M40

Excellent, 7 years later and still very pertinent. To put it in perspective, the grin on my face after getting a picture of a lentil called Mars is priceless. Many thanks.

Oh if only I knew how to stack them :D, nope I quite simply bolted the DSLR camera body to the hyperion zoom and took individual pictures. I have a lot to learn about the telescope and even more to learn about the camera🤣. My son told me I need to change the shutter speed........ Apparently he is going to teach me some camera basics, lets hope some of it sticks 😎 The camera settings were 1/100 F00 iso6400. That should give you a clue as to how much I know about camera settings

Excellent alex_stars 👍 I have the same telescope and I used the Hyperion zoom set to 8mm and a DSLR camera and got this as a first time picture , makes for an interesting comparison. I used a yellow filter on the first and a blue filter on the second.

I have the HEQ5 pro mount and just added up the telescope, eyepiece and DSLR camera weights to be about 8.5Kgs and it can handle that fine. How any vibration during tracking would affect stacking images etc, no idea I am afraid

I think Franklin is pointing you in the right direction here. Some of the new stuff I got, I had to be a bit of a man to move it as brand new the varnish/paint/manufacturing process made things very tight. The knurled knob on the end focuses the reticule, this must turn separately from the body to focus. Hope you don't break it 🤞

Have you thought about shining a torch down it? You should be able to see any markings clearly then. Enjoy

Hello Scorchia, I had a similar challenge moving and carrying my Dobsonian around so I upgraded to an HEQ5pro with a skymax180. This is a goto and tracking type mount. My new kit breaks down into smaller pieces than the DOB and individually each item is lighter and easier to carry, but its probably heavier if you add the lot together. One thing I have noticed is that the skymax180 appears to be an odd size in that there does not appear to be any carrying cases for the tube, so if you intend moving your scope around, budget is one thing but also look to see if there are any cases to keep your stuff safe during transport. Enjoy. Les

Indeed. What I can't understand is why I can't get it to do the same thing twice 🤔 To be honest, this site actually saved my phone from a severe reprimand 🤣 ..... when I know Venus is up and the app sends the scope down, the phone got a right severe looking at, then after, looking at this site for a solution and realising others have the same struggle, the phone lived to annoy me another day 🤣

I have a similar challenge, one of the penalties of an established garden I suppose. I have the added challenge of a garden that slopes dramatically, not a problem for the Dob but now I have to think about it. I have built a platform with adjustable legs so that I can make the platform level at any place and time, so I pick a target for the night, point is roughly North, level the platform and when the time is good, plonk the mount on the platform and its good to go 🤞

Just to add to the previous comments, I have the hyperion zoom and think its excellent. You can add filters and a camera adapter. I don't have the Barlow yet but I have ordered one. The ease at which you can switch magnification is a real winner and when you get to the one you like you can always switch to a fixed lens and focus closer using that. I tend to start with the lowest magnification, focus then zoom in a bit etc. I cannot compare it with other zooms or eyepieces as its the most expensive eyepiece in my toybox 👍

Many thanks for the welcome all😎 Normally when I lurk, I look for a specific thing, I cant believe how big this site is, going to take a while to learn this site let alone the telescope. no no no no no, you can't say its that easy..... I bought a synscan wifi dongle and for the first time I managed to polar align the thing 😉😁. Cant get it to go to the correct place but thats for a different post when I can find where to post it 🤣

Hello Gents, bit of a common theme - Essex and Dobs 😁 I would still have mine if I could carry it, but I could see me dropping it at some point, then there would be tears, so before that happened, got the high tech lighter (albeit not that much lighter) version. Hopefully when this thing is out of the way, I will get a chance to meet up. CPAC, Castle Point?

Hello all, I am the usual long term lurker, but recently I have visited many times for information so thought it time I signed up and said thanks for all the help. For my birthday, my wife bought me a really nice telescope, my first goto telescope. A skymax 180 on an HEQ5 pro mount. I have had a Dob for some while but it was getting a little heavy to move around, it's now the Grandson's pride and joy. Oh how I thought a goto mount would be easy, how wrong could you be........ i.e. what's polar alignment? Just where is home position? you can all see where this is going.... Talk about learning all the time. Looking forward to talking to you all in the future Les