StuartT

haha! I am divorced and single so I can now spend what I like. But (believe it or not) I bought the LX-90 when I was married (this was 12 years ago) and I actually pretended I'd won it in a competition rather than admit to buying it! 🤦‍♂️ The only thing more ridiculous than that is that I was believed... 🤣

now you knew I was going to, right? 100º !!! 😃😃

Crikey! £336 ! I think I had better learn the ropes before going crazy with my shopping (an urge I am very poor at controlling at the best of times!)

I have an old Meade 390 (thanks for the ID guys!) which I was given years ago. The lens cap (assuming it had one originally) has long since gone. Is it possible to buy replacement lens caps? The dew hood diameter is 10cm Can't seem to see any online.

useful to know. thanks. Of course, it's always possible I may buy a new telescope at some stage (a faster one) and then I'll benefit from fancy eyepieces 🤣

I think I may be missing something here... are televue eyepieces very fancy then? Is that why @faulksy was warning against them?

what's that?

@Louis D would you be able to point me to where these diagrams came from? I need the legends to explain them (e.g. what F e and C mean and how the colours mean). Thanks

I must admit you've lost me a bit there... 😔

ok, so now I have it properly embedded, I need to try and figure out what it's telling me! 🤣

BINGO! Thanks! 👍

Hmmm.. I tried both, but it's not working for me. Which was it you inserted? The BBcode or the HTML?

how are you getting to that Image dialog? My signature box doesn't appear to give me that option

you are correct. I was assuming the secondary mirror was flat. Thanks

Aha! Thanks my wise friends 👍

btw - why won't my Clear Outside widget embed properly? I am using the BBcode from the Clear Outside website. You seem to have managed it!

Actually, you could be right. I can't actually get inside the hood to measure the actual diameter of the lens. The hood diameter is 10cm, but the lens is a little smaller than that. Thank you!

My LX-90 tube (plus focuser) is 46cm long. Given the optics of the SCT design, I struggle to see how it can have a focal length of 2m (as it claims). Is the focal length not just the distance between the primary mirror and the focus?

I was given this Meade refractor by an uncle years ago. The aperture is 10cm and I think the focal length is 1m. Anyone know what model it is?

Smashing! Thanks everyone. I have bought a filter for my 20cm SCT and am now much happier 😀

Hi Can't get that to embed in my signature. I tried both the HTML and BBcode versions. What am I doing wrong?

First of all apologies for yet another newbie post asking about solar observing (I am sure all you experts find it a bit tedious). I just want to be 100% sure that I won't fry my eyeballs! Can I check with you the following; 1. Solar filters should be covering the aperture of the scope, not the eyepiece (in order to protect all the optics) 2. they should be the metallized kind (like Baader planetarium film). For example this 3. once securely in place, you can observe using regular eypieces with no further filters needed at the bottom end Thanks. I just have anxieties about this!

Thanks. The Plössls were supplied with my telescope I think. I only heard about the concept of 'eye relief' the other day. Something to do with how close your eye has to be to the eyepiece to see everything. I'm surprised that's an issue as I have not been aware of that. But obviously you guys know far more than I! Does low eye relief end up being uncomfortable then? What's the practical disadvantage?

So are Plössl eyepieces basically entry level, economical eyepieces? A bit like the 'kit lens' on a camera?

uh oh... surely you're not suggesting this is an endless process of buying newer and better toys... ? 🤣