Equipment check OK

[jonathan]

Been a very long while since I got the Big One out - NEQ6 with 8SE OTA (it never agrees with my back even though I am in good health), been using my CG4 with the reflector or refractor due to laziness.  I have been wondering for a long time about a large reflector to put on the NEQ6, perhaps that would be better than the 8SE?  So many scopes to buy and try, never enough money!

So tonight was mostly about brushing up on how to use this setup again, have to say in that regard it went well, appears that I left everything in good working order.  I did manage to see a few night sky objects - a pretty double star, a few clusters, and random areas of starfields.  The dreaded dew began to form on some of my glass surfaces including the eyepiece, no trouble for my dew heater tapes!  I have a small one just for the eyepiece, on it went and about five minutes later the dew was gone, magic!  It was a real pleasure to see this part of the setup actually working as it should, just unlucky that both finders didn't have the luxury of a heater tape for their eyepiece sides (8x40 finder has one on the objective, that remained dew-free).  I was also very happy that I managed to use the red dot finder and 8x40 straight-through uncorrected finder to locate a few targets, even if one of them eluded me (a galaxy, well it was quite bright out there with the 2/3 moon), I always had trouble with them in the past, perhaps my skill level has risen since then.

A large wispy blanket of cloud began stretching across the sky signalling that it was time to call it a night. 

What has become obvious is that the 8SE is a different beast entirely to my refractor or reflector, both of which are closer to one another in terms of eyepiece range and capability, I was only able to use my 25mm and 10mm (though this was rather fuzzy) in the 8SE; I may need to be much more selective of which targets I choose for the 8SE and have them all planned out ready for the next opportunity to use it.  The refractor and reflector seem happy to observe almost anything under most sky conditions which is probably why I have been using them a lot more.

Shame I missed the best of Saturn, just didn't seem to get that clear sky window when I was able to observe.