What did the postman bring?

[Guest]

22 minutes ago, bosun21 said:

I’ll take photos along the way through the process and I’ll create a post/thread showing each step i took. I’m waiting for some parts to arrive that are needed. I’ll message you as soon as I post it.

        Ian 

Thank you sir.  I have read a bit about the Starsense.  Me thinks Celestron hit a home run here.  They could follow up with a grand slam if the just offered the system by itself as a push to

[cajen2]

3 hours ago, F15Rules said:

I've had two completely different experiences with Pentax XWs..

I owned the XW14(and XW20) a few years ago I bought a Morpheus 14mm to compare them.. I found the Morph to be better than the XW14 in field of view (76deg Vs 70), contrast,  and less field curvature (although it still had some).

The XW20 I had was even worse for FC. All that said, the XW range at the shorter focal lengths are all superb (3.5, 5,7 and 10), especially when you consider they were originally designed for spotting scopes.

I bought an XW30 in last year's Christmas sale from FLO and was incredibly disappointed with it..I have a wonderful Celestron Axiom 31mm 82 Deg, but it is very heavy, and I had thought that perhaps the XW30 could be a lighter replacement for the Axiom. Unfortunately, I found it to be again beset with Field curvature in my Tak FS128, and stars near the edge were elongated. So it went back to FLO who of course refunded me without question. I have kept the Axiom and am very happy with it. Of course, it's possible I got a poor example..and others may draw different conclusions in other scopes.

But I would happily recommend the shorter FL XWs to anyone, just great eyepieces 👍.

Dave

I have only the XW 5 and 14 but find both of them very good EPs with no or little appreciable curvature in either. It may be my 14 suits my 8" dob more than it does your frac. I have no experience of the others in the range. I just find the Morpheus with its wider FOV more involving and informative. I have a Morph 6.5 on order at FLO but God knows when they'll get more stock in.

 

[badhex]

On 06/06/2022 at 19:59, Chaz2b said:

That be all my 3D printers!🤑

Nice! Work related or just for fun? Do they all have different use cases? 

[Chaz2b]

13 minutes ago, badhex said:

Nice! Work related or just for fun? Do they all have different use cases? 

Fun, but I make a lot of astro stuff with them, still in my infancy, each is different, deciding what's best for the job. I have a delta printer which is used more than all the others, very easy machine. The delta I'll keep as it does tall items, but considering selling the rest.

[badhex]

11 hours ago, F15Rules said:

I'll be interested to hear what you think of the 4.5mm Morph..and how it does with a Barlow for Uber high power?

I've used the 9, 12.5, 14 and 17.5mm but not the 6.5 and 4.5..

 

11 hours ago, bosun21 said:

Thanks Dave. I will let you know how I get on with the 4.5mm on the first proper clear night i get blessed with. I don’t know about Barlowed. I suppose I could throw approximately 400x-440x at the moon (skies permitting) though. I’ll keep you posted.

   ATB

       Ian 

I can answer this question! The 4.5mm is great, works very well in both my TS102 F7 ED and ZS73 despite the sub-1mm exit pupil size, giving 159x and 96x respectively.

I had it on the moon in the TS102 and it was looking so good I decided to Barlow it with a 2.5x GSO giving 397x and was absolutely shocked at how well it performed. Still incredibly crisp - shaky phone picture below, views through the EP were even better, though.

[badhex]

5 minutes ago, Chaz2b said:

Fun, but I make a lot of astro stuff with them, still in my infancy, each is different, deciding what's best for the job. I have a delta printer which is used more than all the others, very easy machine. The delta I'll keep as it does tall items, but considering selling the rest.

Nice. I feel like astro is a great application for 3D printing given all the odd bits and bobs we often need. 

[DaveL59]

12 hours ago, markse68 said:

Worlds smallest spotting scope?

(I didn't realise it would be so tiny but it's very cute and surprisingly sharp!)

ahhh I'd seen one like that on the bay but having so many of the dual variety of japanese origin I somehow managed to resist the temptation, Looks very well made, enjoy! 🙂 

[bosun21]

Postman dropped off a couple of boxes today. One from auntie FLO with an Explore Scientific 2x tele extender, and the other courtesy of @oldfruit with a 38mm Panaview eyepiece.

 

[bomberbaz]

WO uniguide, tis but a thing of beauty 

[Pixies]

and another!

I'll try and get a group photo tomorrow!

[Alan White]

2 minutes ago, Pixies said:

and another!

I'll try and get a group photo tomorrow!

Wow, where are you managing to fins all these LVW's,
it took literally years to find my LVW 22.
Sorry to Dave @F15Rules, I mentioned it gain 😉

 

[Pixies]

13 minutes ago, Alan White said:

Wow, where are you managing to fins all these LVW's,
it took literally years to find my LVW 22.
Sorry to Dave @F15Rules, I mentioned it gain 😉

 

The clue in in the packaging:

[F15Rules]

Baader MkIII zoom in mint condition (bought online) and Carton Japan 28mm ~58 degrees (I re-acquired this one from an SGL buddy, having sold it to him a few months ago).

These two will be my ultra grab n go set with my Vixen SP102 when we go to the Scottish Isles in late summer👍

Dave

[IB20]

Arrived this morning via DPD completing my short set of Pentaxes from 10-3.5mm. Can’t wait to give it a whirl in the Tak.

😃

[markse68]

Bought a first surface mirror and some diamond drill bits from China to have a go at making an auto collimator eyepiece. It arrived today but was suspiciously heavy. So I weighed it and measured it and calculated it had a specific gravity of 10.2 but glass is about 2.6! Looking up a table of specific gravities of materials it turns out to be solid molybdenum! Which is great as it can be drilled with high speed steel drills  Turns out it’s a laser mirror and they use molybdenum as it is hard enough to take a nice polish and can take high temperatures. Cool!

 

[Alan White]

2 hours ago, IB20 said:

Arrived this morning via DPD completing my short set of Pentaxes from 10-3.5mm. Can’t wait to give it a whirl in the Tak.

😃

When do we get a family photo posted up?

Nice end to the set and exactly the next one on my list too.

[IB20]

19 minutes ago, Alan White said:

When do we get a family photo posted up?

Nice end to the set and exactly the next one on my list too.

Ooh good idea, I’ll get them lined up with some of their peers. ☺️

[Guest]

And today the postman dropped off......nothing.  I am seriously slacking at ordering stuff at the moment.

[Guest]

36 minutes ago, Mike Q said:

And today the postman dropped off......nothing.  I am seriously slacking at ordering stuff at the moment.

Give me a bit @Alan White ....I will get back in the game next month.  I have a couple filters and a 14mm 2 inch eyepiece to get.

Edited June 9, 2022 by Guest

[badhex]

17 hours ago, Pixies said:

The clue in in the packaging:

Hello @Pixies, is this a specific telescope shop or a large well known online retailer? I've considered buying stuff from Japan before as I sometimes buy anime products there and it's always been relatively smooth. 

[badhex]

Camera rig cheese plate, mini magic arm and adapters for mounting a dew heater controller on my tripod. 

[Pixies]

1 hour ago, badhex said:

Hello @Pixies, is this a specific telescope shop or a large well known online retailer? I've considered buying stuff from Japan before as I sometimes buy anime products there and it's always been relatively smooth. 

It's a Japanese auction site but via a proxy agent.

[mog3768]

A Baader K Line filter courtesy of Nigella  and a pack of Baader filter film from FLO.

Unfortunately had to order a second pack as i spoilt making the first filter had a stroke

last November and still recovering with limited movement. The wife made the second one and did a good job. She also purchased from FLO an earl y birthday present for me a Skywatcher  Evolux 82ED. I am such a lucky boy ( well quite an old man really )

[mcrowle]

I've received kit this afternoon from Shoestring Astronomy in the US, so I can hook up my Losmandy G11 mount, PC and guide camera - and start autoguiding (after 30 years of manual guiding).

In reality it probably means several months of shouting at my computer, pulling my hair out, and continuing to guide manually 🤣. We'll see.

Regards,

Mike

Edited June 10, 2022 by mcrowle
typo

[Astro_Dad]

 

Yet to try a “proper” Telrad, but this arrived today to complement my other bullseye finder. Struck by the oversized aperture, and the circles projected are very sharp and bright - better defined than the Rigel.  Will do the job well hopefully. Primarily to use with my Heritage 150p - the Rigel positioning doesn’t really work (comfort wise) on the main solid part of the 150p (without some form of DIY to alter but little time for that) so this will work nicely as the main RDF in the usual location - enjoying the Telrad markers in the 110 things to see book complementing the detail in TLaO. 

As an aside Interesting to discuss “DIY” circles added “by hand” to e.g. S&T’s pocket Sky Atlas with @paulastro, linking with the thread on recommended Atlas’s.