home made dew shield

[stickbow]

Hi Guy's

This is my first attempt at a dew shield for a skymax 150 pro, it is a campmat from blacks and it cost £4-99. It took about half an hour to cut out and fit around the Telrad mount and slider bar. It protudes almost 15 inches from the end of the scope, I think this is about right as the diameter is around 7 inches at the apeture end.

This hopefully will help someone or someone may give me feedback if it is not quite good eneough.

[estwing]

good effort i say!

[JamesM]

That looks to be the business for sure and you have still got plenty of mat left for any other size of scope you might get in the future. Some people in the past have decided to paint the inside with black paint, which apart from not working in the longer term (flakes off) really doesn't make an awful lot of difference in the dark anyway.

Great effort and thanks for posting, it will help others save some money for sure!

James

[NickW]

Hi Stickbow,

So since creating this master piece have you had any issues? Was it the right length? I wondered if dew shields would be flared like sun shields used on camera lens'

I have just purchased a skymax 150 pro, and am therefore en-route to be creating something like this.

BTW: Whats the other thing n the scope beside the finder?

Nick

[stickbow]

Hi NickW

No problems so far, I have used it several times and I have also made a dew shield for the Telrad and that also works wel I bought a Baader solar filter sheet and fitted some between 2 cardboard circles, then fitted this to a smaller version of the dew shield to watch the Venus transit, the whole lot came from a camping mat costing £4-99, not bad. The main dew shield extends out about 14" in front of the scope.

[Pete Presland]

nice dew shield! where did you get the mats? i looked for some camping mats myself but could not find them anywhere, mind you it was winter

[Eastridge]

Bunnygod1 , in case it helps I picked up- a black camping mat from these people yesterday - £5.99.

http://www.thisisitstores.co.uk

Yet to fashion it for 250 Dob, first decision seems to be whether to just go up to focuser ( 2" from end of OTA) or do a cut out for it.

[space3]

made one just like that for my old scope and it was a great job, it does make a serious difference, I used to find it would easily double the time I would get observing.

[stickbow]

Hi all, I got the camping mat from blacks, light blue on the outside and very dark blue on the inside.

[Solar_observer]

Does it matter what colour the mat is? I want to make one today,they sell them in argos but there light blue.

tony

[faulksy]

colour wont matter, the darker the better though as it wont reflect as much light, but if theres no light around it wont matter

[Solar_observer]

Just finished the third mod to my basic sw130. Dew shield for the ota and telrad,made from a camping mat and strips of velcros. Not very pretty but hope it will do the job. Also a jubilee clip infront of the first tube ring, to allow me too rotate the tube (this mod works well as I've tried it) all I need now is clear skies.

tony

[paul schofield]

Very nice looking dew shield. I am currently trying to make one for my 200p, I say trying as last weekend I went out to buy all the bits for it, camping shop closed, no mats in poundland, even Millets believe it or not, had none, went to 3 other shops, no luck, almost bought an exercise mat from Argos but it was quite bright & I want black really. On the plus side I got the duct tape and some velcro too. So might buy the camp mat from Ebay. Still cheaper than buying ready made.

[LukeSkywatcher]

Looks like a very well made dew shield. I wish mine was as pretty. Mine is Kaki green. I use it on my SW Heritage 130P.

I have a dew strip heater now for my 8" SCT.

[Solar_observer]

Thanks guys. Mine was bought from argos, the colour is not as bright as in the picture its cos the flash went off.£6.99 for the mat and£2.99 for the Velcro strips. Did the telrad too.

tony