First Light: Omni XLT 120

[robhatherton]

My new scope arrived a couple of days ago accompanied by the obligatory cloudy skies. However, that gave me useful time to practise setiing up the mount, balancing it, aligning the finderscope on a telegraph pole over the fields and so on. Last night the sky cleared about 11 so I went out. I already had the CG4 roughly polar aligned so after mounting and balancing the scope I set the mount axis to my latitude, 53 deg. Inspirationally (I thought!) I squinted through the hole where the polar scope would go then adjusted the latitude screws and azimuth screws to get Polaris in the middle of the small circle I was looking through. No problem and I was pleased with myself as you can imagine.

So I swung the scope round to align the finderscope on the brightest object in the sky which was Saturn of course. I found aligning the finderscope very quick and easy (but then I am used to the virtually useless one on my Travelscope 70!). With a bright object I found I could often sight along the main tube and find it like that. I felt the view was nicely sharp and contrasty; I only have the 25mm eyepiece that comes with the scope and a Revelation 2.5x barlow so I was limited to 40x and about 100x magnification but that was enough to make out the Cassini division as a line separating 2 rings so I was very pleased. I tried the lenses that came with the Travelscope and the 20mm is okay when barlowed but the 10mm just resulted in a larger blob which is probably to be expected: a poor lens just doesnt hold up when barlowed I suppose. I'm looking forward to ordering a couple of BST's as advised in another thread. I have tried to use the setting circles but I am not sure:

• do I have to readjust the RA scale again, immediately before moving to a new target?
  
• do I need to tighten the thumb screw before moving to the next target or does that lose the setting?
  

I would like to say that I split some double stars and found a few nebulae but that woudn't be true; I spent some time looking at and identifying some of the brighter stars: Arcturus, Spica, Vega and so on. I will need to ask advice i the relevant section on planning an observing session properly now.

I feel I am learning though: celestial coordinates; the importance of balacing the scope makes it effortless to slew it to a target and it can behave alarmingly if you don't! Having a handy camping table, red bike light, a garden chair and very low gardening stool all add to comfort and convenience. All in all I am very pleased with the finish, look and quality of the thing for just under £400.

By the time I looked around it was 12.30 so I packed up: lifted the tube off and took it in the house, put the eyepieces away, loosened the accessory tray, dropping it slightly to turn it round allowed me to fold the tripod legs in a little and, after removing the counter weight I just put the tripod and mount together in through the garage door.

Finally I have also come to a greater appreciation of the Travelscope 70 because, sitting on an old camera tripod with the XLT star diagonal and 35mm eyepiece it's quite an efficient piece of kit itself! Thanks to all the people who have helped and offered advice on this forum; now I will need to concentrate on what I am looking for, not just what I looking through!

Rob

[Grotemobile]

That is a very good refractor.I have got a 102mm one

on a EQ-3 mount.Mine is a Vixen.It is very easy to use,

set up like this.

Steve

[Stardust]

I've had one of those and found it a very nice scope

[astronymonkey]

Lovely scope,

As a starter you might want to use it as grotemobile suggests as this acts more or less as an alt az mount .Then once you get used to the scope you can start having a go at polar alignment etc. and worrying about the scales etc

looks great

cheers

[hoops86]

ive always thought this is one of the coolest looking refractors out there! dunno why... i just do! nothing to do with how good it performs (im sure very well) but just for its looks

[andrew63]

Hope you enjoy your new scope - the autumn skies await ! A BST is a good addition too.

andrew