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crashtestdummy

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Well my last viewing session was 4th of January and I've even considered selling my 16",paracorr and 30mm es 82 and buying bits for the 22" like the feathertouch with sips and 80mm finderscope and just writing this season off and starting fresh with the 22" in September.kinda talked out of it as Virgo is getting higher now and I could bag another 100 galaxies in a fee sessions if the weather ever clears.

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well that's scope number 3 up for sale.i was going to wait until after spring to sell it but the weather is Rubbish and ive used it twice in the last 3 months and when I move down south we don't have space for it so its going to finance the 22".scopeless all through galaxy season,what am I thinking of!!!

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madness crash, madness!

at least buy yourself a set of 100mm binos and tripod so you can take advantage of the odd clear sky now and again!

I can guarantee the next night of clear skies, you will be looking wistfully at the stars and head straight in to the garage to spend 5 hours grinding :evil:

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Playing about with the webcam mod again, this time indoors,  have pointed the scope at a bright led light, looking through an eye piece or just looking through the focuser, its washed out with light, put the web cam in, nothing is hitting the chip, point the chip at the light source its detecting the changes between dark and light, have tried all the previous sugestions

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Playing about with the webcam mod again, this time indoors,  have pointed the scope at a bright led light, looking through an eye piece or just looking through the focuser, its washed out with light, put the web cam in, nothing is hitting the chip, point the chip at the light source its detecting the changes between dark and light, have tried all the previous sugestions

Don't know what to suggest. If we have an observing session if we get a good night again you'll have to come along and we can have a look.

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Finally managed to get some observing in at Winscarr, windy and icy and the moon washing things out but the seeing was excellent.

Saw 5 bands on Jupiter, shadow of one of the moons and finally was able to resolve the great spot.

A few messier objects and the first look at the Orion Nebula through my scope and the usual moon safari, Proculus crater shining nicely tonight as well, the ejector trails showing up nicely.

Such a relief to get out for a couple of hours, well worth the frozen tootsies and watering eyes.

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Playing about with the webcam mod again, this time indoors,  have pointed the scope at a bright led light, looking through an eye piece or just looking through the focuser, its washed out with light, put the web cam in, nothing is hitting the chip, point the chip at the light source its detecting the changes between dark and light, have tried all the previous sugestions

one last thing to consider - is the webcam and the adaptor absolutely square on?

If it is even ever so slightly off centre, it will be hitting the side of the focusser tube or off to the side of the secondary mirror and not pick anything up. I think you only need about 5 degrees off centre and its doooooomed!

try removing the webcam from the adaptor and manually hold the cam against the focus tube and move it about whilst pointing the scope at a bright light indoors. you should see the dark / light / dark thing you experienced when testing the cam independantly.

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Hooray, got back from 5-a-side footy, had a quick bit of tea and it was still clear skies! Managed to get out for about 2 hours doing some Lunar/Jupiter imaging until the clouds fully rolled in at the expected 11pm.

Same I managed a few hours too.

Sent from my iPhone using Tapatalk

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the moon was ludicrously bright last night which ruled out any decent dso observing, so I tried to do some webcam imaging of the moon and jupiter but have stumbled upon a fatal flaw.

got the battery charged, mount set up good with accurate levelling and north - checked the tracking on jupiter at x250 and it was holding in the field of view for 2 minutes - sorted! Plug the webcam in and get a big white splodge on the laptop screen and start trying to focus -

NOT ENOUGH INWARD FOCUS!!!!!!!!!!! ARRRRRRRR!!!!!!!!!

I need about another inch of inward focus for it to work. Blast. So that put paid to doing some imaging with the dob! I'm not sure how to overcome this issue, as the focuser has a 2" eyepiece holder thats only about an inch or so long and the 2" to 1.25" converter only adds about 4mm to the whole length. So unless I barlow the webcam (giving an effective focal length of 3000mm!!! gulp) I'm not sure i will ever get the benefit of 12" of light bucket on jupiter. Plus I think the tracking at 3000mm might be a bit much.

Never mind. Spent an hour ticking off a few more of the lunar 100 using my new moon polarising filter * and taking some widefield piccies with my camera.

Nick

* 12" dob and a decent adjustable polarising filter and good steady air gave some spectacular views of the moon. properly spectacular, really 3D effect and such massive clarity. Without the filter you actually cant see much and have big white blobs on your retina for 10 minutes after looking in the ep. I have fallen in love with the moon again with this filter!

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The Moon looked great through my BST 8mm on my 200P last night, I bet the 300P is even better.

You could always change your focuser Nick to something like this? http://www.firstlightoptics.com/skywatcher-focusers/skywatcher-dual-speed-low-profile-1252-inch-crayford-focuser.html

That's the same one I have on my 200P and it does both imaging and visual ok.

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