Tiny Clanger

I doubt many astronomy societies would accept any under 16's attendance without an accompanying parent, the safeguarding regulations, and requirement for DBS checks of volunteers working with children, or vulnerable adults, are rightly quite tough.

It's not just me then ! I'd read nothing but very happy reports of the things until now. I really wanted to like it, but it just didn't fulfil its promise.

Exact same tripod - took the Castor off, swapped in the Sightron under the 102mm, tested it, didn't quite believe what I saw, restored the Castor to the tripod, checked it, swapped to the Sightron again, faffed with the arm's angle, tried the az slo mo on the far side, tried every variation I could think of, was unable to find one where the vibrations using the Sightron were not far longer lived than with the Castor, gave up. On a different tripod took the AZ5 off, swapped in the Sightron under the 127 mak. , again the vibrations took longer to settle with the Sightron than with the AZ5, and the az control was again in the way and could not be used with a cable. Not what I expected from such an expensive mount . The actual slo mo knobs are plastic, needlessly thicker than the ones that came with my AZ5, and held on by a single, finger tightened, white plastic topped screw. I tried swapping to the SW ones to see if I could gain a little extra alt clearance and was struck by how secure the SW ones were in comparison, being held on with two grub screws tightened by allen key. It didn't help using the slimmer SW knob, or the SW slo mo cables (no slo mo cables are included with the Sightron) . The mount itself is really nicely made, it has a quality feel, the slo mo movements are smooth, the movement when you loosen the clutch is lovely, it looks the part. I suspect it would be fine with an 80mm or smaller short 'frac, the smaller diameter tube might not be fouled as much by the location of the az slo mo, but it certainly didn't work for what I wanted it for.

The Sightron mount of a similar design is now available, I suspect that company may have held the patent. I bought a Sightron last month, and was hugely disappointed, too much 'wag' with a 102mm f7 'frac (compared with my Castor or even AZ5 ) and, crucially, where the Scopetech has a bend in the horizontal part so the az slo mo is offset, in the Sightron that bar is straight, so the slo mo is directly below the OTA, and the knob interferes with the tube at high alt. I tried using a cable and it was no improvement, still in the way. The only way to make it work was to use the AZ control knob pointing away from the user, which is awkward and means using a cable to reduce vibrations would be a reach, or having the clamp and OTA on the outside of the vertical arm which did not seem a stable arrangement to me. I tried the sightron in place of my AZ5 for my 127 mak and found the vibrations died down far faster with my AZ5. The Sightron went back 😞

Stu, what does the mak weigh with finder(s) diagonal etc ? It must be a considerable lump of stuff !

Ha, not the only one, there's also this : https://www.ioptron.com/product-p/8032pt.htm Maybe FLO or another retailer might consider importing and selling them (assuming none do at the moment, I've not checked).

https://oberwerk.com/product/oberwerk-ioptron-az-pro-3-8-tripod-adapter/ seems to be the only commercially available adaptor 😞

Hello and welcome, yes, you are in the right place, but I'd suggest starting your own thread (just click on 'start new topic' at the top ) so people will see you are here once this message scrolls away 🙂

https://www.amazon.co.uk/SMALLRIG-Storage-Protective-Carrying-Breathable/dp/B09Q5R1LJ6 Takes 3 BSTs, or nirvanas , or the slimmer high mag 82 degree ES eyepieces (8.7mm 11mm etc) or two fatter EPs . deep enough for a televue 2x barlow .

Hi I'm not sure which of the Celestron 'scopes this is, I think it could be either the 70mm or the 80mm ? It makes a difference According to RVO the two models are Aperture: 80mm Focal Length: 900mm Focal Ratio: f/11, and aperture 70mm Focal Length 700mm Focal Ratio f/10 With either of those focal lengths, and a simple alt az mount , you are going to find the practical limit to the highest magnification means you will not need to use a barlow to reach high powers (worth keeping the Celestron though, it's nice and can be useful as I'll explain later ) the 4mm eyepieces similarly will be too much for this 'scope( but hang on the the TMB, it has a 58 degree FOV, if it's as sharp as the 6mm one I have it's well worth keeping for if you get a different 'scope in the future) . The 6mm LER eyepiece might be useful , it's pretty high magnification for a 700mm (or 900mm) 'scope , (116x or 150x respectively) and the view may appear rather dim, and show up any eye floaters you may have, worth trying it on a bright target like the Moon. Expect the view to be rather jittery though, the high power will magnify the wobbles as well as the view. The SVbony diagonal will be far better for astro use than the stock one that's in the 'scope in your photo, take that stock one out and leave it in a drawer with the 5x barlow and the 4mm plossl I guess the stock diagonal is a corrected view prism one, OK for daytime use birdwatching (but beware of accidentally pointing at the Sun, which will damage your eyesight without the proper full aperture filter) the SVBONY will be better made, metal not plastic, hold the eyepieces more securely and probably be sharper and brighter, but give you a reversed left/right view, which can be disconcerting to start with, but you soon get used to it. I'd follow the Grumpy one's advice, start with the 25mm eyepiece, but then once I'd found a target I'd be taking the 25mm eyepiece out , unscrewing the lens cell of the Celestron Barlow, and putting just the lens cell on the threads there should be (I hope) on the underside of the 25mm, which will give you around 1.5x what the eyepiece alone does, so a nice 17mm ish eyepiece at 50x or 40x. If the sky conditions, the mount and your eyes are fine with that, take the 25mm back out, unscrew the barlow cell, put it back on the barlow tube, pop the whole barlow in the diagonal, and the 25mm in the barlow. That makes the 25mm effectively a 12.5mm , and gives you 72x or 56x magnification, and should give reasonable views of targets without too much wobble. Only then go for the 10mm, if the wobbles from the mount allow. Heather

http://sainthelenaisland.info/astronomy.htm has a link to an astro soc. but it's facebook so no idea if it is active . Borrow a 'scope from someone there if possible, if not take a small achro refractor on a photo tripod (or some binos) and leave it there as a gift to the relatives, which will make space for the inevitable gifts you will bring back.

And it is being held at Stoneleigh, Warwick.s not Kettering Northants .

This week 🙂 ? Excluding anything very high in the sky, which may be awkward in a 'scope with a 45 deg. diagonal ... Prioritise catching at least a brief sight (before it is lost to us for a while ) of Saturn as soon as you can find it as the Sun sets. Then Jupiter is easy to find , highest in the south around 7pm Then the Pleiades. By now Orion will be getting to a decent altitude, so M42 is a must. Ditto half an hour or so later, M44, the Beehive cluster . 5 down, go indoors and defrost for a bit . Back outside around midnight to 1 am, Orion is sinking in the SW, M44 is now high in the S and may be a more rewarding view, and the constellation Leo is rising in the east, have a try for the Leo triplet of galaxies M65, M66, and the one I can't see from my garden 😞 Then in the east there's M3, a globular cluster. Turn around to the NW, and find Cassiopeia which easily leads you to C13 the Dragonfly/Owl/ET cluster and finish on the nearby double cluster, C14.

You might want to check your email system, moments ago I got this auto reply from it : "Thank you for contacting First Light Optics 🙂 Our office is closed from Fri 29th (midday) until Tue 2nd for New Year. Thank you for your support and custom throughout 2023. Best wishes, The FLO team Alex, Annette, Ann, Chris, Cody, Dave, Grant, Ian, James, Kai, Katie, Lee, Matt, Max, Michael, Rob & Steve 🤗 "

Okay ! Mars is so far away right now it would look tiny even in a big expensive telescope. The next time it will be relatively close to us is the winter of 2024/5. At that time, expect it to appear this sort of size compared with other things in the sky : That's from https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Angular_diameter the caption says "Comparison of angular diameter of the Sun, Moon and planets. To get a true representation of the sizes, view the image at a distance of 103 times the width of the "Moon: max." circle. For example, if this circle is 5 cm wide on your monitor, view it from 5.15 m away." The largest circle is the angular size of the Moon Is this your 'scope ? https://www.amazon.com/Telescopes-Astronomy-Refractor-Telescope-Telescopio/dp/B094CDL8H5 If so it is probably not going to give you want with Mars, even when the planet is closest to us. Don't give up though, try looking at some easier targets, the Moon would likely be best.

They can't see the sell/swap area until they have been a member for a month and made 25 posts.

One of these https://www.firstlightoptics.com/first-light-optics-gift-vouchers/first-light-optics-gift-voucher.html click the box, you get a drop down of higher values to choose from. Buying specialised equipment like this for yourself is enough of a minefield, doing it for someone else is a potential disaster. If you want to buy him something physical with part of the money, 10x50 binoculars like these would be worth thinking about https://www.firstlightoptics.com/opticron-binoculars/opticron-adventurer-10x50-t-wp-binocular.html

The Moon is waning now, and is not a planet.

Nope, you are in luck ! Those are the original requirements posted years ago and not updated, the current situation is this :

The finder on my heritage 150 'scope is actually a 9x50 RACI. RACI is short for right angled correct image finder, it shows the sky right way round (some similar looking right angle finders give you a left/right reversed view.) One of these https://www.firstlightoptics.com/finders/astro-essentials-9x50-right-angled-erecting-finderscope.html It does require drilling holes to bolt a finder shoe onto the 'scope tube to hold the finder though.

A bit busy to reply at the moment- it's lunchtime on Xmas day here in the UK !

My heritage 150 (with a home made cover for the open section and extra finder) pointed as if in night time use.

Laudrop is right, you have the mirror end of the telescope pointing upward in your photo. Look at the illustration on the front of the instruction leaflet, you will see that the extended front section with the cross shaped supports are the actual front end of the 'scope, the end with the removable big dust cap. Yes, you look in the side, but need to point the telescope tube upward so it sees more than its own base.

Nice. I'm amazed so few people seem to have a go at making one of these, they are easy to make, even for an inept carpenter like me. Anyone interested can find a link to Jerry Oltion's page here

Looks like the wooden tripod has an m10 screw (not the usual photo tripod 3/8" screw all the others have) Will your mount fit that ?