powerlord

It's all on the website. basically closed from April 1st. Maybe it's an april fool ? 😉 I suppose even most caravan/motorhomers actually expect toilets, etc. It's obviously not been an easy decision of them to make - to miss the whole of the high season. I head over there friday, but weather looks pants so doubt I'll even bother bringing astro gear. walking the dug, and editing pics and videos and book reading I think. I might bring a portable rig - I've had a plan to try mounting it on the roof... I've got scissor jacks to stablise the motorhome... and thought it'd be good if I'm wild camping somewhere as gear would be safe plus you'd get better visibility. I reckon for wide/medium view stuff it'd probably be steady enough with the scissor jacks... (I can get on roof through bedroom ceiling window) stu p.s. if anyone has a surefire sedative for a mental jackrussell so I can have some relaxing time in the van - please share. 😛

£25 a night. 😱

And here's the last from the night - The fireworks galaxy. So overall, I think I can say it was a very successful first light for the monster !

And the Pinwheel Galaxy. Didn't come out as well this one - only 54 mins of integration which probably didn't help. 3 minute subs.

Here's M82. Since seeing has a bit suspect I tried something I've not done before - I ramped the gain up to max (300) on the asi533, and I shot 10 second subs! 300 of them to be precise. I then stacked only the 150 best ones. I figured I might get a bit of sort of lucky imaging going. So 25 mins of 10 second subs. Here's the result.

So lovely clear night last night. I don't think seeing was the best. meteoblue didn't think so - too much movement in upper atmosphere, and 30mph winds, but mostly sheltered where the monster was. Wow its a big boy on the mount - over 7 feet high. Amazing, just with some rough balancing, my EQ6R-Pro handled it fine - guiding RMS stayed below 1" all night. I shot M51, M82, M101 and NGC6946. This is the first processed - M51. I processed that first as I'd shot it with my ancient Helios 200p with no CC a few days before - albeit with my asi1600 and LRGB. So I figured it would be a good test. To keep things simple for first light I stuck with my asi533 and UV/IR filter only. So much lower effective resolution, but 1500mm vs 1000mm. FIGHT! (as Harry Hill would say). Here's the result from 162 mins of 180 second subs. Excuse the elongated stars. they were perfectly round all the way to the corners on the best frames, but when I stacked just them, I found I got less detail in M51 - so have stacked them all instead. And under it, my 200p attempt reposted from a few days ago. and the 200p asi1600 version:

1. thats how I started. first az, then setup in eq mode. no guiding, computers, etc. I could get 3-4 mins subs ok with my 200mm. As others have said, key is good PA. The way to get this is to go around the loop several times: 1. setup azgti and align. then pa align. 2. now turn it off/on, and clear calibaration, and do it all again (be quicker this time, and you'll get closer to PA alighment) 3. do it about 3 times should get you really close, and then start your imaging. balance is the main thing for heavy loads, if it's all balanced, and you have a bit of weight on the screw, 6+kg is possible.

very nice detail there. I'm hoping to get a few hours on that tonight with the new 300PDS beast.

very nice detail in the foxy fur - really brings out the furriness. 🤩

if it's the green, a quick green removal in Siril will bring that blue out, and 'burnier' reds and oranges. But looks good to me.

I was wrong then. I thought the answer was Covid. 🤧

Budget? I mean imho u can't beat a 6d, especially if u can get a solid battered oldy. But your budget should cover modification or buying modified unless you are sure the rabbit hole stops at planets.. Because for nebula you really need it. But if just planets. Definitely. Look for 550/1100 up. I will say though for planets, u really want lucky imaging, so ideally want one that can do 1080p video. And.. To confuse things further IF you wants planets, you'd be best with an asi120mc or up. 100 quid should get u a second hand one, and since it shoots uncompressed raw video you will get far better results than u will with a dslr. And it sounds like you're using a pc already too.

So, I bought a zwo from @AstroNebulee as I'd been using an svbony one. I have to say, so far I'd say I don't see a difference in the subs. I think maybe it comes down to consistency? Maybe you can get luck with an svbony, but more consistency with a zwo or better? But tbh uvir blockers are so common tech I wonder if it is more of a commodity? Unlike nb where its a different kettle of fish. So Yeh yer 224 (I have one) needs one. But I've taken nice shots of jupiter and saturn through my svbony with it and they've been great. So imho id get the svbony.

just moved weights to bar end, and managed to take off 10kg and balance, so only 20kg on bar now. I can still use the other mount for wide stuff (135mm), but nowt more than that I reckon - getting a bit tight in there 🙂 gonna give myself a bit of an easy night for first light - OSC with uv/ir only, and just point see if we can get it balanced enough to guide ok, and maybe get a galaxy or 2. Just need to bolt on EAF now. I've collimated it with my Ocal Collimator and now seems good. might actually be able to have a go tonight, if not tomorrow: https://www.meteoblue.com/en/weather/outdoorsports/seeing/ipswich_united-kingdom_2646057 I imagine guiding is going to be the trickiest thing - getting the balance just right, and a wee bit west heavy so the EQ6 can handle it.. fingers crossed. 🤞

Yeh. 🤔

Fits in the Observatory! That was fun mounting myself...

Now.. just checking - my new 300 PDS is ok for fitting on one of those Slywatcher EQ3 things right ?

I usually set it all up just as getting dark, then control it all from living room and later, bed. None of this freezing outside malarkey!! I aim for 4 targets a night due to which bits of the sky I can see. But Yeh, been really lucky first 2 months with weather - main thing is don't miss a single opportunity. Stu

100mp - so feel free to zoom in

I'd get rid of the hub. eqdir is a terrible protocol from the 90s. why it's still being used is a mystery to me - but my bet would be the hub isn't handing it well anymore for reasons unknown. I've got 2 EQ6s - fine mounts.. with a serial port on them (well one maskerading as a usb) using technology from last century. does my head in that astro stuff is so backwards. hope u fix it.

I prefer the announcer that sounds like the commander in 'Pigs in Space'.

mine wise - i used my own 48 to 42 as suggested and made sure backfocus was correct. and it's still collimated fine. And I took CC off, and it's also fine. All I can assume is that I screwed up doing it the first time without the CC. I've now done 4 telescopes! 2 to go!! stu

Sorry - few questions - i might be getting wrong end of stick here so bear with the stupid questions: - why would m42 vs m48 be any different ? the baader is 50 on OTA side. so that just slides in to focuser. on the camera side the camera is m42 thread, so surely no point in goinf m48 to m42 as the adapter on the mk3 does that anyway ? undercut - you mean the slight increase in diameter half way down focus side of mk3 from 49.8 or so to 50.7 or so ? the 49.8 bit is wider than the brass ring on the 150 so not followin that bit ? Seemed a good idea to me, as when brass ring tightening it stops the thing slipping out whatever load is on it ? the focuser on the tsp 150 is just bolted directly onto the side if the tube as far as I can tell. distance to CC wise didn't see how it mattered that much as all Im doing is centring things, but i will set it right (to 55 as above - not following why id want to use a different m48-m42 adapter. I started with a cheshire. I didn't like it, hence the ocal the loosen/tighten rings on CC is an interesting tip - will try that. stu

Hi Michael, I'm sure I'm telling you to suck eggs here, but for the hubble palette, you might want to SCNR it ? or remove green if Siril ? Doing a quick process on that jpg gets me something a lot more hubble-like? apologies if it IS egg sucking and you wanted the green. stu