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Showing results for tags 'diy'.
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More than a year has passed since the construction of the Low Spec spectrograph in version 2.0 provided by the author of the project (@Paul Gerlach). The project provided for the purchase of a ready-made module for illumination of the slit. From the beginning, I missed a decent calibration module and slit illumination. But why buy something for almost PLN 100, when you can illuminate the slit while building a spectrum calibration module and add additional functionality. Everything is great on the "project": Inside the device: But the electrical diagram I drew was- 1 reply
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I bought two new dew heaters. They are sold to be used on camera lenses and powered from USB. I have modified them to reduce the power from 8 Watt to 2 Watt which will be enough for my demand. Some photos and documentation from this project: http://www.astrofriend.eu/astronomy/projects/project-heating-band/05-project-heating-band.html This will be battery operated and I try to reduce the power consumtion of the equipment. /Lars
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Hi guys and girls, I would like your thoughts on my grand design for my observatory as Kevin McCloud is busy and I am looking for that little gem of advice which may help me navigate around or avoid a common or not so common problem already addressed by the informed users of SL. I have a (second) shed measuring 2.5m x 3.0m and this is to be my observatory with great views 340° of the night sky (tree hiding NNW so not an issue). I live in the country 10 miles away from the nearest town so light pollution isn't an issue although I'm not in a dark skies site I have looked at the website belo
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I've been contemplating making a portable power box so I can take my mount to a dark site, a friend gave me an old lorry battery that no longer turns the engine over but will hold some charge. My intention was to get a nice enclosure and build something that looked professional like a few other members have created on here, unfortunately spare time is limited so I went for a simpler solution and created the following and it works very well.
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Hi all, As a beginner I'm in the process of acquiring all the equipment necessary to start imaging on an EQ3pro. As we're all experiencing, it's tricky to get your hands on any equipment at the moment due to stock shortage so I've been thinking of ways to keep myself busy in the meantime! I thought I'd share a project I worked on today that will give me a greater view of the night sky from my covered balcony. There are some good views from the balcony from East to West but using the tripod severely limits any overhead views. To bring the setup closer to the edge o
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From the album: Astronomical Equipment
finished android nichrome wire heater -
From the album: Astronomical Equipment
Heating my 21mm Baader Hyperion -
corrector heater strap installed with controller
Badweather posted a gallery image in Member's Album
From the album: Astronomical Equipment
Corrector heater installed -
From the album: Astronomical Equipment
finished corrector heater -
From the album: Astronomical Equipment
finished diagonal heater -
From the album: Astronomical Equipment
star diagonal heater -
From the album: Astronomical Equipment
I finally received enough of the parts for my DIY dew control system to begin making the first one. -
In the famous words of Bilbao Baggins, I'm going on an adventure! Almost 2 years ago i got rid of my old shed with the intention of replacing it with a R O R shed, Well a lot has happened since then, but no R O R shed ? No way i could build one, my DIY skills are rubbish. My mount and scope plus other bits have sat in the garage ever since, mainly because it's such a pain to drag everything out and set up only to be thwarted by cloud/rain, so i decided that they would stay in the garage until the arrival of R O R shed, so fast forward 2 years..... Well! while browsing so
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Hi all, Pretty often I read about people having issues that may be related to backlash in DEC or RA, and I would like to offer a very simple and effective cure for it. I have done it on my HEQ5 Pro but surely it can be modified for any mount that needs it. With this simple fix, I can live with a rather big backlash (with no risk for binding in freezing temperatures). For DEC, I always balance carefully (neither front nor back heavy). Then I stretch the coil spring until it has a small impact on the DEC balance (and later in the evening I eventually forget about loosening it when I sl
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Hello, It's been a long time since I've posted in this forum, anyway I've picked up a Skywatcher 200p F/6 dobsonian as a DIY project whilst I continue to work on a new telescope from scratch, (I've started to grind the mirror). I'll be making improvements to this dobsonian as a project and learning experience, I've already got a temperature controlled fan which has a probe that can measure both mirror and ambient temperature. I'll be measuring the primary mirror with my in progress Foucault/Ronchi/Bath Tester when that's finished in the next couple of weeks, may even refigure it d
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Hi guys! I thought I'd pass on this link to a blog I am constructing. I intend to detail and illustrate all the steps involved in the construction of a 2.2m square dome observatory from its conception to it's complete outfitting. I am an amateur astronomer and most of the stuff I used in the making of the dome, apart from the actual construction materials was from recycled stuff and bits and pieces I managed to scrounge. A lot of the outfitting electronics and gadgetry came from cheap Asian sources and the circuitry and software was again partly home grown or borrowed from other sources.
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Finally a clear night and some good images grabbed with my DIY All Sky Camera. All stitched together in Light Room and the resulting video stuck up on YouTube and now linked to here Hopefully it will be clear again soon and can get some more good timelapses. Shame I am not further north with a possibility of an aurora, but hey ho. Thanks for looking
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observing chair Wooden Observing Chair - UK Source Required
DeepSkyMan posted a topic in DIY Astronomer
Hi there, I've been searching for a supplier or manufacturer of wooden observing chairs in the UK, with very little success (plenty over the pond). Do any SGLrs know of a source for these in the UK? I've looked at the Geoptik offeirng 'Nadira', but not sure of the build quality. In addition the base looks too narrow to me, also, being a short a##rse, the lack of foot rests in the design is a negative for me :-) Looking for something akin to this: Kind Regards Paul J. -
Took the bull by the horns and done the power modification on my Eq6 pro to connect via the 2pin connector , bit nerve racking haven’t really done much soldering before ,managed to do soldering without frying anything, used Blu-tac to isolate surrounding area so I didn’t solder anything I shouldn’t have , mount powered up checked slewing with handset , steady red light voltage reading 14v dropping to 13.9v slewing phew ?
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Hi SGL A call for ideas. I’m sat in a ferry on my way to the beautiful dark skies of the west coast of Ireland. I’ve packed my ED80 and porta Mount ready to enjoy some pristine skies. What I’ve forgotten is my finder scope ?. Can I make a make shift finder / red dot finder? Any ideas greatly received. Brendan
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Decided to put cooling fans on my newtonians a 200pds and a 130pds ,used a 120mm on the 200 and a 80mm on the 130pds ,i used, Be Quite silent Wings2 fans they use rifle bearings and are so quite German made, i did the 200 first and was impressed with this make so ordered the same make for the 130 pds it comes with a lead with four wires but only needed neg ang pos so snipped other two out , made a disc from plastic and cut out around collimation screws on primary then used velcro to attach to OTA fitted a 2.1mm dc socket on to the disc then bought a usb lead to 2.1mm barrel though i may
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I have several parts, motors, and an arduino based AstroEQ controller that I don't use and maybe they could be useful to someone else. Btw I currently live in Turkey and I will ship everything with registered post from here. It should take approximately 2-3 weeks to reach to UK or other parts of Europe. I can accept payments from Paypal and also UK bank transfer. First, I have the arduino based controller. I have put it in a plastic project box. Pretty much everything is connected by jumper cables and the stepper drivers are on a breadbox. So it would be possible to change the casi
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I and my girlfriend has come home from a one week travel at Malta, a small island in the Medeterranien Sea. About a mount before we go I came in contact with an amateur astronomer down there, Maurice. He invited me and my girfriend to visit him and his DIY built observatory. The observatory is built on top of his house and it has a real dome. If you find it interesting to read about it I have done a small report from our visit at the Malta observatory with photos: http://www.astrofriend.eu/astronomy/observatory-sites/malta-maurice-observatory/malta-maurice-observatory.html
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It's about time that I got together a thread describing my rebuild of my old Orion Optics SPX350. I'd bought this a *long* time ago with a mind to doing it up to use for AP, but then house move, life, etc meant it sat around doing not a lot for a long time. When I came to use it, I got some good results, esp on planetary work, but also found that under the weight of the heavier SBIG CCD, the thin tube didn't hold collimation particularly well. Here it was: So, eventually, I decided to have a rebuild. I plumped for a truss tube over a remount inside a carbon tube. Not sure whe
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I am building a newtonian reflector telescope, and I could use some help. This is my first DIY telescope, so I am pretty unprepared and don't know where to buy some stuff, namely optics. I am planning on going for a 8" aperture, but I can't find a website that sells mirrors. What website or sites has good quality mirrors but isn't to expensive, and what mirror coating is best? All help is appreciated, thank you in advance!
