Maideneer

3 minutes ago, Swoop1 said:

I had issues getting used to my equatorial mount where GoTo would point me in the opposite direction to which I wanted. 

I soon twigged that I was mounting the scope the wrong way round in the saddle. I got a sticker and marked it with an arrow which represented the direction I needed to mount the objective lens.

Every day is an education!

I think that's one of my two problems...mounting it wrong.  It's one of those stupid simple things that makes you slap your head when you finally figure it out.

1 minute ago, Cornelius Varley said:

Aligning the mount north would naturally point the telescope north as well.

Not in my case because I'm a bozo lol.  I tried to show in my picture that I presumed the actual front of the mount needed to be facing north, which would cause the scope to be perpendicular (east-west) and I also got confused at the left-right facing scope thing which I think I can rectify now.

1 hour ago, StevieDvd said:

With the mount in front of you, like in your picture and with a scope fitted on the left-side and facing away from you. Level the scope and point the telescope North (use a compass). So your picture the arrow is pointing West, not North.

 

See here where there is a video to explain all this and more.

Steve

I was under the impression my mount had to be facing north, I didn't know the scope had to be facing due north.  . Cheers for the info friend, I'll try and apply it tonight.

For the life of me, I cannot figure this out.  Got to take out my setup last night for only the second time as it's been cloudy for weeks and I've been trying in vain to align my Skywatcher AZ-GTi mount to no avail.  I'm using it in ALT-AZ mode for now, and I've probably researched every article and watched every Youtube vid I could find and still nothing is working...I feel like I'm stupidly dense or something because there is something just not clicking in the cranium.

I thought I was supposed to point the dang thing north to start so that's what I did, err, I think anyway.  Am I pointing the wrong end north? See picture.  Also, I'm reading that the actual scope has to be mounted a certain way on the mount correct?  Which way would that be?  I've read all of this left/right stuff and those directionals mean nothing to me as it depends on someone's viewpoint.  When I aimed north to start, I attempted to align by directing SynScan to go to the Moon first, and that took it so far off course it wasn't even close, it was basically pointing at the ground.  I reset and tried again with another start (Vega I believe)...again, wasn't even in the realm of close.  I made sure my location settings were correct in the app so that wasn't the issue.

Here's how I got something to "work".  I had it track to the moon and when it was essentially pointing at the ground and who knows how many degrees from my actual target, I picked the whole thing up, turned it around, manually aligned to the moon and then clicked OK on the app.  I felt like a ridiculous clown doing that but somehow it actually managed to do the trick but something tells me that isn't right on a long term basis.

I'm thinking about getting SkySafari to control the mount but I should probably master the basics first.

Tips/tricks appreciated.

What I cannot seem to find for this scope is a solar filter.  Celestron apparently discontinued the 70mm filter and absolutely nobody has it in stock.  Ideas anyone?

4 hours ago, neil phillips said:

Congrats on your first image. Took the glare away a bit seems to show a little more

Bless you for fixing that, it didn’t even occur to me to manipulate it. I have Photoshop on my phone so next time I’ll head there first. Cheers!

This is going to seem ridiculous to some but that’s ok. I got my very first telescope just last week and the weather has been absolutely horrible so I’ve only been able to use it twice so far, for about 20 minutes each time.

I have a simple Celestron TS 70 on an AZ-GTi mount with some better EP’s and a good 90 degree diagonal and a neutral density filter. Keep in mind, I know next to nothing so far about AP so this is INCREDIBLY crude. Taken with an iPhone with an 8mm EP (IIRC) with horrific cloud cover and about 5 seconds to capture it before it was unseen again.

Forget the quality, the point is it gave me confidence to keep going with this hobby for the long term. Thanks for reading.

8 minutes ago, Mr Spock said:

Looks like you have everything covered. Enjoy your set up - weather permitting!

Thank you!  Weather is a factor right now for the next week, booooo.

3 minutes ago, M40 said:

Hello Maideneer looks a pretty good starter setup to me, very portable and can't think of a thing to add. Rather than a red flash light, see if you can get a red head torch, it will leave hands free. I am going to plug the planisphere as I find it  easy to use and gets you locating the brighter objects in the sky. Maybe an eyepiece phone holder to get in that lucky picture?

It's an interesting hobby this, probably a thousand different hobbies covered under the word astronomy, so as you get into the hobby you will find the route that your particular journey will take, so maybe hold off buying stuff until you get an idea of where your interests lie. 

A head torch, ha never thought of that!  Oh, I did fail to mention I do have an EP smartphone adapter so covered there.  Have not heard of a planisphere yet so will check it out!

Keep in mind I'm just a newbie who is just starting out so I'd love to hear perspective and input as far as what I still might need (or don't).

Here is my set-up:
Celestron TravelScope 70
Skywatcher AZ-GTi mount
Celestron 1.25-Inch Twist-Lock Dielectric Star Diagonal
Celestron 2.3mm X-Cel LX Eyepiece
Celestron 32 mm Omni Plossl Eyepiece
Celestron 8-24 mm Zoom Eyepiece
Celestron 1.25" 3x X-Cel LX Barlow Lens
Celestron Neutral Density Moon Filter

You'll quickly notice my general affinity towards the Celestron brand, as that it what I gravitated to when I first started researching this hobby a few months ago.  I'm generally a "brand" guy so if I find one that I'm comfortable with, I'll stick with that brand unless they don't make something particular or something else is just so outstanding it's worth buying from another manufacturer.

I know that I need a little red flashlight so that's incoming. I also just bought a DC battery pack for my mount so I don't have to run on batteries.  What I don't have is a case to keep all my eyepieces (I have the backpack Celestron sent me with the scope), and what I'm finding so far is that in the dark it is tough to either find my eyepieces as I try them all out and it's also difficult to remember what FOV each eyepiece has because it's not printed on the EP anywhere, so are those things I can easily mark down on each piece or should I make a little "cheat sheet" and always bring it with me until I remember it?

Thanks for the help so far on this site, I am finding everyone genuinely helpful and kind towards others, and that is a major catalyst for not scaring off those new to this hobby.

2 hours ago, Stu1smartcookie said:

in the case of the synscan app you tell it where to go and hopefully it finds it . But thats all down to alignment . This doesn't work like the celestron nexstar mounts which just ask you to point at three objects not having to know what they are .

Thanks for that.  I don't yet have a Nexstar/CGEM/VX whatever that assists in those things.  Once I learn and get good on my starter kit I will take the plunge into something better I decided, so for now SynScan is my friend and I will have to get good at that.  It doesn't help that it's been cloudy and raining these last 2 weeks 😞

On 16/05/2021 at 07:49, badhex said:

Sure. It works pretty well. It's hard to get it to balance as the dovetail is miniscule so it's usually back-heavy, but the total weight of everything, including a decent diagonal and heavy EP is still reasonably low so the AZ-GTi can take it. If you're confident making adjustments you could unscrew the three screws holding the focuser to the main tube, and replace the dovetail with something longer to allow better adjustment. If I weren't replacing the scope I would definitely do this.

 

So Mr. Badhex, I’ve now got a very similar setup to this one in the photo and I took it out last night for the first time to try and understand what I am doing.

I am having trouble with some things…if I have some random star centered in my scope, can the SynScan app tell me what that star is or is that not a thing? I suppose I could use one of those Night Sky apps for that but maybe I’m wrong.

Also, the app gives me some pre-selected stars during the alignment process but what if I find some random star in the sky I want to align to? Can I point to that and have the mount begin alignment on that?

Just came across this as I just bought one myself, so thank you to all who gave suggestions, I've gone with the TalentCell.

6 minutes ago, iapa said:

I feel your heartache.

An order I place in March is still awaited due to Covid impact on shipping and manufacture.

Fortunately we are generally, in northern hemisphere, also in a period of fairly short or non-existent astronomical darkness.

Is the whole order out of stock? Or just the AVX/Edge?

No, not the whole order.  I am getting some accessories (eyepieces, filters etc) and I am going to fit those on my Travelscope 70 for now on an AZ-GTi mount I got today.  I want to say this is a blessing as it will allow me to learn about the accessories first which I can use on the EdgeHD later on when things calm down in the market.

5 minutes ago, badhex said:

Hi @Maideneer

I have this same scope, I think you may have seen from another thread. Sorry if I bamboozled you at all with my explanation, I hadn't realised that you were just starting out so I may not have been totally clear!

I found that all the accessories supplied with my Travelscope were pretty poor, but once I put half decent accessories with it, the actual scope itself was really quite good. 

1) The eyepieces that come with are indeed Super MA and pretty basic. They will be okay to start but you should consider upgrading them one at a time, finances allowing. The BST Starguiders linked above are extremely good value for money and would represent a significant upgrade for the cost. This scope works best at medium to low power views so the 25mm Starguider is a good shout, as is a Plössl as mentioned. Worth mentioning, I have a 17mm 76° eyepiece that gives great views through this scope, and I imagine the 18mm Starguider will also work well, albeit with a slightly narrower field of view.

2) Regarding the diagonal: I would consider this a candidate for replacing quite quickly once you can afford it. The one that comes with it is very poorly made and mine was not even a completely flat mirror, which leads to distortions in the image. I've replaced mine with one very similar to this: https://www.firstlightoptics.com/diagonals/stellamira-1-25-90-di-electric-diagonal.html

Although this may be out of your budget, it would represent a good investment in the longer term as it can be used in other scopes and is good quality. See if you might be able to pick up something like it second hand to allow your budget to go further. 

3) You don't need any other attachments or anything to use this with a AZ-GTi, and it works very well, although once you get a better diagonal and eyepiece in there you may find it difficult to balance - i.e. Getting the weight evenly distributed from the front to the back of the scope. Balancing is less important with this scope in the AZ-GTi motorised mount as it is so lightweight even with attached accessories, but you should try to get it as close as possible to make sure the mount does not have to work harder and potentially shorten its lifespan in the long term. I'll see if there is a good tutorial or article on balancing.

Hopefully you saw my picture in the other thread, but basically the small dovetail will work perfectly well in the 'saddle' - the bit on the mount that the scope attaches to. 

4) I can't really help with the smartphone adaptor, but I'm sure other will have some ideas. 

5) Ditch the rubbish finder, it's completely useless. As already mentioned, once you have a lower power eyepiece in you may not need one at all, especially if you are using the AZ-GTi goto function. 

You sir are amazing.  And no worries about the other thread, I just felt like I was bothering you and I didn't want to seem annoying.  Your information is here is great, I read through it all and will apply accordingly!

1 hour ago, Geoff Lister said:

Mine came with 20mm, 10mm & 4mm eyepieces. I tend to use a 32mm Plossl and 7-21mm zoom.

Geoff

I just picked up a 32mm ep, a 8-24 zoom and a 2.3 mm ep in addition to a smartphone adapter and a neutral density filter.  All good to learn on and will be helpful when I finally pick up an EdgeHD sometime in the future when things are back in stock again.  Thanks again!

8 minutes ago, Tiny Clanger said:

Check the advert : if the eyepieces it came with are plossls, it will announce the fact, they are a good selling point ! However, if Celestron 'scopes are equipped like skywatcher ones are, they probably bundled the cheapest possible eyepieces in with it, see if there is anything marked on the eyepiece : if it says 'MA' or 'long eye relief' (LER) or 'K' or 'R'  it isn't a plossl . This is a good explanation :

http://swindonstargazers.com/beginners/eyepieces.htm

Plossl is a type rather than a trade name , they all have a field of view of 52 degrees, to get wider field of view than that means bigger glass, bigger heavier eyepiece, much bigger cost !

A handy tool is https://astronomy.tools/calculators/field_of_view/

if your 'scope is not listed, just input the 400mm focal  length, 70mm aperture, find any manufacturers' plossl in the eyepiece dropdown menu, choose a target, click on add to view, and the  tool shows you a photo of that target with a circle around it showing the boundary that eyepiece will give you in that telescope. You can add various eyepieces' circles to the same image for comparison

Heather

Oh my, what a wealth of knowledge you just handed over.  I can't thank you enough!

34 minutes ago, Tiny Clanger said:

I don't have any experience of that specific model of 'scope, or the accessories which come with it, but if the supplied diagonal is a 45 degree one, it will be awkward for viewing objects high in the sky, so would probably be best replaced.

I have an Orion ST80 , a similar little 'scope with an 80mm aperture, and have a few small light (and cheap !) eyepieces I keep with it to make a compact portable kit :  a skywatcher 25mm (not a plossl)  which came with one of my other 'scopes, a 17mm skywatcher plossl , and a 12.5mm  skywatcher plossl . They work pretty well. As a low cost upgrade a plossl or two of a reputable make would  be hard to beat.

I've not added a 32mm plossl ( the lowest magnification eyepiece for visual use on a 1.25" focuser ) because in my 400mm focal length ST80,  a 32mm eyepiece would give me just 12.5x magnification, a range very close to the one my binoculars already cover very well. I'm happy with the 25mm, which gives a magnification of 16x

The very small straight through , optical viewfinders are fairly useless , so if that is what you are struggling with, a simple red dot finder might suit you better : again, I use one on my ST80 which came bundled with another 'scope , so it was essentially free to me. Quite often I don't even switch it  on,  just line the 'scope up though, so if I were you, I'd experiment and see if you really need a finder at all ... this sort of small refractor sometimes gets used itself as a finder on a far bigger telescope !

You might find this thread useful:

Heather

Great thread thanks!  So, what it comes with is a 20mm ep, a 10mm ep (how do I tell if something is a Plossl or something else?) and a diagonal (not sure of specs).  It is a 400mm scope like yours.

I need the following advice for my TS70 for which I only have the standard, supplied accessories for...I understand they are not very good and are just 'the basics".

1) Good low-power eyepiece with wide field of view
2) Is the supplied diagonal acceptable or should I source another?
3) Will this connect straightaway to a AZ-GTi mount or do I need another dovetail bar or mechanism?
4) A smartphone adapter (just want to take a few basic pics to test some things out for myself)

I'm confidently guessing the diagonal and EP are 1.25" here.  Lastly, the finderscope is really annoying and I'm thinking about removing it totally...the placement of it is such that the diagonal and eyepiece get in the way when trying to view through the finderscope and it's really more of an obstruction so not sure if anyone has any tips there.

Thanks a ton...from a newbie.

2 hours ago, badhex said:

This topic articulates something very well that I have been thinking for a while and felt a certain amount of remorse about. Great opportunity to come clean - an astronomy confessions booth if you will! 

For a variety of reasons (partly, the old mount I was using really struggled with my 80ED, partly as I can only observe from a shared space in Bortle 8 skies) I had been having a break from astronomy. Last year that changed when I went away to a small island with Bortle 5 skies which compelled me to buy a Celestron Travelscope 70 to use while there. It was loads of fun despite the terrible accessories. 

Since then, I bought an AZ-GTi for grab and go use and had planned to go to a dark site for a few days over Christmas. To ensure I had the "best experience" I decided to get an EQ6-R Pro as my "mount for life", but due to (still ongoing) COVID restrictions (and also getting COVID!) the trip never happened, and the mount has gone unused, along with my SW 80ED. It's too big/complex to set up for use in the brief windows I get to observe, and I can't move it upstairs to the shared terrace without numerous trips. 

Conversely - once the cheapo celestron went on the AZ-GTi and had some decent eyepieces in it, I've basically used nothing else since - it's been a total delight to use and so quick to set up or break down - I can get *at least* a solid 1.5hours observing in a 2 hour window and the whole scope and mount cost a mere fraction of the EQ6-R. 

If I had my time again I'd not bother at all with the big mount, and I doubt it will get any decent use until at least winter, but I feel pretty terrible for spending so much on something I can barely use. I'm cutting (or compounding?) my losses and will replace the Travelscope 70 with a semi APO version as part of a travel/grab and go kit, and I've no doubt that this setup will be my main kit for years to come. 
 

I have a Travelscope 70. May I ask how mounting it to the AZ-GTi works? aka did you need to purchase extras to make it attach?

Oh thanks I did not know that was possible in the profile, thank you!

Thanks for this, I will keep an eye on the stock. I am in the US so I will hopefully wish shipping is not too much extra but it might be worth it in the end.

You sir, have my thanks.

On 11/05/2021 at 15:04, gorann said:

If you aim at astrophotography including deep space (not only planets which will be in the center of the image field) I would without doubt chose the EdgeHD8 since it has superior optics with a flat field. No brainer to me. The 9.25 is a planetary and visual instrument that lacks the extra lenses needed to give a wider flat field. The 9.25 will catch 33% more photons, which is not much, and then you can catch those by just exposing 33% longer with the EdgeHD and have nicely shaped stars all over the image. Also the 8" scope weighs 3 kg less, so easier to handle for the mount.

EDIT: The longer focal length of the 9.25 makes it even less useful for deep space.

I have experienced my first official heartbreak today. The place I ordered my AVX from called and told me they do not have it in stock even though the website said available so now I am back to work searching for an alternative.

I do see a 9.25 AVX (not HD) in stock so I’m wondering if I should go with that.🤷‍♂️

I am a bit sad to be honest.

Amazing!  I just pulled the trigger and made my purchases!  Had to go to three different sites to find everything in stock and then price compare, but here is what I ended up with.

• Advanced VX 8" EdgeHD Telescope
• DEW SHIELD DX
• STARSENSE AUTOALIGN
• SkyPortal WiFi Module
• NEUTRAL DENSITY MOON FILTER
• EclipSmart White-Light Solar Filter
• 8-24MM ZOOM EYEPIECE
• X-Cel LX 5 mm Eyepiece
• Smartphone Adapter DX Kit

I think that will basically set me up for visuals for a good long time lol.  AP can come later, but I basically just spent 3 grand as a treat to myself for surviving these past few years - getting through a long bout of depression and anxiety, finding a new job and coming out the other end much happier.

Thank you everyone for awesome advice, I think I'm going to be busy very, very soon.

1 hour ago, philtodd said:

I might add in the reducer and possibly a better finder. But looks like my buying list! 

I think I'm gonna wait on a reducer because I'll think about getting a Hyperstar which I am reading does a fantastic job and I also have to think about a proper camera.  Right now I'm going to solely focus (ha) on visuals for a while so I can get familiar and acclimated to everything.