupiter's moons change position during the night or from day to day, knowing that the black dot I'm watching cross the face of Jupiter is actually the shadow of one of its moons (watching an eclipse on another planet!), thousands of stars packed into a "ball" - a globular cluster (like M13), looking at the different colours in the stars and realising they are different types/sizes and at different stages in their lives, seeing the shell of an exploded star from millions of years ago (M57 - planetary nebula), watching a specific star at a precise time and watching it wink out for a few seconds as an asteroid crosses its path, looking at galaxy after galaxy in the Virgo cluster, seeing the magnificence of the milky way from a truly dark site... If you're sufficiently motivated and patient, and maybe with a couple more eyepieces, you'll be able to see all those things and more with the telescope you just bought. Your scope is bigger than anything I've used for the above. Try not to get too bogged down with the technical stuff, go enjoy the skies. Cheers, Mark

Welcome aboard SGL, Anthony.

Welcome aboard Ecki. Nice set of equipment you have. Looking forward to seeing what it will do.

Hi Erik, Don't panic, it's probably something simple. I've no experience with that scope (but I'm sure others have), but I see it comes with 2 eyepieces, a barlow and a diagonal. As SeeLive said, make sure the diagonal is in the tube first, ignore the barlow for now, and put your biggest eyepiece (that's the one with the highest number on it) into the diagonal. Make sure you're aiming at something a fair distance away - maybe just 1/2 a mile, and move the focus knob from all the way in, to all the way out. Anything? Does the big lens at the front of the scope look clear and secure? (Don't put finger marks all over it when you check 🙂) I suppose it's possible it's been damaged or moved in transit. If not, take a piccie or two of how you've set it up and we'll look closer. Oh, welcome aboard.

You might get away with the wifi signal. I've just put my phone in a similar aluminium case (without the foil or insulating you have), and it will still take a call from outside. I know, different frequencies and technology to wifi, but I was a bit surprised it worked. There's plenty of postings about aluminium foil being used to prevent signals from phones.

I can't help on the astrophotography side (visual only), but I can give you a warm welcome to the forum.

Nice hack! Ironically, I wonder with all that insulation and the heat generated from the laptop and drive, if you might have an overheating problem...

Sorry I'm late to the party, but Sunday was the first clear night up here that I wasn't trying to get to grips with my new scope (c9.25). Managed to split them both at 181x, and then 138x. I think I could do better, I'm out of practice. The last time I split these was in September 1999*, through my 8.75" dob, using a borrowed Meade Super Plossl 9.7mm, giving 167x. It's nice to be back observing again, it's been far too long. *To newcomers, it's well worth keeping an observing log of the objects you've viewed, eyepieces used, seeing, comments etc.

+1 for milk bottle tops. Lucosade tops work for smaller eyepieces.

I always used a cheshire to collimate my dob, and when I bought an SCT thought I should be using it on that too. After a lot of messing around on the SCT, I found the cheshire was just confusing things. You don't adjust the primary mirror in an SCT, just the secondary. I also spent a happy few days with a touch, tinfoil and a pin making artifical stars to try collimating during the daytime, but I've found no real substitute for just using real stars. I made some notes for myself, which may be helpful. I'm not putting these up as the only or correct way to do this, it simply works for me and helps me work out where the screws are on my scope, and which one to twiddle! If a screw is too tight to tighten more, then slightly slacken the other two. 1/12 of a turn is enough. If the Fresnel rings are all over the place the atmosphere probably isn't steady enough to collimate, enjoy the scope and tweak another night. If the rings look weird, particularly on one side, it's probably tube currents and needs longer to cool. NOTE: This is using a star diagonal. The directions will be wrong without one.

Hi and Welcome. Looks like it's been stood a while. If you've not cleaned it yet, here's what I'd do. Firstly, leave the end cap on the main tube at the top. Unless you're outside observing, leave that on to protect the mirrors. I'd probably get a vaccum cleaner and a soft brush, and gently remove all the lose dust you can see. Whatever else you do, don't try cleaning anything glass or mirrors just yet. That includes eyepieces and the little finder scope attached to the front. Cleaning optics without having looked up how to do it properly can damage them, which would be a real shame. If you have one of those little blower things for blowing dust of camera lenses, they are okay to use on your eyepieces to get rid of any loose dust. Dusty mirrors are generally not something to worry about and shouldn't affect the performance too much. I'd take it out during daylight and have a play. Put the 50mm eyepiece in (50mm is the focal length), and try to get focus on something a good few hundred yards away. (Obligatory warning about not looking at the sun, which will fry your eyes instantly). I use chimney pots on houses at the end of the street and know the state of their mortar intimately. Notice the image is unside down, that's due to how a Newtonion telescope works and is perfectly normal. Leaving the scope where it is, look through the little "finder" scope and see if it's pointing at the exact same place as the main scope. If not, adjust the three silver screws on the finder until it is. That's how you're going to be finding stuff in the sky, and it's vital that the finder is aligned with the scope. It's easier to get familiar with this stuff in the daylight. Notice how the image moves in the finder scope and the main scope as you move around. You'll soon get used to that. Get used to looking through the finder, moving the scope around, and then looking through the main eyepiece. All that builds "muscle memory" that makes it easier to use in the dark. Try different eyepieces and notice that as you use eyepieces with a smaller focal length, the size of the image gets smaller (field of view), and the magnification goes up. You might also notice that the brightness of the images goes down with higher magnification. That happens in the sky too, so you're better off using lower magnifications when starting off. Trying to use too higher magnification often doesn't give you anything other than a blurry image. The moon makes an excellent first object to look at, and will likely blow your socks off. Looking at the craters where the shadows meet sunlight is amazing. The planets (Jupiter on the right, and Saturn on the left) can be found low down in the south around 10pm at the moment in the UK. Being so low at the moment they are not at their best, but you should be able to see some of their features and moons. If you're not sure what you're looking at in the sky, there's a number of apps that can help (eg: https://stellarium-web.org/) . You'll need something like that, or sky maps to help you learn the night sky and where all the cool stuff is. With that scope you'll be able to see literally thousands of objects: various types and colours of stars, star clusters, globular clusters, planetary nebular, galaxies. None of them will look remotely as grand as they do in the pictures from hubble of course, and you're unlikely to see much colour, but as your skill and patience builds you'll see more and more. Like any hobby, practice is the key. As you look through the scope (especially at higher mag) you may see the image wobbling a bit, like looking over distance on a really hot day. It's the same reason, the atmosphere and something we have to live with. Sometimes the "seeing" is better than other times, even on the same evening. So if you watch an object for a while, now and again you might see it with more clarity - those are the times to live for! When you know youe way around a bit and have some experience under your belt, then you might think about starting with photography - which is a whole dark art that I steer clear of. All the best, Mark

Hi and welcome aboard SGL.