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attatching a phone to a dob


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I have downloaded skEye and I am looking to fasten the phone to an eight inch dob, has anyone tried this method yet? Cannot figure a way of holding the phone on the scope securely, but still be able to remove the phone quickly to input objects to look for.

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I used a bicycle mobile phone holder on my dob. Tried many ways to use my phones gps function on my scope. None worked as my scope confused the gps. Something to do with the scope being metal. It caused the phone screen to freeze, be at least 100° off and give me bad magnetic disturbance warnings.

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That seems to be a problem I will need to figure out. Would rubber between the tube and the phone work? Any other materials that will shield the phone that I can use as a barrier? I managed to get a holder from town today but as yet I have not figured out how to fit it our how far away from the tube I need it to be. skEye looks to be a great app, will be interesting to see if I can get it to work more accurately than my setting circle/altimeter method. Thnx for the help guys, much appreciated.

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I ditched the idea of attaching my phone to my scope and decided to get a Wixey and stuck a big setting circle under my dob base.

I only use my phone to find co-ordinates. Very easy and can find objects within a minute or so.

51620271-3721-f976.jpg51620271-3746-63fc.jpg

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Omg your setting circles make mine look like a 3 year old made them. I printed them on ten sheets of paper then cut them out and stuck them together, then I put them on the base, got an altimeter from Amazon for 4 quid. Only problem I have is my paving stone I have my dob on isn't level, and its cemented in and the missus won't let me rip them all up to level them :)

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Mine was quite cheap really. Downloaded a setting circle pic off of the interweb. Went to Staples, they enlarged it, printed it and then laminated it.

I then went to B&Q. Got a cheap sheet of chipboard. They cut it to size for free. Whilst I was there, I purchased 4 leveling legs, the sort you put on kitchen units. Screwed the legs to the board and level it up in my garden using a bullseye bubble level.

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i gave up on mounting my phone...because whatever software i used, it always seemed to keep losing it's alignment (e.g. you point the scope at the moon, lign up the phone so it's also pointing to the moon....then try finding something else witht he setup, e.g. jupiter....scroll accross the sky, it's already slightly off....scroll back to the moon and it's not even close).

this setup looks interesting though.

personally, i'm actually finding it alot of fun and getting to know the skies a bit more just by taking one constellation at a time, learning all the bits and bobs, what to look for inside it, etc, learning to use the finderscope to hope around the sky.....so i;m kinda glad the phone mounting didn't work, or i'd have ended up just inputting a name, going, looking and that'd be that.....alot more fun and challenging this way, even if it takes a while to find things.....

i think the "route" stays in your mind better if you find it yourself too. if it was just a case of inputting your target then moving where it told me too, i wouldn't ever be able to find anything without it...whereas this way I start recognising things a bit more, and can remember the route to a certain object.

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I just printed the circle onto a sheet of A4. Staples then scanned it on their pc and enlarged it to the correct size and then printed it off. You could save the circle to disk or memory stick also. I can not remember exact diameter of the circle, but I do remember the outer edge of the circle being an inch larger than my dob base, just so that when I attach a pointer to the base it points over the numbers, as you can see from my previous pics. I have a 10" dob, no idea if the 8" uses same size base.

The paper that the circle was printed on was a lot bigger than needed. Think it was printed on size A0. The paper will need to be trimmed before laminating.

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Tried the sucker, it wouldn't stick, gonna have to be some diy contraption. Lol nightfisher, had a feeling I was gonna get some ET phone home comments :)

Ismangil, have you tried it, does it work?

Sorry could not resist, so using the phone on the dob, is this to utilise the apps as a guide?

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That's the idea. But when the phone is placed near to a scope it gets a lot of magnetic interference, and the phones gps chucks a whobbly.

Plus it loses its usefulness once the scope passes a certain angle, you need to be a contortionist to be able to see the phones screen.

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