M40

Hello lawsio and welcome back. First off, you have the required posts so keep your eye on the for sale section, fingers crossed something will pop up. The skywatcher skymax is great for solar system stuff and if the budget allows, the skymax127 seems to be a very well regarded starting point and will provide slightly better views that the 200. There is a field of view calculator in the astronomy tools at the top of the page, pop in your current telescope and using the same eyepiece pop in a couple of other telescopes to give you a bit of a comparison, treat it as a guide only though. I note you say time is important, so maybe a goto is also the way to go. Initially I would look at the eq3 and 127 combo as I believe the mount can be upgraded to a goto at a later date as budget allows but please do confirm with flo. All the best.

The skymax is superb on planets but not the best on deep sky as you say. Couple of thoughts for you. I stuck an eaf on the focuser and it works great, gone is the shakey hand syndrome. I use the hand controller for focus. You have an excellent mount so weight is not a concern, I have recently installed a guide scope and camera to the skymax with the plan to use the guide camera as the main camera for plate solving and goto on an asiair. This will leave you free to use the skymax for visual or a second camera. Weather being what the weather is, it's setup and good to go but not tried it yet, but asking the question others use this method with no worries. All the best.

The heart and horses head are very much targets that astrophotographers love, as to tease out the definition and colours is a skill that's beyond me. The horsehead nebula however, is within the orion constellation and is one of the easier targets so well worth a go. Life, particularly in the astronomers world is all about managing expectations, your galaxsee 114 x 500 telescope is very much a starter telescope which will be limited by your mount, stick that on a good mount and it might make all the difference. Below is a screen shot using your galaxsee with a 10mm eyepiece and the supplied barlow just give you an idea...... I would also point you to a very good post thats a few years old now but still very relevant ... All the best

Hello squipper and welcome to the site. First off, management must be kept happy so make sure you know what you want to see, the telescope thats good for eea or dso astrophotography will not be so good on solar system stuff and vice versa. As someone that tries on eea, I use an heq5, 85mm refractor, zwo asi290 and an asiair and I know I will not run out of targets with that setup. I use a few other bits and bobs like a fixed power supply, flip mirror and red dot finder but thats more or less it. I started with a 200P on a dob mount, realised I wanted a tracking mount, then moved on the 200P for the refractor, as I knew sooner or later I would drop the 200P. Not a massive difference in the weight but the refractor is far easier to manhandle. Have a look through the eeva discussion and reports sections on the site to see what people are achieving and what they use. All the best.

Hello Astro_buddy and welcome to the site. Just to make sure it's working ok, have you ever had any form of image from the 533? Oh and 900SL, I understand your thoughts but a bit harsh.

In case you missed it, FLO have put a delivery update post in the sponsors section..... https://stargazerslounge.com/topic/412294-zwo-seestar-s50-eta/#comment-4399560

Hello Rileybowler and welcome to the site. Based on previous zwo devices and as Elp said, there will be minimal paper info with the majority of info found online. This in the short term is also likely to be limited as this is a new product with confirmed shipping to first light optics in August so hopefully grubby paws will get hold of it in September sometime, until then we are all just guessing a bit. From what I have gleaned, the device comes with a table top tripod with a traditional camera fixing to the tripod so the tripod can be upgraded. The seestars needs levelling and the app has a routine for levelling, after that off you go. The zwo software, like all software has a learning curve and I would suggest that the best source of info is going to be sites like this and YouTube as once they land we are going to be all over it. Please note that this is not a telescope that you can look through, any images it gets will be displayed on your phone or tablet. As Giles_B pointed out, this is not going to be the best for planets other than showing bright dots but the moon will be good. Where the device will shine is going to be galaxies using eea. I use zwo devices and software for DSO so I know it works, it's just how it works with the Seestars. As you may have noted from earlier comments you have found a device that has mixed views, I for one am very much looking forward to it.

How about this as a thought provoker. Have you considered a permanent pier? I leave my mount outside 24/7 with a tg cover and its made life so much quicker and lighter. Touch of metal paint later and the pier blends right in. I've enhanced it with a very small footprint enclosure with perspex panels that I simply pick up and move out of the way. From looking out of the window to looking through the eyepiece about 15 minutes. Ive also added an asiair which in my opinion is excellent and certainly adds to the hobby. Could be a nice project. All the best.

Biggest frustration I have is how do I convince management that I NEED that new toy when I can’t use what I already have 🤦‍♂️😉

Hello Darth and welcome to the site. My thoughts are that the word allowed does not even enter the discussion. If you enjoy how you achieve the image then go for it and I look forward to seeing your results. Is it strictly eeva? Well I suppose if any post processing is carried out you would have to say probably not but does post processing include stacking and sharpening? I wouldn't have thought so but as someone who just does stacking and playing with the histogram and not even sure how to do sharpening maybe I'm not the best person to answer that, hopefully others will have some thoughts. Thanks for the video link, I will have a look at that soon, can't believe the thread is over two years old and I still haven't taken a single video of any solar system stuff 🤦‍♂️ All the best.

You may be to blame for the current spell of bad weather, but just wait until all the seestars land that will take us through to the new year 😉

Hello Trevor, it's not a camera I use but I know others have. I did a search on the site for lodestar x2c and it popped quite a few links out, some quite aged but well worth a look. It might also be worth asking the question on the eeva discussion section to see if anyone can help. All the best.

So....the second controller you bought works well with your heq5 plus it has the newer internals; why not just recycle the old one giving you more time to wait for the clouds to go? If it were me, I would by now have fried both of them and be looking for a third 🤦‍♂️

What a great image 👌

Spot on, I have the asiair plus. I don't process any image's other than stacking within the asiair, so I have no need to transfer files so you are no doubt 100% correct with the data transfer speed. What I can say though is that during live stacking using the asiair internal memory, there is always a rotating green circle as it writes to memory, using the card, it's just done.

Just thought I would put it on here, fathers day presented me with a Sandisc extreme pro 128gb micro sdxc card. Plugged it into the asiair, set the memory to use it and the result is well pleased. Wishful thinking or not, it seemed faster than the internal memory. Only downside I have found is that if you have master darks or others saved on the internal memory, you will either need to transfer them over somehow or take some more as memory source seems to me to be all one or the other. All the best.

A few more of the brighter targets, all using stellamira 85mm, zwo asi290mm, heq5, asiair. M63, The Sunflower galaxy, 10x30 seconds, gain=110 M64, The Black Eye galaxy, 10x30 seconds, gain=110

I think both these comments are exactly right, this is a base introduction model to keep costs down and test the market. If it sells well, and I see no reason why it won't, expect new upgraded releases with extra gadgets and extra costs. Received an update from flo today, confirmed shipping to flo sometime in August 👌

Just to offer an alternative, I would choose the eq3 with synscan. You need a tripod, it has one in the package, you can polar align the mount plus at a later date should you want to upgrade the mount can take upto 5Kg for a telescope plus bits and if your camera is compatible, you can add the asiair plus. Food for thought. All the best.

I think all devices in this hobby of ours fulfill a niche; as this hobby is so varied, that niche may not be something on everyone's radar. I can’t see me requiring an electronic filter wheel anytime soon but as a device I appreciate the role it plays for different people. Likewise the seestar will hopefully fill a hole for me in being a great little grab and go for eea. It will also have a wider fov than my current setup so enabling pictures of widefield I've not even bothered going for yet. I do appreciate this iteration is never going to be an all singing all dancing AP rig but that's not currently what I want. We are all in the hobby because we enjoy it, I'm looking forward to playing when it lands 👌

Not sure which one's are the poor one's, they all look good to me 👌 great pictures, more so given it's not getting dark till midnight

Hello Kenneth and welcome to the site, hopefully between us we can help. I have the big brother of your telescope and yes you will have to refocus each time you change eyepieces. As for focus adjustment, on mine I have about 30 turns end to end but I wouldn't expect to use even half of that when switching eyepieces. One of the things I did to help speed up refocusing was to get a zoom eyepiece which is now my goto eyepiece but it's not to everyones taste. With regard to dust/swarf on the secondary, mine is quite clean so I would like to think that your supplier will help in some way with that. Any chance of a picture as we will soon say if it's at an acceptable level or not. All the best.

I have an enclosure that is 150 x 600 x 800mm, this winter the Nevada was left on continuously to supply the dew heaters for getting on for three months with no challenges 🤞 I have installed it in such a way though, that there is clear space all around. During the summer months it is left off unless I am using it so if you plan on using it for hours during the summer nights, you may want to think on ventilation for the enclosure or you could just leave the enclosure door open; just ensure that the door opens away from your telescope as the Nevada kicks out quite a bright light.

Not sure if it would work for you but this is what I did. I got a large ip66 enclosure with rain shield ( this stops rain sitting in the gutter at the top of the enclosure door). The enclosure was then mounted about 3-4M from the pier. In the enclosure I mounted the permanently wired socket. I then installed a multiway extension lead, this just plugged into the socket, Nevada power supply and an anti condensation heater with integral thermostat. I then took an swa cable for the 12vdc from the main enclosure to a second small ip66 enclosure mounted on the pier, within this enclosure are a set of quick release connectors for the 12vdc from the Nevada. Job done. 18 months later and all good. Install all wiring to the bottom of both enclosures only. Just pop into any good electrical wholesaler and ask about the enclosures, they will be able to find one for you. Depending on distances, I see no reason why you can't install your nuc within the main or second enclosure. All the best and food for thought.

This is turning into a nice thought provoking challenge. Taking pictures of M13, I thought a single 10 second shot was the best I had taken, this as longer or more exposures just turned it into a blob, but I am now wondering if more and longer exposures with a lower gain will make the difference. Thanks very much for your thoughts people, it is appreciated.