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New toy Vixen 80m f11

SnakeyJ

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SnakeyJ

SnakeyJ

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I've been looking for an 80's Vixen 80m achromat for a while, but just found and brought a very nice example on ABS. Thanks Stu!

I'm thinking this will be a very nice grab and go, but would also like to use for some solar. Can anyone recommend some non destructive solar mods to consider - I dont really want to chop, but might shorten a little for a focuser replacement. Also a good altaz mount to sit atop an existing eq5 tripod?

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Peter Drew

Peter Drew

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Depends on what type of solar observation you have in mind. For white light a Baader solar film filter or Herschel wedge would involve no modification. Hydrogen-alpha using a front mounted etalon and a rear blocking filter diagonal would give great results but expensive. The cheaper route would be a PST mod but this would involve some surgery to the OTA. A Quark could be used but the effective magnification would be rather high at F>45.   :smiley: 

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NickK

NickK

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The obvious one with the A80Mf is the Nick H vixen alpha scope mod.. the 910mm focal length gives extremely good solar views.

I found it a little lacking for DSO, it's too slow for visual use. It does work nicely for lunar.

Mine is now the front end of my spectrograph as it's high enough resolution to not have problems with achromat focusing. :D

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Stu

Stu

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I've been looking for an 80's Vixen 80m achromat for a while, but just found and brought a very nice example on ABS. Thanks Stu!

I'm thinking this will be a very nice grab and go, but would also like to use for some solar. Can anyone recommend some non destructive solar mods to consider - I dont really want to chop, but might shorten a little for a focuser replacement. Also a good altaz mount to sit atop an existing eq5 tripod?

Nice one Jake, I didn't twig it was you!!

I think you will be very happy with it, it is a lovely scope.

I reckon just sticking a Herschel Wedge in it would give cracking views. Shane does just this.

Enjoy it.

Stu

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SnakeyJ

SnakeyJ

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Nice one Jake, I didn't twig it was you!!

I think you will be very happy with it, it is a lovely scope.

I reckon just sticking a Herschel Wedge in it would give cracking views. Shane does just this.

Enjoy it.

Stu

Thanks Stu, I did think it might be you when I saw your e-mail address.     Photo's on ABS were terrible, but the scope looks in very nice original condition and I promise to give it a good home :)

Looking forward to first light, though may be a little delayed whilst I move home.

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SnakeyJ

SnakeyJ

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The obvious one with the A80Mf is the Nick H vixen alpha scope mod.. the 910mm focal length gives extremely good solar views.

I found it a little lacking for DSO, it's too slow for visual use. It does work nicely for lunar.

Mine is now the front end of my spectrograph as it's high enough resolution to not have problems with achromat focusing. :D

Thanks Nick for the pointers on this - I found references, but no direct link to Nick H's mod, but while searching turned up an excellent link to Matthias Bopp's mod.

http://www.dd1us.de/Downloads/Modification%20of%20a%20Coronado%20PST%200v7.pdf

Although dated back in 2010, this seems to be an excellent intro and displays some excellent engineering for a PST mod.    Excellent food for thought, though could take a little while to save up for the parts ;)

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Stu

Stu

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Thanks Stu, I did think it might be you when I saw your e-mail address. Photo's on ABS were terrible, but the scope looks in very nice original condition and I promise to give it a good home :)

Looking forward to first light, though may be a little delayed whilst I move home.

I'll email some decent resolution ones to keep you going until it arrives [emoji6]

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  • 2 months later...
SnakeyJ

SnakeyJ

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It's taken a long time, but I finally achieved first light with this scope yesterday and my first ever solar white light - http://stargazerslounge.com/topic/243916-first-light-vixen-a80m-and-first-white-light/

I managed to source an original Vixen dovetail from ENS and other than the fact this does not quite sit properly in my long custom clamp (as its wider than the dovetail profile at the ends) it was handled with ease by the HEQ5.

The finder is bright and clear with nice reticle and attaches solidly to the OTA.    Only a minor tweak was required to centre this up again after remounting.

The optics produced nice sharp surface detail on the sun and I spent a long time exploring the area around AR2339 which put on a spectacular show for a first outing.

The biggest revelation though was the RP focuser, although this is the standard Vixen single speed, it performed perfectly with no discernible back lash and light but positive control.     There is no noticeable droop or slop in the draw tube and plenty of extension, allowing me to comfortably find focus with and without diagonal, even with a relatively heavy Baader 8-24 zoom.

I was originally thinking of replacing the focuser with a 2" crayford, so that I could use my wider field EPs, 2" diagonal and perhaps add a 2" wedge at some point.    I shall hold off for the time being and enjoy the original focuser, but will replace the EP clamp with a 1.25" compression fitting and turn up some low profile adaptors for the 0.965" EPs.

The original Vixen 0.965" EPs, K 20mm, H 12.5mm and O 6mm performed very well indeed and I was running these up against my Zeiss Abbe Orthos (16mm and 4mm), though the seeing was not good enough to really test the short focal lengths and some dust/dirt was evident.     I will do a little cleaning of these and sure they will get some more use.

Really looking forward to testing the optics at night, but no doubts about the quality of this scope - a very nicely made and well looked after example of the Japanese art of achromatic refractors ;)

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