Stu

Awesome Gavin! Wonder how good that will be with the 160? I can't quite believe you got the Horsey in the Tak! Could you see it visually? So, apologies Helen, but I think today's StuPOD has to go to Gavin! Nice one.

That's nice Helen, nice and sharp, nothing wrong with your focus! Have you tried holding the phone a little bit away from the eyepiece? You need to be in the same position as you would put your eye i.e. at the eye relief difference. Closer to the eyepiece and you get blackouts all the time, or just nothing at all!

By popular demand, I've decided to enter my moon image from yesterday evening for the judge's consideration. Let's see whether there are any other entrants by this evening before final voting takes place

I do apologise @furrysocks2 (are you related to furry socks??), the judge was obviously too busy preparing for the festive season and missed your entry. For the fine split of the Trapezium and faint whiff of nebulosity, I'm pleased to announce you as the winner for 16th December

Given our climate, it is often the case that aperture is not everything, but convenience and speed of setup/breakdown are. The 150 needs a heavier mount and longer cool down than the 127 so I'm sure these are all factors that are important. I 'only' have a 4" scope currently. That's not to say I would not have larger again in future but I'm quite happy observing with it, the views are lovely, far from disappointing and it is very quick to setup and pack away to make use of quick gaps in the cloud or short opportunities.

Cracking job! Very skillful

Charic, this may help. The image size on the sensor through your scope using a Nikon D5000 and then the view through a 15mm BST, 60 degree afov giving x80.

Insurance?

How bizarre, no idea how that happened. Will try to sort. Thanks for pointing it out.

M57....

Moved to the 'Postman' thread. Nice books, have had the first two for a long time, not the third. Great to read and reference.

Good and comprehensive review, thanks for the link.

That's possibly not the best response to get continued answered from people.They are giving you the answers and information you need to learn in order to understand. My answer gave exactly the info requested, the size of the moon on camera sensor with your scope, and the link to the tool required to calculate it for yourself for your exact camera.

If you put your equipment details into this calculator it will show you the actual area of sky covered by the sensor using your scope. Magnification is largely meaningless when talking of imaging. http://astronomy.tools/calculators/field_of_view/ For instance, this is the moon using your scope and a Canon 1000D

Well the judge has had extensive conversations with himself about today's entries, and against all better judgement (to award it to myself ) I have decided that Niall is the obvious winner. Great shot Niall!!

Great image Niall, not easy. Have you tried any of the apps that give better control of exposure? I use ProCam 4 and it works very well. I'll add my lunar image from this morning in just so the judges have a little more work to do

Paz, that is quite an achievement! Certainly our most colourful entry to date I think

Haydn, hope all is well with you? You don't actually need those functions to be able to use it to control the mount. I never use mine in that mode i.e. Pointing at the sky to see what is there. I only ever use it as, effectively, a star atlas to find targets to look at. The device, and SkySafari will, as far as I'm aware, get its position data from the Synscan app or handset so it does not need the sensors to do this. When you connect to a scope within the SkySafari app the star map will slew round to the correct position as soon as it syncs with SynScan. It is certainly worth trying before buying another device?

Ain't that the truth!

I agree with Dave here, I think Android is the better/safer bet. If you did try then I don't think two adaptors are needed, you would just need to connect the device running Synscan to the Wifi adaptor and then the SkySafari device to the same network. It may work, but don't hold your breath!

Makes sense Dave, if youve got something that works then no need to mess around any more

That really is a dream setup Matt! Amazing.

Dave, the multi purpose port is on the handset, can it not plug in there? Agreed though, Android works in a different way and can have two apps running at the same time so works fine, iOS does not.

Yes, I believe that's correct

I hope I am understanding the question. I think the AZGTi behaves the same way as other Synscan mounts. The handset connects to the mount as normal, then you plug the Skywire cable into the multi-purpose port and connect it to the iPhone. This gives serial connection and enables the phone to communicate. The key thing is that with iOS devices they cannot run two apps at once so you need the Synscan controller to control the mount as you cannot run the app alongside SkySafari. SkyFi will (I believe) also act as the connection between handset and phone if you want to avoid cables. I'm not sure if the Skywatcher Wifi adapter will work in the same way but hopefully someone will check it out at some point. Summary is that for iOS you need a handset to run SkySafari, you can't just use the Synscan app.