Zakalwe Posted December 6, 2013 Share Posted December 6, 2013 Mine landed today from the guys at FLO. Great service as usual.What a beast. Beautifully packaged in a substantial roadie type case. The mount looks absolutely superb, and the quality of machining and finish really marks a step up from Skywatcher. The counterweight bar is massive compared to the spindly, wobbly thing on the standard EQ6.I've thrown it onto the pier, but I need to fetch a M12 bolt to secure it down.I'll do a proper post when I have it secured to the mount, but in the meantime.....no more graunching gears! Link to comment Share on other sites More sharing options...
Steve 1962 Posted December 6, 2013 Share Posted December 6, 2013 Very nice - congratulations on your new toy! Link to comment Share on other sites More sharing options...
Chris Posted December 6, 2013 Share Posted December 6, 2013 Looks and sounds wonderful, like you say bye bye coffee grinder! Link to comment Share on other sites More sharing options...
sloz1664 Posted December 6, 2013 Share Posted December 6, 2013 Nice mount, lucky you and to put icing on your premature Christmas cake, it's getting really good reviews. cheers Steve Link to comment Share on other sites More sharing options...
Chris Posted December 6, 2013 Share Posted December 6, 2013 I think you can probably wave goodbye to guiding at shorter focal lengths Link to comment Share on other sites More sharing options...
tingting44 Posted December 6, 2013 Share Posted December 6, 2013 wow! Link to comment Share on other sites More sharing options...
Zakalwe Posted December 6, 2013 Author Share Posted December 6, 2013 I think you can probably wave goodbye to guiding at shorter focal lengths I'm hoping to use my C11 (with a focal reducer) to image some galaxies in the Spring. 1.7metres of focal length will soon see if it's any good!The Equinox 80 looks lost on it! I can't polar align as its piddling with rain. Plus the new EQDIR cable doesn't want to play. Windows 7 sees it and installs the driver, but EQASCOM won't connec to it, even though its on Com5??? Link to comment Share on other sites More sharing options...
Chris Posted December 6, 2013 Share Posted December 6, 2013 Looks amazing, almost war like even!Have you had a word with Gina? Hers is running nicely I think she might be able to help. If you have a laptop with a diferent OS it might be worth trying perhaps?I'm picking up the bigger brother of your Equinox on Sunday and I'm just thinking how nice that would look on an EQ8! Speaking of which, slightly off topic if you dont mind, I see you have a TRF with your Equinox, is it a straight forward connection to the scope? Just thinking of other options to the SW .85.I will be following with interest, especially your plans with the C11, that will be some serious resolution and framing on galaxies!Chris Link to comment Share on other sites More sharing options...
Zakalwe Posted December 6, 2013 Author Share Posted December 6, 2013 Hi Chris,Thanks for the comments.The TRF has a 2" nosepiece that goes straight into the focuser. I would prefer a screwed connection, to be honest...I'm paranoid about it dropping out! Hence the blue lanyard cable-tied to the camera and hooked back onto the scope.Is it the Equinox 120 that you are getting? If so, the TRF-2008 isn't suitable. It works on scopes with a focal length of 400-600mmhttp://www.televue.com/pdf/literature/Focal%20Reducer%20Flattener.pdfYou want the "normal" Skywatcher one:http://www.firstlightoptics.com/reducersflatteners/skywatcher-focal-reducers.htmlRgdsSteve J Link to comment Share on other sites More sharing options...
Stephen Posted December 6, 2013 Share Posted December 6, 2013 Looking good I don't suppose you could answer my question for me could you?http://stargazerslounge.com/topic/201455-eq8-az-locking-screws/Thanks Link to comment Share on other sites More sharing options...
Zakalwe Posted December 6, 2013 Author Share Posted December 6, 2013 Looking good I don't suppose you could answer my question for me could you?http://stargazerslounge.com/topic/201455-eq8-az-locking-screws/Thanks No problem.Let me know if you need any more dimensions. Link to comment Share on other sites More sharing options...
Stephen Posted December 6, 2013 Share Posted December 6, 2013 No problem.Let me know if you need any more dimensions. Link to comment Share on other sites More sharing options...
Zakalwe Posted December 7, 2013 Author Share Posted December 7, 2013 Problem solved on the EQDIR front. I de-installed ASCOM and EQASCOM and then reinstalled the lot. It still didn't work, so I installed the Celestron Unified ASCOM driver and it all sprang into life. I have no idea why this was de-installed itself?Its now chucking a pretty big load around like a boss Link to comment Share on other sites More sharing options...
Earl Posted December 7, 2013 Share Posted December 7, 2013 you have room for another scope or two on there Link to comment Share on other sites More sharing options...
Zakalwe Posted December 7, 2013 Author Share Posted December 7, 2013 LOL!Im not too sure on the side-by-side arrangement, to be honest. I don't like leaving the scopes in the obs, and I won't be using both at the same time. Will have to think about this one. Link to comment Share on other sites More sharing options...
Zakalwe Posted December 9, 2013 Author Share Posted December 9, 2013 Well I snatched a couple of minutes to try and polar align tonight. Clouds rolled back in though, so I didn't get anywhere. To be honest, I am just playing with cable control and tidying up at the moment. I have never used a Synscan controller, so I'm not too sure of what I am doing. I *think* that I have to do a 3-star align and then see what it says about the error? Link to comment Share on other sites More sharing options...
stephen_usher Posted December 9, 2013 Share Posted December 9, 2013 Well I snatched a couple of minutes to try and polar align tonight. Clouds rolled back in though, so I didn't get anywhere. To be honest, I am just playing with cable control and tidying up at the moment. I have never used a Synscan controller, so I'm not too sure of what I am doing. I *think* that I have to do a 3-star align and then see what it says about the errorNot quite. You're supposed to do a 2 or 3 star alignment (three is better) and then use the "Polar Align" function, during which you pick a star, the mount slews to it, you centre it and then the scope slew to where it thinks the star should be if the mount's polar aligned. You then move the mount using the adjusters until the star is in the centre of view.You then do another 2 or three star alignment and repeat until the error given in the alignment is small enough. Link to comment Share on other sites More sharing options...
Zakalwe Posted December 9, 2013 Author Share Posted December 9, 2013 Thanks Stepehn,Its cleared up a bit here, so am on with this now. Link to comment Share on other sites More sharing options...
Zakalwe Posted December 10, 2013 Author Share Posted December 10, 2013 Right, I think that I've sussed it. It took a good few goes as the mount would shift ever so slightly when I cinched up the azimuth bolts. Perhaps the base or base plate is not perfectly flat and it is "rocking" slightly? Or there could be a bit of grit under it? Anyway, its reporting a pretty small error now. GOTOs put the selected star pretty much bang in the centre of an 8mm EP on the 11" SCT. I can always have a bash at drift aligning later.Compared to my old EQ6, this thing is a joy. I had a fair bit of backlash in the 6 in the DEC axis that I was never able to tweak out. The 8, in comparison, seems backlash free. Touch a direction button and it just moves.Its a school night tonight, otherwise I'd have a bash at shooting a few frames. I've got my SCT focal reducer already spaced up, so shooting at 1.7metres of focal length will soon tell me what the tracking is like. Link to comment Share on other sites More sharing options...
Tinker1947 Posted December 10, 2013 Share Posted December 10, 2013 Do you have the FR to Chip spacing, i may one day decide to image something..) Link to comment Share on other sites More sharing options...
Zakalwe Posted December 10, 2013 Author Share Posted December 10, 2013 Do you have the FR to Chip spacing, i may one day decide to image something.. )I've set it at 108mm. Its an Antares one that I've had kicking about...there's various posts on t'Internet about how the spacing on the Antares should be 105mm, 108mm, 79mm or 85mm :icon_scratch:I've never tried imaging with the big SCT, so I fancy having a bash. Mind you, there clouds are all encompassing, so I might have to wait until March! Link to comment Share on other sites More sharing options...
Tinker1947 Posted December 10, 2013 Share Posted December 10, 2013 Thanks for the info i have the Celestron 6.3 so the spacing will be different, will have a search round later.....the sky was clear last night here, 2-3 hours just roaming about, think i need a EP heater as they were misting up or may be get the hairdryer.. Link to comment Share on other sites More sharing options...
Zakalwe Posted December 11, 2013 Author Share Posted December 11, 2013 Last night was clouded over (again) so I had a bash at upgrading the firmware to the latest (3.35). Things, predictably, went skew-whiff as the damn USB-to-serial adapter kept failing on me, which resulted in a dead handset. Everytime I ran the firmware upgrade it would die at 1 or 2 %. I spent an hour messing around with the COM port settings with no luck. Finally, on the off-chance, I plugged the USB-to-serial into my USB3 hub (it was plugged direct into one of the USB ports on the PC) and it only went and worked like a charm. I have no idea why it wouldn't work when plugged into the PC, but would work when plugged into the hub???I hate computers........ Link to comment Share on other sites More sharing options...
ollypenrice Posted December 11, 2013 Share Posted December 11, 2013 Great. The resemblance to the Gemini is obvious. I can keep myself reasonably calm by following these EQ8 threads till ours arrives!The 'out and back' method is a very fast form of drift. I don't know if you know it? http://www.cloudynights.com/item.php?item_id=2838Olly Link to comment Share on other sites More sharing options...
Zakalwe Posted December 11, 2013 Author Share Posted December 11, 2013 Thanks Holly. Predictably, its foggy here, so it'll have to wait till later. :-[ Link to comment Share on other sites More sharing options...
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