Telescope "plumbing"

[Longinthetooth]

Hi all - I'm always impressed by the knowledge base here and the willingness of members to give a helping hand. So here's another query.

I have been surprised and sometimes daunted by the variety of bits of "plumbing" required to connect components like focusers, filter wheels, focal reducers, eyepieces and cameras together.

Supplier's descriptions such as:

"supplied with a 1.25” eyepiece adaptor, 1.25” focuser nosepiece, T-2 camera adaptor and locking ring" (picked at random from a supplier's website - no offence intended!) will be prefectly clear to experienced users but don't mean much to newcomers to the hobby like me. I find myself googling to see if I can find out what the bits are and what they look like, and having accumulated quite a lot of kit I discover I haven't got the "bits" needed to connect them together. In fact I wouldn't know how to describe or how to ask for them. People might ask me "is it M42 or M48?" or say " all you need is a female t thread extension" or "a hosetail adaptor" and generally my reaction is to glaze over.

There's a whole vocabulary related to the plumbing alone  so my question is:

Is there, anywhere, a beginner's guide (preferably illustrated with big friendly pictures) devoted to the adaptors/connectors without which the kit doesn't fit together?

John B

(Only starting to get the hang of it......!)

[oldpink]

it can be a minefield esp as camera manufactures tend to use non standard fittings so you are forced to use their brand accessory's

I don't think there is any default way to connect kit as everyone will have slightly different equipment
sometimes you have to bodge it together with what you have or look for a custom attachment,

Google can be a very useful tool for searching out info on adapters and what they will fit

[Alien 13]

I was lucky the WOZS71 manual has a section showing all the accessories with pictures showing what goes with what for any application.

Alan

[astromerlin]

A handy piece of equipment to have is a digital caliper to measure the diameter of threaded items you might have.

First Light Optics has plenty of images of adapter on their website (click on link at top of page)

Here's a few handy ones to get you going.

Male thread is on the outside, Female on the inside

Threads designated M eg M42 will be approx mm size on a male thread eg M42 = 42mm

T thread is M42 x 0.75 (thread pitch) It is called a T thread to differentiate it from the old camera lens thread which is 42mm but different pitch.

A T2 adapter connects to a camera fitting (DSLR) and has a female M42 thread.

i've never heard of hosetail but a guess is the fitting is like a circular dovetail which looks like a slanted groove.

[Longinthetooth]

Thank you for your reply John. I'll have a look at the FLO website and see if i can lay my hands on digital calipers - good advice that!

[Owmuchonomy]

I do empathise. One useful source I refer to (because it has great photos) is the Baader website. I also have the brochure which shows a plethora of connection options! Try that.

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