SuburbanMak

I go out to a couple of different dark(er) sites, one in the local park and a couple up on the South Downs.  At first I found this outside my comfort zone but quickly got to enjoy & crave the solitude after a busy week.   The occasional slighly odd encounter (weed smokers, Hampshire's finest constabulary, radio amateurs etc) have been more than made up for by the improved views, fascinating wildlife sightings/hearings (no bears in Hampshire) and sense of peace at being out at night. 

Also, I figure that most folk running across me are more likely to be wary of me than the other way round - a fourteen stone bloke in a giant parka waving the business end of a Manfrotto 55 can be quite disconcerting!   I also keep a big Maglite handy to function as a truncheon/sensory weapon in extremis, to date its always stayed in the bag however. 

First of all, great to see you back @John!  

I replied in the "often use GoTo" option here. 

As often as not I align the GoTo because I want to use accurate tracking to keep objects in the field of my somewhat narrow Mak 127.  Equally if the batteries go down I am perfectly prepared to star-hop and refer to charts (just as I use a GPS in the mountains and at sea but am very sure I can find my way home with a map/chart & compass if the batteries go out!).    

When I bought it I naively thought that GoTo would solve all location challenges and, provided its carefully set up (particularly levelling), then it absolutely delivers this on bright targets, however, if you are looking for faint things at the 'scope's limits then you still need to know the starfield you are looking for and in that scenario I'd typically use GoTo to give me a known waypoint for a planned star hop - a local bright star for example. I think the difference is that this kind of observing means the chart-work takes place in advance and you don't then need to reference them so much out in the dark. Although there have been targets that I've either made a sketch of the FoV or taken a photo of the relevant section of the chart to reference on my (red filtered and hugely dimmed) phone in the field.

GoTo is a tool that helps the observer spend as much time as possible observing rather than hunting the target, its use requires a skillset all of its own and it combines well with traditional starhopping. 

With my Dob, which is all manual, I tend to look deeper and longer at fewer targets that are manually found - very satisfying & a different kind of session. Sometimes with my ST80 I like to just sweep around manually with a  widefield and then identify what catches my eye, equally if I am feeling lazy, GoTo on a widefield 'scope can be enormous fun taking an easy "tour" of favourites that plop straight into the eyepiece with every slew.    I get a particular thrill from seeing my 120 year old brass Clarkson 3" f15 slewing around the sky on a computerised wi-fi powered GoTo, very steampunk!

None of these things constitute value judgements about the quality of those experiences, nor the  skills required for proficiency, nor does any one approach threaten another, they are just different ways to enjoy being out under the stars.

Sometimes I like a kebab, sometimes I like a formal meal, sometimes I like to spend all afternoon cooking...inherently subjective & situational as to who enjoys what the most and no one taste is necessarily "better" than another.  

Great thread though - clear skies!

Another vote for the Baader Classic Orthos here - the 18mm is very sharp, flat, contrasty and has comfortable eye relief (compared to the shorter FL orthos).  I use it a lot for slightly higher magnification in my SW Mak 127 (gives 83x) for DSO's once found with either a Baader Hyperion 24mm or 40mm Celestron Plossl.  Gives fantastic views in the Mak on Targets like the Ring Nebula, M42 and the brighter Messier galaxies. Generally I pair it with a Neodymium filter. 

Works well too with the 2.25 Barlow that goes with the Hyperion Zoom to give 8mm equivalent (188x in the Mak). 

In Atlanta, GA this week for a work conference. Is Bortle 9, forecast cloudy and my diary is full of work stuff so I had zero expectation of being able to take advantage of the more southerly latitude - I was delighted to be greeted by the sight of Jupiter, new moon & Venus (below) on exiting a cab to an event tonight, thrilling to see so high above the horizon and I duly bored/amazed my colleagues with what they were looking at (and made my judgements about them based in reaction 

…). 

An unforecast break in the clouds tonight allowed a quick bino session with the Canon IS 10x42’s. 
Nice views of the Beehive (M44), Coma cluster (Melotte 111) a stunning object in this format, M3 a big fuzzy star in its context and the Markarian’s chain area in  Virgo.  Visually a bunch of dim, smudgy “stars” but conceptually awesome to consider the vastness of space and time captured in that 6.5 degree field of view. 
These bins are fantastic. 

If you are happy with the 45 degree or so field of an Ortho I can thoroughly recommend the Baader Classic Ortho range - the 18mm and 10mm in particular are superbly crisp and contrasty, the 6mm has tight eye relief but I’ve found great for high Mag doubles and planetary work on those rare nights of special seeing. 
They are also I reckon the best value astro items per quality that I’ve picked up - £54 each on @FLO right now.  
I bought them as a lightweight minimum glass solution to use in my old classic refractors but have found myself reaching for them time and again with my Mak 127 and 10” Dob. 

These Celestron Nature DX 10x50 ED have served me well over the last few years - ED glass, properly gas-purged waterproof and under 700g.  They’ve gone up a bit in price but I still reckon they are punching above their weight at £239. 

59 minutes ago, JeremyS said:

So I’d just emerged from my darkened room after seeing @Captain Scarlet’s amazing new handle and now I’m confronted with this!

Nowhere near as racy as @Stu’s leg spreader surely… 

To complement my aforementioned Dobknob, the final Dob-fettling purchase for a while, it’s…. 

A handle. 

Great report and sketches! 

Great slice of sky!  I hope you don’t mind @kelly324, I took the liberty of downloading your photo and tweaking it just using the standard phone picture settings  - contrast, definition and sharpness turned up and you can see you captured a lot! 

Wow - what things of beauty! 

A bundle of bits from @FLO for optimising the set up I have and preparing for a Dob fettling session ahead of spring galaxy season. 
 

- SL 8x50 RACI finder to be dedicated to the 10” GSO Dob.  I’ve been switching finders across from the Mak and while my Telrad takes seconds to re-align, the 8x50 RACI seems to require adjustment right to its extreme every time so I have bitten the bullet on a second finder. 
 

- GSO coma corrector, let’s see what difference this makes visually. 
 

- Bob’s Knobs 

- Telrad risers 2” for the Mak and 4” for the Dob. 

Welcome to the forum - and that is some first image! 

Great, detailed report and some new doubles targets for me to add thank you!  So sorry to read of your incident, hope all's well! 

The postman brought a knob for my Dob. 
It’s a Dobknob. 

10 minutes ago, Yossanator said:

Apologies if this has been asked before, but I'm having issues getting the SynScan app working. I downloaded the latest version from the Skywatcher website. It's simply a ZIP file and has no setup/installer that I can see. Regardless of where I plonk the files, I get an error when attempting to launch the executable. I've given full rights to the folder, tried running it as Administrator etc., but no joy.

Can anyone shed light on what I need to do to get this working?

 

Many thanks in advance! 

If you’ve a smartphone the mobile app works very well, certainly on iPhone.  Then  install is just a click on the AppStore. 

2 hours ago, adyj1 said:

Just as an aside, I bought my AZ-GTi and ADM upgrade clamp from @FLO, and I was very pleased to be informed that fitting the ADM clamp didn't invalidate the mount warranty with them 🙂 👍

That is good to know thank you! 

3 hours ago, Moon-Monkey said:

@SuburbanMak

hey bud Thabkyou so much for that I think this might be the ideal solution for me !!! Thanks for all the extra photos it looks perfectly spaced apart for easy viewing buddy many thanks for that I’m glad your getting on well with it 

clear skies 

You're most welcome - yes, you can move between scope's without having to shift anything with the seat. 

8 hours ago, Moon-Monkey said:

Hey buddy can I ask now how it’s getting on sometime later ?? I am thinking exactly the same setup my ST80 2” modded and a mak I do a lot of sketching so would love an alt az with tracking its this or the skytee but this pups it with the tracking could we please see some more pics of these two setup perhaps ? Hard to see them together and how close they are in the pic above my friend 🙂🙂🔭🔭🔭

clear skies 

Phill

Hi Phil @Moon-Monkey 

I’m a very happy customer - absolutely the same objective as you, I can now switch easily between widefield and high power view and finding it a very satisfying way to observe. I have hovered over the buy button in a Skytee so many times but hesitated as tracking is so nice to have, particularly with the Mak’s relatively narrow field.   Could not be happier with it so far.  
 
A couple of additional photos below’ let me know if there’s anything else you’d like to see/measure. 

2 hours ago, josefk said:

This is "cold and damp off the clipboard" rather than "hot off the press" - a 75% Waning Gibbous moon sketched 05:50...06:30 this morning.

Very damp outside just now so i lost the ability to fully detail the terminator (or at least i lost the ability to try to bring the detail i could see into the sketch). Basically the paper wouldn't take highlight and shadow marks very well. 

The same spotting scope set up and white pastel, white pen, black fineliner set up as usual on a black index card.

Beautiful! 

Last nights session was very much "brought to me by SGL".   

Starting a couple of weeks ago when my new AZGTiX mount turned up allowing me to run ST80 & Mak 127 side by side, @RobertI noted that in my photo of the new gear my Dob looked like it was "sulking in the corner".     Then reading @Optic Nerve's thread on collimation queries got me thinking about Dob-tweaking matters again, the final push came from @Mr Spock's comment on @F15Rules' excellent thread on sharp to the edge eyepieces that his new Stellalyra 30mm Ultra Flat Field was working beautifully in his own 12" F5. All were signs it was time to get the Dob out. 

Last night looked like the last for a few where there would be a clear sky so I set up as it got dark and left to cool. Seeing was very steady, transparency less good - maybe 3/5, calm and hovering around freezing at just after 7pm. 

I did a quick collimation tweak, aligned the Telrad on RIgel and swung to the Pleiades.  The first thing I always notice when I switch to the 10" is just how bright the stars appear compared to my smaller aperture scopes - the Pleaides were truly sparkling but in my Baader Aspheric 31mm, definitely little comet shapes from about 2/3s the way to the edge, along with some kind of spherical/pincushion error the overall effect makes me almost seasick after a while.   

Switching in the Stellalyra 30mm Ultra Flat Field brought an immediate improvement - yes there is still some focus difference across the field but the coma effect is vastly reduced and the image is sharp in the central 75% or so and absolutely acceptable right across the field.  Its not quite as transformative as it was in the ST80 but the clear conclusion is that this APM UFF-Clone 30mm is a superb performer in an f5 'scope.  I'm not ruling out having a go with a coma corrector at some point, but the 30mm UFF will almost certainly mean that my GSO 10" f5 will see a lot more starlight this year!   M45 in this eyepiece was gorgeous, I couldn't be sure about the Merope Nebula given slightly iffy transparency and the ambient LP around but i had a sense it was just beyond vision.  

The other huge improvement for Dob-comfort is the addition of a proper observing chair (Berlebach Charon), I've found the Dob really uncomfortable to use up to now but this simple but classy piece of kit is an absolute game-changer in this regard.   

M42 was showing plenty of billowing 3D texture, a real sense of the stars embedded within. For the first time I could see a dim glow where the Running Man Nebula (NGC 1977) should be and I have looked in vain many times. I couldn't make out the "man" but in AV there was a definite glow in that region  which - considering my light polluted back yard -I was really excited by.  On splitting the Trap' this was where I concluded that I don't have perfect collimation yet, I could get 5 stars (with a Hyperion Zoom from around 120x) but not the sixth, mainly due to the messiness of the picture. The separation between the others notably greater than it appears in my 5 inch Mak. 

Star colours were gorgeous with this combination, I was drawn to the profound orange of 31 Orionis a degree and half or so SW of the easily & widely-split Mintaka. 

On to M35 which despite the murk was revealing a rich eyeful of stars criss-crossed with darker lanes.  Whilst a good view in the 30mm, this really shone in the Baader zoom at mid-focal lengths (60-80x).

Up overhead to the Double Cluster - really enjoying that chair at these angles! - and its just breathtaking, even though not in the best direction for me, over the lights of the town centre - but still one my absolute favourite "Deep-space" fileds of view. Stunning in both eyepieces, dense glitter separated by a dark chasm and, in the 1.68 degrees of the 30mm, on an almost equally rich background.   

Around this time the bellringers started practicing over at the cathedral adding a nice soundtrack to my town-centre session.   

As I was already almost pointing overhead I figured it was time for another look at the comet C/2022/E3 (ZTF)  easy to find next to the (again brightly orange) Iota Aurigae. The bright, coloured star with the diffuse comet, showing some extension in AV, made a super field in the 30mm (42x) against a sprinkling of mag 8-10 stars in what looked to me like a mini-Hercules shape. This all reminded me of the sketching challenge so I went inside and after a short (warm & whisky) break came back out and made a sketch.  Spending the extra time on the view and looking closely at the relative positions to capture them on paper, really brought home the rate of progress of the comet - moving around a half degree North in the half hour or so it took me to make the sketch, which I based on its original position.  

Transparency began to decline further around 9 o'clock so I called it a night and, having heaved the Dob under cover, put the bin-lid type lens cap on and, for some stupid reason, gave it a gentle pat - wedging it askew in the top of the tube!   For a minute or two I had a vision of mangled spider-veins and collimating from scratch rebuilds, but on getting inside found to my relief no damage done! Won't be doing that again....

So a great session and a different pace of observing, fewer targets, in seated comfort, sketching, all manual - Telrad powered finding and the combination of just 2 eyepieces in 2" mode all night working really well.   I must make the effort to get the Dob out more often!  

5 minutes ago, josefk said:

I like the idea of a nip of something mid session and the accompaniment of cathedral bell ringers. Coincidently on Monday for my second moon i was accompanied by the drum & bass of Stamford "yoofs" in the nearby carpark. I recognise the reading glasses juggle!

Thank you - the nip purely for warmth obviously...

In the interest of balance we have our fair share of drum & bass "yoots" in Winch' as well, there have been sessions where the fumes of their "herbal cigarettes" have been most intrusive! Last night a little more civilised however... 

I didn't have this thread in mind when I took my 10" GSO Dob out into the garden last night.  Mostly I wanted to test my new 30mm Stellalyra UFF in the Dob and see if it improved the views - it did! I still have some twiddling to do to get perfect collimation but, once everything was properly cooled, I was getting nice tight stars across the centre of the field and a much improved view across the field (over the Baader Hyperion Aspheric 31mm I was previously using).  I enjoyed the new improved views around Orion, the Pleiades, M35 and Double Cluster - marvelling at the absolute brightness of higher magnitude stars in the 10" versus my usual view in a Mak 127/ST80 combo.  

After an hour and a half I was having fun and not ready to stop and, turning to the comet found it easily in a stunning field about half a degree West and slightly South of orangey magnitude 3 Hassaleh (Iota Aurigae). It was then I remembered this sketching challenge.   This gave me the excuse to pop inside for a warm (& perhaps just a nip of Ardbegh Wee Beastie) and pick up my newly assembled sketching kit, complete with Amazon £7 flexi light covered in 3 layers of brown insulating tape!   After congratulating myself that my sketching gear was the cheapest astro purchase I'd made, I then went and bought a Berlebach Cahron chair so that I could sit long enough to use it - its a fabulous piece of kit which, combined with the new improved Dobviews from the 30mm, will see me getting a lot more use out of what's been christened in our house the "FLT" (Farily Large Telescope!), and a lot more sketching. 

So I then sat for maybe a half hour juggling the logistical challenges of Dob-nudging, observe, reading glasses on, try to see pencil marks, reading glasses off, observe, nudge, observe again, glasses on etc...  All this accompanied by the Winchester Cathedral bell ringers who practice on a Wednesday night made for a really special and satisfying session.  The comet was really motoring and moved roughly half a degree North during the time I was sketching. 

I've inverted a photo of the sketch in PS Express and tweaked the field a little and humbly submit the sketch below (I missed off the direction markers, doh!  N is down and W is Left at its a Dob view).  

A very enjoyable garden session last night with the GSO 10" Dob inspired by things I'd been reading on SGL earlier in the day - I'll write a separate report but it was a varied evening looking at clusters, touring Orion and sketching the comet. Along the way I tested my new Stellalyra 30mm UFF in the Dob - and it was good....    There was even a little bit of drama at the end, fortunately no Dob damage was sustained!   More in a separate report later but a super mid-week session before the cloud closed in!