Maideneer

I do kind of the same thing as you lol. My biggest issue is the arcade style controls because the diagonal reverses everything so I always go the wrong way and then have to correct, it's so disorienting

I have my 32mm EP, an 8-24 zoom (my favorite one) and a 23mm Luminos. M13 last night was visible yes but was extremely difficult to view as were most things. Did I finally see something? YES! But my eyes were straining more than I thought was normal. M31 looked like a faint, small grey fuzz and I was presuming it would at least look like a faint, large grey fuzz lol...not sure why that is...even at 8mm. I'm in Bortle 6 so about the same as you.

It's so funny, I have that book but have been too busy to get through it. I guess this is one situation where I'd love cloudy skies for a couple weeks so I can read it lol. I have the 9x50 finder that came with the set and that's served me well so far I have to say. I did find M13 last night (sort of), for some reason it was totally clear out for hours but all the star clusters and nebula I tried viewing were either faint beyond belief or just not visible. M13 was probably my best seeing but it still wasn't that great, it was very difficult to make it out.

I did and it made a *slight* difference but not much. Everything just feels like it needs oil or something but who knows...I just have to keep playing with it. Not sure why this aspect has to be so tricky.

CGEM II mount - trying again tonight, fingers crossed! But those Azimuth adjustment knobs are so tight! They’re very hard to move, almost like they need oil or something. It’s laborious work and I feel like it shouldn’t be.

Clear skies tonight over here. I've got my Starsense autoalign and my hand controller. Starsense apparently can do ASPA so I'm going to give it a shot.

Thanks so much! Do I need to polar align to accomplish this or an EQ align is enough?

*where is that shame shame shame gif when you need it?* When I slew to an object using my C9.25/CGEM II, in addition to finding the object the mount will automatically track the object and keep it centered in the eyepiece assuming alignment is correct yes? The reason I'm asking this is because my mount was definitely NOT doing this yesterday, objects immediately started drifting out of FOV and I could not figure out why for the life of me. I almost felt like I was back using my little Alt/Az manual mount. There's nothing extra I have to do after slewing to keep the object centered for a while is there?

Skies were great last night so it's more than likely user error lol. In essence what I do is face the thing north, do a Starsense autoalign (I recalibrated last night because I screwed it up the day prior) and then autoalign again. I don't really polar align yet because I'm not planning on imaging for a while - gotta find it before you can capture it haha. Ok great, so I'm going to try that tonight. M57 and M27. Like most things, I think I have to slow it all down, stop trying to do too much and just take it one object at a time. Too many EP's, too many devices, too many softwares etc. - it makes it all overwhelming and honestly not that enjoyable. Sometimes less is more and I have to remember that.

It was just a fool's hope to get something on screen with my 224, I knew it wasn't gonna work but took a leap of faith. I must have played around and worked on my GoTo alignment 6 times last night and I feel like it was still acting up. Even Jupiter and Saturn which normally stay centered were drifting off. So yes, sticking to the HC for now until I'm proficient enough to move on.

Ohhhhhhhhhh so you're saying that basically any consumer style scope will show you these objects in grey and then only when imaging -> processing is color essentially added, yes? Finding these things your first time is confusing as hell when you don't know what to look for, even if you know exactly what they look like...what a strange phenomenon. Much appreciated!

I've gotten really good at viewing and focusing in on Jupiter, Saturn and the moon, that's all extremely easy for me now. But I have this strange hesitation with trying to slew to and observe anything else, I quite literally don't know how - I tried for the first time yesterday and it was a total bomb. All the checking in the world on Astronomy Tools didn't make a lick of difference for me - I tried M31, M13, M27. I slewed to it last night and didn't see a thing, and hell I wasn't even sure at that point that my GoTo was working right because there was nothing there. I used all the right EP's, I even tried using my 224MC and nothing. Is it a focus problem? aka, if I am perfectly focused for the stars, can I slew to one of these objects and be able to see it right away without touching the focuser? And what on earth will I be seeing? Is it the colorful blasts I'm used to seeing in photos or am I looking for something different entirely? I read the "What will I see?" thread stickied here and I still can't grasp it. I think tonight I'm going to try a different method...last night I was playing around and trying to learn all sorts of new stuff - ASPA, CPWI etc. - things I had never done or used before so maybe I was just overloaded and could not think straight. By the way, using CPWI isn't the easiest thing in the world as it disables my hand controller and I actually like the hand controller. I think maybe later on I'm going to stick to my HC and StarSense only and see if that works for me. Boy do I sound lost huh?🙂

I'm reading these are supposed to move the mount left or right and they both push off the alignment peg on the tripod head. My question is, are these knobs supposed to be insanely laborious to adjust? I feel like all I do is turn turn turn these things a hundred times each way and nothing really ever moves and it's difficult to turn them in the process as well. Once the mount is on the tripod it's not like I can actually see in there to view what's going on but man, it's a whole lotta work for a whole lotta nothing.

Thank you. I actually do have an ADC but because it was cloudy'ish last night and in my haste I forgot to attach it, lesson learned. The focus was challenging - even with a dew shield my corrector plate was dripping wet and since clouds were rolling in as I said it was a mad dash to the finish line. I see that it's blurry and it's annoying me 🙂 In Registax, I did use RGB balance and this is what it gave me. Also at the top and bottom if you look really carefully, you'll see what almost look like lines of latitude...that's the wavelet processing which I tried to keep to absolute minimums. It sounds like I'm almost there but need to either wait for a better night and/or remember to actually use the specific crap that I bought lol.

Just realized this contest existed. I don't expect a winner of course because this is my very first try but why not I guess. C9.25HD, ASI224MC, 15% of 6,000 frames, PiPP/AS/Registax - done in horrible humidity and not the best seeing conditions on 16 August.

I only get better when people rip my work apart, this way I know what to correct. While not my very first planetary shot technically, it is my very first one with the C9.25 HD as opposed to my little Travelscope 70, so the learning gap is wide. Something like 15% of 6,000 frames used here - PiPP, AS and Registax using a ASI224MC.

You rock man, that worked! Thanks a million!

Thanks, I'll try this out next opportunity. For some reason it always feels like these scope manufacturers operate very much like a "mom and pop" shop with their printed collateral and customer service, but sell millions of dollars of product, enough to warrant a higher standard of service than a vague and non-informative manual like it's printed off the same line as a fortune cookie factory. No wonder it's a difficult hobby to enter, it's very much a DIY/learn yourself via Youtube kind of thing...the official sources almost make it a barrier.

Last night it showed all red for me but turned to be perfectly clear. Don't trust any forecast 100% and don't give up hope!

I'm just getting used to my new StarSense camera and something is really confusing me. The manual says a calibration needs to be done the very first time (and only time I suppose) you start using this camera. I did the first alignment procedure just fine after a bit of trial and error and then was moving on to the calibration step as follows: 1. Go to "Named Stars" 2. Select a star for alignment and press {ENTER} to begin slewing. 3. Do coarse centering, press {ENTER} when complete. 4. Do fine centering finishing by using UP and RIGHT arrow keys, press {ALIGN} when completed. 5. Press {ENTER} when "Solution Found" message displays. 6. Shut down the mount. 7. Restart the mount and do a StarSense AutoAlign. My problem occurred during point #5. It didn't say Solution Found it said ERROR NO SOLUTION. For the life of me I can't figure out why. Also as a side note, I feel like the mount plate for the camera causes the unit to sort of turn in a bit of a downward position, almost so that I have to believe a tiny bit of the sensor perhaps picks up some of the OTA itself...it's definitely not straight on. My dew shield doesn't help that matter either, so not sure if these things are related. I have the unit mounted on the right side of the OTA, so maybe I should move it to the center position.

The bar arrived today! If I told you Celestron packed it well, that would be an understatement. The entire box was taped over followed by about a pound of packing material inside, and then the bar itself was first wrapped in about 2 feet of bubble wrap followed by a couple circles worth of packing tape followed by another 2 feet of bubble wrap lol. I've never seen a box prepared that way haha. Aye I'm so relieved! Which means of course the next couple of days will be filled with clouds of course, but that's ok...I can now take my time and learn the thing. What a ride!

Welp, I've been advised Friday is the day again. UPS is shipping and this time will require my signature upon receipt. Hoping this finally clears it all up.

Thanks for allowing me to release a little bit of frustration here. I've checked stock on the major sites every day for seven straight months as I was in the market for a C9.25HD + CGEM II Mount - as we know the global supply chain is all disrupted so this made for a tedious exercise. Finally about 3 weeks ago I saw some in stock and snapped one up. Sure enough everything shipped ok and arrived at my house 12 days ago. Starting to assemble everything I got to the point to attach the counterweight bar to the mount and realized there was no counterweight bar to be found! Whoever did the packing somewhere along the line did not include the bar in the box. I had to contact the retailer and tell them about it and they began the process of contacting Celestron for a replacement. A day or two later I was relieved to learn a brand new bar was on its way but would take about a week to arrive due to shipping. Ok, so patiently I waited (again) and last Thursday was the day the bar was due to arrive. I come home from work and sure enough the box is there at the steps, although it felt suspiciously light! Bring it inside, open it up...and it's an EMPTY box. I thought someone was playing a prank on me like on a hidden camera show. Then I discover the box had about a 2" gaping hole in one corner and somehow the thing must have slipped out (or someone stole it). So back I went to Celestron customer service again who is now trying to get me set up with yet another bar and told me that it would take another 7-10 days to receive it, hopefully anyway. Here I sit with a beautiful, brand new $4,000 telescope for 2 weeks now and I cannot use it because of some crazy turn of events that sounds highly ridiculous and totally improbable and yet here we are. I wish I could say I was frustrated which is probably an understatement right now. Sure, this all seems like a first world problem and I know there are starving children somewhere so boo-hoo about your telescope, I get that. I just can't believe my luck, it's like someone or something doesn't want me having this scope!

I am ABSOLUTELY beside myself. The box with the counterweight bar arrived today, I raced home to get it. I open the box and it was totally EMPTY. I thought I was on a prank show. I just can’t believe it, now I have to start the process all over again of waiting, this is crazy! And I’m just really sad.

Still waiting for my counterweight bar, but the post office tells me that today is the day! I hope to god the right one is delivered and I can get going with my new toys, it's been the longest week I swear!