PeterStudz

I always use a red dot finder with both eyes open. For me I’m making things difficult with only one eye. For example. If I’m location M3 from my garden I align the red dot roughly half way between Arcturus and Cor Caroli, slightly off to one side. Apart from these two stars naked eye I can’t see anything else - it’s quite a big distance of sky and I need both eyes well open in order to place the red dot in between the two. In this case the screen of the red dot finders only purpose is to reflect the red dot. Roughly 90% of the time M3 is somewhere in the RACI. For the small number of times it isn’t I’m close enough to star hop with the RACI. But all of this is personal and subjective.

It’s personal. One isn’t better than the other. Eg I do most of my observing from my back garden which suffers from light pollution. A Telrad/Rigel can be used to star hop. But in my location there are so few stars visible with the naked eye I find this pointless and it just becomes a big and clunky RDF. I also don’t find my simple RDF at all “wobbly” but then I have it on a solid DIY mount. What I do is simply use the RDF to get in the right area of sky and then use my RACI finder scope to star hop. Yes, they do have a habit of dewing up, but for me this doesn’t matter as long as the RACI is dew free. Even when the RDF is totally covered in dew I can still see the red dot and use it to get in the right part of the sky. If dew bothers you than a simple dew shield made out of cardboard or better still a thin sheet of craft foam improves matters no end and costs next to nothing. I last aligned my RDF about 9 months ago. It hasn’t needed to be realigned since. I’ve never had an issue of it being knocked off! And personally I don’t like the common way of fixing a Telrad/Rigel which is with double sided sticky tape. In my experience this never lasts as long as bolting the thing down, although there are options of doing this with a Telrad/Rigel.

For me there were some clear spells during some nights this week and I managed to get out twice before, in both cases, fog rolled in and killed off any more observing. Although having to work the next morning resulted in me not getting enough sleep and being far too tired. Worth it though. I suspect that the same will occurs in the near future despite the current unfavourable forecast.

Having been a “total newbie” not long ago plus having a daughter who’s interested in astronomy my advice would be to buy nothing until you have got use to what you have, learnt a little, done some observing and know what you both like looking at. Eg it was only after some considerable time that my daughter decided she preferred the plants and also the sun - solar with a white light filter. This will obviously have an impact on eyepieces and accessories. Having said that most will replace the 10mm eyepiece first. But after using our kit I decided that a 12mm would be better for us. For what we have It gives a little more space around many deep sky objects which we prefer. And this has become our most used eyepiece. Others might prefer an 8mm or 15mm. Maybe even a zoom. There’s no right/best solution.

I did get some Bobs Knobs for my 200p but not initially. I could collimate it perfectly well without but they do make it easier. Then, at the same time, I did the “milk bottle mod”, which made it even easier. Didn’t mention it as it’s a question of where do you stop. Unless it’s recently changed the Skywatcher Skyliner 200p Dob doesn’t have springs for the primary. It has rubber grommets. I known people criticised this but I last adjusted my primary 9 months ago and have used the telescope regularly. Since then collimation hasn’t charged one bit. If it ain’t broke don’t fix it

Looks like an EQ2 variant. There’s a similar one with a slightly larger OTA on Amazon (or it was)… Konus Konusmotor-130 130/1000 Newtonian Telescope https://amzn.eu/d/diLh9Vd The mount looks identical. The little motor drive in the picture is the like the one you can buy for an EQ1/EQ2. And over £500 - That’s a rip-off!

I have a 200p Dob and managed to collimate it as a complete beginner just using the cap. The telescope was second hand and way off when I got it. Mind, it was frustrating at first and took some time. But as someone said me “it’s a bit like learning to ride a bike”. Now it’s second nature, so you’ll be fine! I do now have a Cheshire plus a cap. For me the Cheshire allows a tad more accuracy but you could argue that it makes the process more complicated - there’s more going on when you look through it. And I’m not convinced that the tiny bit of accuracy has actually improved the views in any way that, in practice, I can notice.

Had an interesting session last night/this morning from my garden in Southampton. Only planned to have a look at Mars, especially so that my daughter could see it again before she went to bed. 200p Dob & EQ platform out at about 9:20pm. Dew shields attached as it was definitely damp and dewy. Transparency looked good. Started on Mars around 10pm but the seeing was truly awful. The worse I’ve ever had. Mars just a fuzzy disc with no detail. Checked out Jupiter and that was fuzzy too. Could just make out some banding but it was all extremely washed out. Then went to check out the star clusters around Auriga - M36, M37 & M38 - a favourite of mine. These did look good and I haven’t seen them in ages. A little look at the Orion Nebula. Always great. I could easily make out 4 stars in the Trapezium but they were oscillating/moving - not a good sign. Then back to Mars. Still a fuzzy blob. Then, all of a sudden, within a few minutes, the view dramatically improved. I could make out the North Polar Hood. Some dark features running east to west and also patches of white to the east and west of the South Pole, especially to the east. Maybe clouds? But they were obvious. Another observation - the North Polar Hood appears to be shrinking. On a few occasions I could get the magnification over 300x before things got fuzzy once more. I went back in for a coffee. Unfortunately, bring a school night, my daughter had long since gone to bed. Out again around mid-night. There was a lot of dew with gear soaking wet. Fortunately the dew shields did their job. Another look at Mars. Still quite good but maybe not quite as good. After a short while I could make out Syrtis Major swinging into view from the east. I attempted a sketch. One thing I’ve learnt is that with the likes of Mars you’ve got to look long and hard. Let eyes and brain build up a picture, almost like stacking when imaging. And It was mesmerised watching the planet slowly rotating and Syrtis Major coming more into view. The “clouds” near the South Pole still visible. Mars was getting closer to zenith and my Dob harder to nudge. But once in the centre of the FOV the EQ platform does the work. At about 00:50 I noticed the view in the eyepiece starting to get dark. Looking up fog was rapidly rolling in! And within a few moments had completely covered the sky. Fascinating watching it form but ended the night. Probably just as well as I was thinking about other targets and had work in the morning. All in all not bad and looking at the forecast I’m glad I made the efforts

Don’t look at the BBC weather! The BBC also has it cloudy for me. Met Office and ClearOutside have a lovely clear night for Monday/Tuesday. Well, for Southampton 😀

There is certainly a change coming if you look at the forecasts. On social media many of the weather types, especially the amateur ones, have been getting very excited about the possibility of some very cold weather that we might get from around mid-December on. Although at least initially (first week of December), possibly after that too, the high pressure appears to be of the annoying cloudy type. Of course there could well be breaks and forecasts are often inaccurate or even totally wrong.

At my age 12yrs seems like yesterday 😀

Down south at least there’s a suggestion in the forecast that Monday night & Tuesday morning might actually be clear. I have work on Tuesday but if it does turn out clear I’ll still go for the lack of sleep - with lack of clear sky’s it has to be done!

Personally I prefer a RDF plus RACI over a Telrad/Quikfinder. Some of that might be due to living in a light polluted area. I can’t star hop without magnification. I’m also not keen on mounting things with tape. For my 200p I made a simple bracket out of scraps found down my shed, but it would cost pennies to make. And mounted it with bolts to the side of the RACI pillar so that both finders are as close together as possible, can’t be knocked/moved and I don’t need to move my head very far from one to the other. It’s also very light in weight.

Have been reading this discussion with interest. There’s some interesting and informative posts and just want to say thanks!

Even though my Dob is obviously smaller and lighter than yours I still find it awkward to move the whole thing, base and all. I also have a weak left knee which is still fine when lifting weight but an issue if anything is awkward and bulky. I also find a handle useful when nudging at certain angles, especially near zenith.

The best and most useful mods on my 200p (one of the cheapest too) was sticking a handle on it. Although I haven’t had it long the Lacerta micro-focuser has also been great. And the DIY EQ platform that I made via the instructions on this website has been amazing, especially when observing at high magnification. I now could not do without it. For a few quid installing a smartphone bracket has given accurate PushTo using the PSAlign-Pro app. Other mods include - fully flocking the OTA & focuser - blackening the back & edge of the secondary - bobs knobs & milk bottle mod to the secondary - DIY dew/light shields - DIY white light solar filter. One of the things I like about Dobs (well, telescopes in general) is the amount of mods you can make with a minimum of tools and equipment thereby customising it to what you want. And everything can come apart and go back together with basic tools. Unusual in this day and age when most things are glued and welded together.

Total cloud cover now in Southampton. I expect it’ll stay that way for the night And it’s been sunny all day.

@Mandy D Thanks again! It’s been and still is a lot of fun. I have a red cabinet light in the base. Especially handy when setting up and taking down. The moon also functions as a handle to carry the base around.

What a good idea for a thread! And it’s made me realise that even though I do around 75% of observing with my daughter I haven’t got many pictures of her at/with a telescope. In fact I have more pictures of the telescope(s) on its own Here are a few that I have. It kind of illustrates our journey. First is on Christmas Day 2020 when she was 8 yrs old and about to look at the moon. I’d hurriedly stuck the thing together. Eagle eyed observers might notice that the RDF is the wrong way around! Second is our 200p in April 2021 which was give to us free from a member on here. No base and with a damaged primary. Third & fourth is the 200p (1145p in the background) with part finished base. Pictures taken at 4am in the morning, June 2021 at the end of a 2 hour session on Jupiter & Saturn. First ever look at the GRS for both of us. Fifth & last picture is from July 2022 with finished 200p at the end of an all night session (4.55am) that included camping in the garden - looking for shooting stars plus scanning the sky with binoculars (no problem getting eyes use to the dark). At this point Alice had obviously just gone back to sleep but you can make out where she is so I’ve included it! Really should make the effort to take some people with telescope pictures and not just telescope pics!

A Prinz Astral 500! My parents bought me a Prinz Astral 100 for Christmas 1970-something when I was a small boy. Didn’t see much but for a while I loved it. And could only dream of a model 500. Sadly my mother gave it to a charity shop in 1990-something.

White with black trim. My favourite colour telescope combination

Just popped in after observing Mars in the 200p Dob in Southampton. Some high clouds occasionally passing through. Seeing OK but I’ve had better recently. Can get to 200x before things go fuzzy. Even so Syrtis Major is certainly visible as well as the north polar hood.

I’ve been observing Mars too. But the best I’ve got so far was on the night of November 11th-12th. Then the seeing was decent and Mare Acidalium was obvious and made the planet more interesting. Being right up against the north polar hood the contrast of white + dark area really helped it stand out.

I agree that you don’t need a moon filter. And if what you are looking at (like the moon) appears too bright, just look at a bright object, we often use a smartphone screen, before looking through the eyepiece. As for a phone adapter. My point was to get use to what you have. There’s a shed load to learn without the faff of a phone holder. Using Orion as an example again. Just hovering the phone camera over the eyepiece and looking at the live view on screen (no taking pictures) showed colours in the nebula. With the eye at the eyepiece it was just a faint grey smudge. It was that, not the actual picture, that got my daughter exciting and jumping up and down.

I started on a similar journey coming up for 3 yrs ago when I bought my then 9 yr old daughter a telescope for Christmas, as she was showing an great interest in astronomy and I thought it would be something we could do together. This turned out to be true and we now have another, much larger telescope too. I originally got something slightly bigger than the Heritage 100p, but only with a mirror that is 114mm rather than 100mm. So not much difference. A few words of advice … For a youngster they will need help, assistance and encouragement however keen they are. It’s not something where you can stick them out in the garden and leave them. The moon and later on the planets, are great for young kids as they don’t need to sit out in the cold in order to get eyes adapted to the dark. Moon/Planets being bright don’t require this and they can hop in and out the house. Deep sky objects & star clusters are another matter. Initially don’t worry too much about accessories. Eg we got a cheap phone adapter for £9.50 and still have it. The expensive £50 phone holder that was recommended was next to useless as it was far too heavy for a small telescope. If you have a steady hand it’s fun to try and take pictures just by holding the phone to the eyepiece. It’ll work for the moon and a very few other bright objects. This old picture here is our very first attempt at taking a simple handheld phone camera image of anything. It’s of the Orion Nebula. We’d had the telescope for about 2 weeks. Sure, it’s crude but this simple image literally had my daughter jumping up and down. No apps or anything. I remember it as if it was yesterday One thing that surprised us and is worth considering in the near future (after you have a little experience). Viewing the sun using a white light solar filter has turned out to be amazing. Now, you obviously need to be careful and take suitable precautions but my daughter prefers this to most deep sky objects. With the sun you can view when it’s warm, no faffing about getting eyes use to the dark, you can see what you are doing without messing around with torches. When we had friends & kids around for a BBQ in the summer getting the telescope out and viewing the sun has been a great hit. For adults too. And the recent partial solar eclipse was brilliant. Not only that but we are now in a period where sunspots are on the up, so potentially things could get interesting.