Skywatcher Esprit 80 first light

[alexbb]

Season greetings!

Got my 80 Esprit around one week ago and yesterday was the first clear-ish night since. I came to my parents' for Christmas and here the skies are much better. I went to a hill nearby where our galaxy was visible. I had an EQ5 which I didn't polar align very well. I tried to start my RPi3, but it didn't connect to my mobile router so I had to forget about it. I was limited to 15s or 20s subs. The scope is quite heavy, heavier than I expected, it doesn't balance well with a Canon 550D attached. I had to tighten its dovetail towards its end as much as I could and the setup was still camera heavy a bit. Anyways. I left it to cool for maybe half an hour and it didn't reach thermal equilibrium perfectly. Focuser is very good, no slip with the DSLR and tightening it doesn't shift focus. No tilt either.

I bought my scope from FLO and checked by Es.

Here are some pictures taken through it, I only had the camera, no visual stuff.

M45 is 151x15s: https://drive.google.com/open?id=1CbAuNQCGkQPSsPB11UOBkye3Y8EnzNDL
M42 is 14x20s: https://drive.google.com/open?id=1dVgAxK8LQ4jXqPDlv2G0CVjV88UnsU9u
M37 is 10x20s: https://drive.google.com/open?id=1iITFwXffhGvAi4dUbE_qR9_9VQVJszPT
All ISO1600. Darks and bias, no flats.

Today are exactly 2 years since I took my first astrophoto. Quite some progress since then.

Clear skies and happy new year!

Alex

[MARS1960]

Very nice set Alex and i love those nice tight star colours.

[MarsG76]

Even with the balancing woes.. I'd say you had a successful first light session.. very nice images.

[Victor Boesen]

Nice trio of photos! I really like that M45

[alexbb]

Thanks, guys!

This topic was supposed to be more like a scope review. I will solve the balance issues, but by default there are some.
I did not find any tilt in the optics/flattener/focuser, focuser doesn't slip and doesn't shift when locking, but focus seemed to me quite sensible to temperature drift.
Other than this, not mentioned earlier, I see some halos around the bright stars, but not very annoying. This cannot be due to poorly filter coatings as there were none. 
Stars have the same size across the frame and no issues towards the corners. Spacing is right with a Canon DSLR and the provided adapter.
Images were added to the post just to show how tight the stars are, star shapes, halos, corner performance on APS-C sensor. Perhaps the star shapes are less relevant, I might have had some drift even at such short exposures.

By no means this is all the scope can provide, I expect much more from it

I just need some clear nights on a proper set up mount and will come back with some images which the scope really deserves.

Alex

[alexbb]

I was able to get some shots since December, not as much clear time as I wanted, but I hope to get some more on Rosette before it hides beyond the house.

It appears that the 80mm aperture is able to display good resolution. I was able to guide lately 0.7-1" RMS, that means that I had better seeing than usually and I was aiming for 1.9"/pixel with the ASI1600.

The brighter stars are a tad larger than I wanted.

Other than this, I don't think I have other additional remarks, the scope performs as expected.

M81-M82 is made of ~3h Lum, 15min each RGB + 3h Ha.

The triplet is ~4h of Lum and 30min each RGB.

Orion is 1h of Lum each panel.

Rosette has 2h of moonless time and 3h of full moon time to its left through the Ha filter.

The moon is from one of the nights when shooting hydrogen and it was captured through the Ha filter therefore. A stack of about 30 exposures.

Clear skies!

PS. While cooling

[Jkulin]

First time of using my Esprit 80 last night and I found it tricky to balance, even to the extent of contemplating changing the vixen mount for a longer one and putting some weights at the front, it clouded over before I could get any images.

The focuser is absolutely superb, I fitted a Lakeside motor to it, so have yet to comment about the ease of use.

You have some very nice images there.

[25585]

On 02/02/2018 at 22:26, moise212 said:

I was able to get some shots since December, not as much clear time as I wanted, but I hope to get some more on Rosette before it hides beyond the house.

It appears that the 80mm aperture is able to display good resolution. I was able to guide lately 0.7-1" RMS, that means that I had better seeing than usually and I was aiming for 1.9"/pixel with the ASI1600.

The brighter stars are a tad larger than I wanted.

Other than this, I don't think I have other additional remarks, the scope performs as expected.

M81-M82 is made of ~3h Lum, 15min each RGB + 3h Ha.

The triplet is ~4h of Lum and 30min each RGB.

Orion is 1h of Lum each panel.

Rosette has 2h of moonless time and 3h of full moon time to its left through the Ha filter.

The moon is from one of the nights when shooting hydrogen and it was captured through the Ha filter therefore. A stack of about 30 exposures.

Clear skies!

PS. While cooling

I would want to use the full length and both clamp knobs to secure my scope to ?

[alexbb]

John, thanks!

@25585 that picture was while cooling. I drilled a hole in the vixen dovetail which is now secured with 2 screws to the mounting shoe. I mount now the scope on that vixen dovetail and it's quite sturdy.

[russ]

On 26/12/2017 at 16:32, moise212 said:

Season greetings!

Got my 80 Esprit around one week ago and yesterday was the first clear-ish night since. I came to my parents' for Christmas and here the skies are much better. I went to a hill nearby where our galaxy was visible. I had an EQ5 which I didn't polar align very well. I tried to start my RPi3, but it didn't connect to my mobile router so I had to forget about it. I was limited to 15s or 20s subs. The scope is quite heavy, heavier than I expected, it doesn't balance well with a Canon 550D attached. I had to tighten its dovetail towards its end as much as I could and the setup was still camera heavy a bit. Anyways. I left it to cool for maybe half an hour and it didn't reach thermal equilibrium perfectly. Focuser is very good, no slip with the DSLR and tightening it doesn't shift focus. No tilt either.

I bought my scope from FLO and checked by Es.

Here are some pictures taken through it, I only had the camera, no visual stuff.

M45 is 151x15s: https://drive.google.com/open?id=1CbAuNQCGkQPSsPB11UOBkye3Y8EnzNDL
M42 is 14x20s: https://drive.google.com/open?id=1dVgAxK8LQ4jXqPDlv2G0CVjV88UnsU9u
M37 is 10x20s: https://drive.google.com/open?id=1iITFwXffhGvAi4dUbE_qR9_9VQVJszPT
All ISO1600. Darks and bias, no flats.

Today are exactly 2 years since I took my first astrophoto. Quite some progress since then.

Clear skies and happy new year!

Alex

Looks like a highly successful first light indeed Alex. Quality of the images are outstanding. Your processing is amazing, I always appreciate images that are not pushed too far leaving stars clipped and devoid of colour. Yours are perfect and that M37 image....wow!

[russ]

Sorry Alex I didn’t scroll down to see your second post.......wow, wow and wow. Gotta love galaxies. Awesome stuff, great little scope.

[Stu]

On 04/02/2018 at 18:57, 25585 said:

I would want to use the full length and both clamp knobs to secure my scope to ?

Still looks perfectly sturdy enough to me, the bottom dovetail is clamped along a good length and I'm sure the OP would have made sure his lovely scope was secure.

[alexbb]

Thanks, Russ!

Those images are not pushed more as the data was so limited. I did manage to have a few more clear nights since then and the scope behaves well, though the larger stars are just a bit too big for my expectations.

Perhaps I bought the scope a little too late for the nebula season, now I switched to the newton for a while for the galaxies.

Stu, yes, it is sturdy enough indeed.