Show us your dual scope set ups

[Tyson M]

Here is my current dual scope set up

[Anne S]

I'm just in the process of setting up my dual imaging rig. Everything connects correctly. Now I just need to get the telescopes pointing the same way, I'm hoping I can use the moon once the cloud clears.

[Axunator]

Tak FC100-DF + C9.25 on AZ-EQ6 and Berlebach Planet:

 

[Stu]

1 hour ago, Axunator said:

Tak FC100-DF + C9.25 on AZ-EQ6 and Berlebach Planet:

Very nice! Is that a wrap around the 925? Have you tried it out yet, does it make much difference?

[Axunator]

3 hours ago, Stu said:

Very nice! Is that a wrap around the 925? Have you tried it out yet, does it make much difference?

Yes, it’s an insulation wrap: two layers of reflecting aluminized bubble wrap with a thin foam layer sandwiched in between. I added it last spring after lot of talk about SCT/MCT insulation on CN, and I have to admit it seems to decrease required cool-down time to effectively zero. Haven’t tried it during really cold winter weather yet, though.

I still also use a corrector dew heater band under the insulation (at low power),  if I don’t put a dew shield on, since I need battery power for the mount anyway. With an insulated dew shield, insulation is supposed to prevent the cooling of the corrector below dew point, making active dew heating unnecessary. 

[geordie85]

It's a surprise clear night tonight and with an almost full moon so I decided to cobble together a dual rig. 

Canon 6d on the flt98 and qhy183c on my WO Star71. 

Everything seems to be working OK for now. 

[tooth_dr]

I’ve reworked my setup today. Since moving from DSLR to CCD I needed to overhaul wiring etc.  New Lindy USB cables from FLO, two SW motor focusers, shorter QHY power cable from Modern Astronomy, a second Baader Click-Lock from North Down Telescopes and 12v cabling from CPC.

 

This means just 2 cables going to the kit - 1 x Power and 1 x USB (plus a third cable to power the mount).

 

Edited December 26, 2018 by tooth_dr
Added detail

[wimvb]

7 minutes ago, tooth_dr said:

I’ve reworked my setup today. Since moving from DSLR to CCD I needed to overhaul wiring etc.  New Lindy USB cables from FLO, two SW motor focusers, shorter QHY power cable from Modern Astronomy, a second Baader Click-Lock from North Down Telescopes and 12v cabling from CPC.

 

This means just 2 cables going to the kit - 1 x Power and 1 x USB (plus a third cable to power the mount).

NEAT!

[tooth_dr]

1 minute ago, wimvb said:

NEAT!

Thanks Wim. A prolonged period of cloud causes this type of behaviour. 

[wimvb]

24 minutes ago, tooth_dr said:

Thanks Wim. A prolonged period of cloud causes this type of behaviour. 

I can relate to that. I'm still looking for a solution to my cable spaghetti.

[Anne S]

10 hours ago, tooth_dr said:

I’ve reworked my setup today. Since moving from DSLR to CCD I needed to overhaul wiring etc.  New Lindy USB cables from FLO, two SW motor focusers, shorter QHY power cable from Modern Astronomy, a second Baader Click-Lock from North Down Telescopes and 12v cabling from CPC.

  

 This means just 2 cables going to the kit - 1 x Power and 1 x USB (plus a third cable to power the mount).

 

Do you have something fitted to aim the two scopes? I can't see if you've anything fitted. I'm still working on the best way to mount mine and am considering using a side by side setup. I want to use both sets of data and the fovs are fairly similar.

[tooth_dr]

36 minutes ago, Anne S said:

Do you have something fitted to aim the two scopes? I can't see if you've anything fitted. I'm still working on the best way to mount mine and am considering using a side by side setup. I want to use both sets of data and the fovs are fairly similar.

Hi Anne

I modified the dovetail and mounting ring height on one scope. It’s not that pretty but if you have patience it works. 

 

[Anne S]

2 hours ago, tooth_dr said:

Hi Anne

I modified the dovetail and mounting ring height on one scope. It’s not that pretty but if you have patience it works. 

 

Thanks, I've got a Skywatcher guidescope Mount, so I'll start with that. I discovered when I was piggybacking my two scopes that, because of rings etc not being exact, both scopes ended up pointing fairly close to the same point! I wasn't happy with how the eq6 was handling so I've shelved things pending my new mount.

I discovered the finder shoe with the finderguider was loose when I was dismantling everything, which probably accounted for my guiding issues! But I also had problems with the top scope not being usable too near the zenith because of the design of my dome so I was going to try a tandem setup like yours next time.

[tooth_dr]

On ‎27‎/‎12‎/‎2018 at 11:33, Anne S said:

Thanks, I've got a Skywatcher guidescope Mount, so I'll start with that. I discovered when I was piggybacking my two scopes that, because of rings etc not being exact, both scopes ended up pointing fairly close to the same point! I wasn't happy with how the eq6 was handling so I've shelved things pending my new mount.

I discovered the finder shoe with the finderguider was loose when I was dismantling everything, which probably accounted for my guiding issues! But I also had problems with the top scope not being usable too near the zenith because of the design of my dome so I was going to try a tandem setup like yours next time.

Hi Anne

As I hoped, I got some time today to align my scopes.  This was done manually simply by adjusting the screw within the slotted space and adding one fine shim for vertical adjustment.  I didn't realise that objects located around 1 mile away would be in a different position in each scope, which threw me initially (parallax?).  However I then used the horizon which is quite a few miles away (around 12 I think), and I achieved very reasonable alignment.  The QHY9 camera has a slightly smaller number of pixels than the Atik 383L+ (3336x2496 versus 3354x2529) which worked in my favour.  I think a very very slightly rotation of the QHY camera will leave me spot on - the QHY is green and the Atik is blue, canvas background red.

 

Good luck with yours.

Adam.

 

 

 

[carastro]

Taken at Astro camp back in the summer before I changed my Atik314L & Manual Filterwheel for an Atik428EX & EFW.  The cables are wrapped around the ED80 from when I covered everything up the previous night.   

Anne, I see in one of your pictures you are also using the Skywatcher Guidescope Mount to mount your dual rig piggy back.  I find that works really well, as once you have got it pretty close, (as you seem to have done), I can plonk the top scope back into the Guidesope mount and it's pretty much there, (usually just a small tweak and I do this when I have a bright star in the FOV), the only thing I have to be careful of is placing the two cameras orientated the same way i.e. sensor horizontal.  So it is hardly a chore at all.   It would be even less of a chore if I had a permanent set up, but as I go to astro camps monthly I have to set up every time. 

Edited December 29, 2018 by carastro

[Anne S]

20 hours ago, carastro said:

Taken at Astro camp back in the summer before I changed my Atik314L & Manual Filterwheel for an Atik428EX & EFW.  The cables are wrapped around the ED80 from when I covered everything up the previous night.   

Anne, I see in one of your pictures you are also using the Skywatcher Guidescope Mount to mount your dual rig piggy back.  I find that works really well, as once you have got it pretty close, (as you seem to have done), I can plonk the top scope back into the Guidesope mount and it's pretty much there, (usually just a small tweak and I do this when I have a bright star in the FOV), the only thing I have to be careful of is placing the two cameras orientated the same way i.e. sensor horizontal.  So it is hardly a chore at all.   It would be even less of a chore if I had a permanent set up, but as I go to astro camps monthly I have to set up every time. 

I got my both scopes pointing at the same star but with some rotation but I was getting bad traillng with the upper scope. It was suggested it might have been the SW guidescope Mount. As I also need to buy some 36mm filters as my SX694 was showing bad vignetting, I took everything down till I could get them. That's when I discovered the findershoe base was loose! The other issue was that the top scope in my Pulsar dome couldn't be used when I was imaging high up. I want to try getting them as close together side to side as possible next but I need to get another Losmandy dovetail first.

In the meantime my husband may be replacing my elderly eq6, maybe with an Ioptron CEM60 as I'm getting rather close to the maximum imaging weight for an eq6 and my eq6 wasn't too keen on carrying the weight. It's all the mounting stuff, cameras and filterwheels weighing so much. Hopefully I can experiment again next winter. For the time being I'm going to have another try at getting autofocus working in Maxim. I've got the 70mm scope with Atik428 and ef2 filterwheel with a Pegasusastro focus cube. Maybe that'll play nicely, my Laksideastro setup won't!

Of course it's been cloudy and wet ever since I changed over....

[Miguel1983]

C11 & ED80

So far i've just used this for visual, the ED80 is a little off axis due to use of regular clamps, it's also at the limit of the suggested max load-capacity of the EQ6R-Pro

 

[iPeace]

Losmandy AZ8 on Berlebach UNI tripod with geared centre column: the eyepiece is instantly at the height you want it to be.

Great for ticking off lists of double stars; the Borg 71FL (DIY flocked dew shield) is in its ultra-finder configuration with giant RDF, Baader correct-image prism and Polaris illuminated crosshair eyepiece and connected to the mount with a precision alignment clamp, whatever you find with it is guaranteed to be in the centre of the other scope's view.

The TV-85 sports a Tak prism and 3mm DeLite, giving wonderful views of the most beautiful doubles at 200x.

[Saganite]

What a superb set up Mike. Love the mount on the centre column.

[garryblueboy]

My two waiting for cool down and the darkness 

Edited April 20, 2019 by garryblueboy

[alexbb]

An idea for aligning 2 relatively light scopes: use a guiding ring at the front of one of the scopes instead of a fixed ring.

I bought 2 Primaluce Lab 115mm guiding rings which fit both a 102ED F/7 refractor and a William Optics Star 71 II.

Alignment shouldn't be a problem anymore. The guiding rings seem to hold tight enough the scopes and the fixed rings still allows the tubes to tilt a bit, enough for fine adjustments.

[geordie85]

I finally managed to try out my dual rig, first time since I bought my 2nd scope in October.

Had alot of issues getting everything set up and balanced. I started setting up just before 6 o'clock and didn't take my first sub till 10 o'clock. Once everything was working as intended I managed a few hours on the rosette nebula.

Looking forward to processing after today's festivities are over.

Ha with my esprit 100 with matching flattener, zwo 183 mono. O111 and s11 with my William optics FLT98, 0.8 flattener and qhy 183 mono mounted on my neq6.

I used a skywatcher guide scope mount to align my flt to the esprit, but I need something alot sturdier as most of my time setting up was trying to get it aligned.

[garryblueboy]

Latest dual set up 

[ratskrad]

Here is my latest build. AT152EDT, WO GT81 IV, WO Uniguide 50/200 guide scope. Couple nights back I was able to do a first run with

everything working as it's supposed to. Collected  photons on M81/M82 running both cameras and scopes at the same time. 53.4 lbs

on a mount that is rated for 75 lbs of imaging gear.  .23px (.70") or less Total RMS during a three hour run.

Edited February 12, 2021 by ratskrad
Fix spelling and grammar

[SimonIRE]

First post here.  Love all the dual set ups. Here is a foursome. I have been working on this for a few weeks. The weather has been pitiful. Its a 152 LZOS, TSA 120mm (for solar although not set up fully yet), Edge 1100 and a WO ZS 73mm for model building. I have subsequently removed the WO as it was creating some unpredictable flexure in the SCT. 

 

Edited February 14, 2021 by SimonIRE