Concordia000

5 hours ago, Clarkey said:

Bike trailer?😁

I have a different problem. Easy access to dark sites but an absence of visible sky due to cloud and rain!

Hey, at least you get to set up quickly when you have good weather.

I got around my problem by roping a friend into astronomy. He owns a car so he can drive us around…

1 hour ago, AstroMuni said:

Most proper dark sites will be in open areas which would not be be easy to reach without car. You could look at using a bicycle as well 😉

With my Astro gear strapped to my back…?

that will be a hell of a workout

45 minutes ago, AstroGee said:

Just looking the map Audley End from Liverpool Street looks like a possibility?

I looked it up, it’s not hard getting there but there aren’t a lot of accommodations nearby. The last leg will always require a car or a taxi.

I guess I should just give up and consider learning to drive.

Hmm, due to some change of circumstances (I might get a bigger scope…) the AZ75 might actually be something I want to get.

Still though. I want it pink🤪

3 minutes ago, Stu said:

Don’t try the spin test with this!

So what should we do to make sure it’s butter-smooth?

43 minutes ago, Stu said:

The only thing I’ve done differently is to use a Nexus unit rather than a DSC. This just gives connectivity to a phone or tablet for SkySafari without the additional ‘standalone’ functionality of the DSC. Works very well and is significantly cheaper.

That might be the way I am going for when/if I buy an AZ75. I prefer the phone screen to the red LEDs…

25 minutes ago, Alan White said:

Indeed it is and in reality part of what this and I assume @Stu thread are all about.
Rowan are receptive to customer feedback, even the desire for a Pink mount...... but don't get to hopeful on that colour 😉

All jokes aside, a red or grey version will be very welcome.

Another question for AZ100 owners actually: does anyone have experience using their mount with encoders but not with the Nexus DSC? I am thinking whether it would be possible to use another “hand controller” or make my own actually…

RC51 is the best astrograph out of the three simply due to the fact it’s a 4-element Petzval design. It does not show CA and has a very flat field over even a full frame sensor. Its edges will have coma and vignetting on a full frame sensor but honestly, so does every scope in that price range. It has an extremely wide field also, which is both a good and a bad thing depending on what you want to photograph. I love mine even if I have to crop basically every picture. 

It can have collimation problems which is quite painful to resolve if you get it. But FLO could help you with that.

Some users on Cloudy Nights claim that the Askar FRA400 is excellent for its price. Flat field, no CA, no collimation problems. At 1100 US it will be slightly out of your budget, and it’s bigger and heavier than the RedCat, but you are getting 72mm of aperture compared to 51mm. It’s something you might want to look at.

8 hours ago, Alan White said:

It is available in 'Rowan'
but 'Rowan Black' 😉

Fine, I will do it myself.

Takes out a can of pink paint

Just did a quick and dirty CAD drawing of how a wedge can look like. Ignore the scales and stuff please...

I also made mistake with regards to the centre of gravity here. The point where it rotates should be a bit more forward.

Just now, Stu said:

@Concordia000 yes, the Ball mount unused wasn’t exactly rigid either, and I found similar issues with the little wedges available. With something solid it would work well. I guess the mount is working with loading a it is not designed to take, so stiction is worse than in Alt Az mode perhaps?

Sorry, I should have mentioned that I meant stiction in Alt-Az mode.

In the “equatorial” mode the stiction did not matter as much, because with my camera + scope setup (8deg x 5deg field) I did not need precise framing. I have to crop out a lot of the frame anyways, so being off by a few arcsecs doesn’t matter. It’s impossible to achieve precise framing with that setup anyways, because I had to twist the friction-adjusting knobs to “lock” the mount in place.

I also used the mini az in alt az mode that night, with a Borg 90FL attached (3.2kg with everything) and used the counterweight. Theoretically it should be butter smooth, but when I tried to track Jupiter at 100x there was always that little bit of stiction that annoyed the hell out of me. It was not a particular cold night either — 10 degrees or so.

Now let me talk a bit about the AZ75 in particular. I will have a very capable computerised altaz/EQ dual mode mount very soon, so I am really only lacking a capable manual mount. AZ100 is obviously too heavy for me; AZ75 is about the right weight and ticks a lot of boxes. However, it’s heavier than the RST-135 by about 1kg. I trust Rowan to make a butter smooth mount and love the built in encoders, but I don’t need the dual mounting capability and I do love slow motion on manual mounts. Nothing about the AZ75 is a dealbreaker for me, but at the same time, nothing about me makes me want to go “buy this now” either. So I just wanted that little bit of push: let it be pricing, colouring, a smaller version, or a wedge that makes the mount usable as an equatorial mount (I love manual EQ mounts)…

I think that might be too much for the EQM35…

The CEM-26 might be a better choice.

1 hour ago, Stu said:

In one of my crazier moments I gave that a go. It actually works very well, because you just need to pan in one axis to track planets so it is smoother than having to move two axes. With a solid wedge there’s no reason it couldn’t work.

I mean, I did almost the same thing with the setup attached. That’s an Altair Mini-AZ mounted on a Fornax Lightrack mounted on a SWSA wedge. The Lightrack was acting as a rotator of sorts. It worked decently well and I was able to take 75s subs without problems. 

The weakness there was certainly the wedge which had a lot of flex. The mini AZ’s stiction wasn’t ideal either, and there was no way to lock the axes completely. Because of that I decided to sell the setup and get a RST-135 instead. I will probably keep the Mini-AZ, but if Rowan ever makes an AZ50 or a Rowan-coloured AZ75… they can take my money.

5 hours ago, JeremyS said:

Rowanberry colour? 
🤣

I will literally put down my money right now if Rowan does make that colour. It’s gonna be the centre of focus at a star party, one way or the other.
Rowan please…

1 hour ago, Stephenstargazer said:

Hmmmmm? people talking about an AZ50 with slowmos, encoders etc and only weighing 3 kg......If that tube had reasonable wall thickness there is not much room to fit decent shafts and bearings inside or gears is there? So the real world capacity will come right down and the quality of motion will suffer and then it wont have the Rowan feel we love. Whats more there are such smaller mounts in the market already, have a look at http://www.desertskyastro.com/DSV-2.html. They are very well made mounts, I have had one, but it's no Rowan beater.

I wonder if with a well placed pan handle we really need slow motions anyway (and I like them!). Smaller mounts for smaller scopes might not be the best choice for regular use at very high magnification? ( and I have tried that too!)

PS @Concordia000 putting an AZ side mount on a wedge does not turn it into an equatorial - the balance is all wrong unfortunately. But you can use an equatorial on it's side as an AZ (if you must).

As long as the said AZ mount can have a counterweight shaft on the opposite side of the payload, and the Z-axis balance isn’t too off, it should be fine, no?

Maybe a bit of a selfish desire but I wish Rowan can make their mounts available in more colours.

A silver or red AZ75 will look a lot more compelling to me…

Though as mentioned above, if there is ever an AZ50 with silky smooth motion, Rowan can just take my money  

One thing people here might find counter intuitive is that I wish Rowan or other makers can make a wedge for their altaz mounts. There are so many premium manual Altaz mounts, but the only premium manual equatorial mount is the Vixen AP which is bloody expensive.

1 hour ago, johninderby said:

What I would like to see is an AZ50. A single sided mount with slo-mo and say a 10kg capacity and under 3 kg in weight.  Something to fill in a real gap in the market. And yes it wouldn't be cheap but think there would be a market for such a premium product. 🤔

This tbh. With encoders and the possibility to use motors down the line.

I would recommend a bigger Mak. A 90 Mak is *tiny*. It’s both a good thing and a bad thing; you will understand when you see one in person. Get the 127mm Mak if you can handle it. Upgrade the mount too; the travel scope comes with a photo tripod I believe, which doesn’t work well for a larger scope.
 

Maks will always be slower than comparable aperture refractors but they are excellent for planetary views and smaller DSOs. If you are looking for a scope for big DSOs, you want a Dobsonian. Skywatcher’s flex tube dobs are fairly portable and you might want to look into that.

From my experience you really want 4” or above for a refractor and 5-6” and above for a SCT/Mak. The 127mm Synta Mak will be a good choice or if you wish the splurge, OOUK makes 140mm Maks and Intes-Micro also makes more expensive 127mm Maks.

Have you ruled out Dobsonians? An 8” full size Dob shouldn’t be still relatively portable while being a blast to use visually. Alternatively there’s this but you will have to stomach the “helical focuser”.

https://www.firstlightoptics.com/heritage/sky-watcher-heritage-150p-flextube-virtuoso-gti.html

I believe it attaches to a tripod.

May I ask what the full weight with DSC fitted would be and if you know about the pricing?

The lack of slow motion, I assume, means the lack fo ability to add motors down the line. That's probably fine for a mount designed to be used manually, but I can't help but to feel that the niche for the AZ75 is somewhat limited. It is for someone who is looking for a manual mount that holds 8-15kg of equipment and possibly two scopes at the same time; those who want bigger scopes are better served by the AZ100 and those with smaller scopes are better served by the many single arm fork mounts on the market.

1 hour ago, DougQuaidHauser said:

Hello, yes it is something I want to try as well, and to answer your question, I am a complete noob with regards to astrophotography at this stage. So far I have tried it this year without much success due to using a 127 Mak. Mostly done planetary imaging, post processing video up to now which has been a blast.

I have a Canon 1000D DSLR but bought it used just the body so would need to buy a lens, but zero clue at this point which lens would be compatible as never been a camera person. Once researched I could buy a used lens and give it a go.

If you mention to the customer service/shop keeper that you have a Canon camera they should be able to tell you which lenses are compatible.

Second hand lenses are what I will recommend too, because they can be had for dirt cheap, like £50 at local stores. A 135-200mm lens will be pretty good to begin AP with, but you will still need an equatorial mount.

The SW72ED needs a field flattener to have a flat field over APS-C sensors iirc and it will still show chromatic aberrations. An alternative is to get a short FL Newtonian with a coma corrector, even though the latter isn’t strictly necessary.

But before you get any optics, you really need an equatorial mount no matter what.

I wish I have a Dob, but I am in the middle of London without a car...

Neither.

Yes, the bigger aperture does help somewhat, but you have more problems before that. You need an apochromatic (APO) refractor. And an equatorial mount.

The scopes you listed are all achromats and if you use them for imaging, they will have severe fringing (false colour) on the picture. That means every star will have a purple halo around it and while it can be mitigated with an aggressive filter and post processing, it’s not recommended.

If you track with your mount, it will introduce field rotation into your picture and you won’t be able to take long exposures. Your mount can be used with an wedge to act as an EQ mount, but that wedge is very expensive and it’s hard to recommend.

What I would suggest is to get a star tracker, or AZ-GTi on a wedge, and a small APO — 50-60mm in aperture. The small aperture will mean those scopes are not very good visually, but for photography the F-ratio and focal lengths are more important. For two scopes with identical F-ratios, the larger scope has a bigger magnification and more resolution which might be desirable, but for many DSOs the short focal length is actually an advantage. Do not underestimate what star trackers and a small APO can do; the attached picture was taken with a WO RedCat 51mm on a Fornax Lightrack with an unmodded Sony A7R.

Aperture does matter a lot more for visual though, and presumably your scope would not be for visual only. A big achromat is best for visual use though your 127 Mak is already a fantastic visual scope.

Looks like an old topic but no, Takahashis are not twice as good as their competitors. But their scopes are worth every penny you paid for them.

This hobby is plagued by diminishing returns, and that hits quick. A £400 8” Dob will show you most things an amateur scope can see. A £4000 setup, no matter what it is, will not show you 10 times as many things.

But say an Esprit 100 manages to be 80% of a FSQ at 1/4 the price, you cannot get the remaining 20% unless you pay the 3/4. There are alternatives, like a Borg 107FL F3.9 is probably 90% of a FSQ (it has issues with CA but is much lighter) and it’s 3/4 the price. Same with the TV NP-101is, presumably.

What you paid for the Tak went into quality control, better optics, reputation, and the exceptional build quality. Photos don’t do justice for how well built those things are. When you see it, even with how simple the livery is, you would know it’s expensive.

On 09/10/2021 at 16:11, Peter_D said:

I have a de-forked Meade 2080 dating from the mid 1990s. SCT prices are be a lot higher in Germany than the UK or especially the US!

One improvement that transformed the scope was buying an SCT Crayford focuser. Before, it had quite a bit of image shift when focusing. For medium / low powers, it would have been ok but I use it mostly for planetary and high magnification lunar so it needed addressing.

> SCT prices are be a lot higher in Germany

May I ask if you know why that is the case? Before the UK left the EU, both countries should have the same import/export rules towards the USA and China, the two leading SCT makers.

Or is it because people in Germany are more attracted towards refractors or Newtonians?