what ccd for ed120 pro

[terry67]

hello,,,ive just bouhgt a second hand skywatcher ed120 pro,,,and am now looking at purchasing a ccd camera to go with it

ive got a webcam for the planets so im  looking for somthing for nebulae and deep sky

price range...200-500 aprox   depending on how many saturdays i want to work

any advise is much appreciated

thanks terry

[lensman57]

hello,,,ive just bouhgt a second hand skywatcher ed120 pro,,,and am now looking at purchasing a ccd camera to go with it

ive got a webcam for the planets so im  looking for somthing for nebulae and deep sky

price range...200-500 aprox   depending on how many saturdays i want to work

any advise is much appreciated

thanks terry

You have bought a scope with an FL 900mm, a very fine scope but quite long for general widefield imaging. The size of a CCD to get  u a decent field of view should be quite large and these are very expensive at the best of times unless you find a used one , there are a couple for sale on UK Astro Buy and Sell for about £1300.00 upwards well outside of your budget. My advice is to get a modded DSLR to start with, prefereably one with the Baader Filter Mod. This Baader Mod is not necessary but gives u the option for daytime photography too. I am afraid that u won't find anything  useful below the £1200.00 mark, the decent ones will set u back above £ 1500.00. There is the QHY 8L which is a cooled OSC camera ( same as a DSLR but with cooling ) and that is about  £900.00 new, this will match your scope and from time to time they turn up for sale at around £650.00~£700.00 used.

A.G

[ollypenrice]

Well, you could find a second hand Atik 16HR or maybe the later 314L (which really isn't significantly better) for the upper end of your budget. This would have a small chip but would be of very, very serious quality. If you have a mount that is accurate under autoguiding then, with reasonable filters, you could take world class images. There can be no doubt about that. Of course a DSLR would give you a much bigger chip but, in a fairly slow scope, it will not give you comparable image quality.

On a budget second hand is your best possible friend.

Olly

[terry67]

hi...if i purchased the reducer i think it brings the scope down to around f6.3....would that help things

[Davey-T]

How handy are you at DIY ?, you could get a S/H Canon 450d or later model ( if Gina hasn't hoovered them all up ) and mod it yourself and budget for a light pollution filter as I don't think Carshalton is the darkest place in the country Yes f/r would help.

If looking to get a CCD presumably you're thinking of colour on your budget as you'd need the same again for a filter wheel and filters.

Dave

[ollypenrice]

A manual filterwheel and basic filterset would not come in at too much cost. People 'upgrade' to electric ones but when my USB connections get cantankerous I wonder why I went there!! (I run three electric filterwheels here but sometimes miss my manual one which never did anything wrong...)

The main purpose of a focal reducer is to widen your field of view. Using it to speed things up is a little more complicated. If you are feeling brave look up 'the F ratio myth.' Depending on your target the 'myth' criticism is valid or not valid.

Olly

[terry67]

hi,,,i have a filter wheel and meade 4000 filters

[lensman57]

to turn up used as

hi,,,i have a filter wheel and meade 4000 filters

Have a look at Orion G3 cooled CCDs or an Atik Titan, the sensors are quite small but they will make a reasonable galaxy hunter - imager and can do some planetary nebula but no wide field imaging there, alternatively wait for an Atik 314L+ to turn up used as people upgrade to 460 EXM, the used prices are about £700.00 but the sensor is still samll for widefield imaging.

A.G

[terry67]

thanks everyone