2018 album with new scopes and cameras

[gorann]

For me 2018 has been a year of major investments in this hobby. It started in April when I bought an Esprit 150 and I was so pleased with it that I now also have an Esprit 100 on a dual rig. Then I have largely retired my Canon 60D cameras and made the jump to cooled ASI CMOS cameras: first an ASI 071 MCpro (OSC) and then an ASI 1600 MMpro. As usual, the weather has been conspiring so I would have liked to have more good images with longer exposures. In any case, here are what I got out of the new kits so far, in various combinations and mixtures. Details can be found on my Astrobin page (see signature lines below).

The biggest investement is yet to arrive - a Mesu 200 mount that should arrive shortly after new years.

Comments and suggestions most welcome & Merry Christmas everyone!

[Spaceade]

Man that is quite an investment...see it's been worth it though! ?

what's next on your list? (assuming you have any money left). 

[xtreemchaos]

great shots and setup, well done, a fruitful year. merry Christmas. charl.

[gorann]

6 hours ago, Spaceade said:

Man that is quite an investment...see it's been worth it though! ?

what's next on your list? (assuming you have any money left). 

Thanks! After my Mesu mount arrives in January I really should let the wallet have a rest and try to master what I have. At least that is the plan but there is something with this hobby that infects the spending centre of our brains. I am suspect that this centre will come up with new things that I now do not know that I need. It is usually worst over the summer when nights are too light for AP.

Oh sh-t, the centre just told me that I do not have a 3 nm Ha filter?

EDIT: Since you awoke the spending centre in my brain and got me thinking about about new investments - just ordered a Baader 3.5 nm Ha filter from FLO. Then I can run Ha on both scopes next time the moon is out?.

[gorann]

15 minutes ago, xtreemchaos said:

great shots and setup, well done, a fruitful year. merry Christmas. charl.

Thanks Charl!

[Mark at Beaufort]

Fabulous photos Goran and wonderful kit. Look forward to seeing more of your work in 2019.

[gorann]

25 minutes ago, Mark at Beaufort said:

Fabulous photos Goran and wonderful kit. Look forward to seeing more of your work in 2019.

Thanks a lot Mark!

[Allinthehead]

A fine collection Gorann. That's some investment you've made. I'm like you trying always to resist an upgrade or two. I'm considering a new camera and/or an Esprit 100 at the moment. ?

[gorann]

Thanks Richard! Buying an Esprit 100 can never go wrong. What camera are you longing for?

[tomato]

Some great images from your rig, Goran, they are really encouraging as I am planning an Esprit 150 and Altair 102 dual rig on a Mesu for 2019.

If I may ask, how do you split the channel duties across the scopes? Do you shoot all the Luminence on one scope and collect the colour channels with the OSC, or do you mix and match depending on the target?

[gorann]

33 minutes ago, tomato said:

Some great images from your rig, Goran, they are really encouraging as I am planning an Esprit 150 and Altair 102 dual rig on a Mesu for 2019.

If I may ask, how do you split the channel duties across the scopes? Do you shoot all the Luminence on one scope and collect the colour channels with the OSC, or do you mix and match depending on the target?

Thanks!

So far I have put the 1600 on the E100 to collect Ha and the 071 on E150 for RGB, and then combine them for HaRGB. Not a perfect match but ok. I found that on many object Ha makes more of a difference than Lum. If you do not have it you need something like this to get them aligned:

https://www.firstlightoptics.com/misc/jtd-dual-rig-telescope-alignment-saddle.html

[wimvb]

21 hours ago, gorann said:

EDIT: Since you awoke the spending centre in my brain and got me thinking about about new investments - just ordered a Baader 3.5 nm Ha filter from FLO. Then I can run Ha on both scopes next time the moon is out?.

The horror!   I'd expected nothing less than 3 nm Astrodons from you. ?

The pictures are great, btw.

[Laurin Dave]

Great images Goran, good luck with the Mesu.. you just need to master Windows pc and you’ll be fine ?..   dual rig for me too once all the bits arrive...  just waiting for filters now so currently running off darks on the new camera

Dave

[gorann]

6 hours ago, wimvb said:

The horror!   I'd expected nothing less than 3 nm Astrodons from you. ?

The pictures are great, btw.

Baader 3.5 nm = 365 Euro, Astrodon 3 nm = 1260 Euro (TS prices for comparison - I ordered my Baader even "cheaper" from FLO).

Would 0.5 nm make much difference except in the wallet??

[jjosefsen]

22 hours ago, gorann said:

Thanks!

So far I have put the 1600 on the E100 to collect Ha and the 071 on E150 for RGB, and then combine them for HaRGB. Not a perfect match but ok. I found that on many object Ha makes more of a difference than Lum. If you do not have it you need something like this to get them aligned:

https://www.firstlightoptics.com/misc/jtd-dual-rig-telescope-alignment-saddle.html

Do you really need that though? It seems your fov is much smaller on the 150 scope, so there is a margin for inaccuracy..

I am asking beceause I am considering going dual rig, as I now have a 130PDS and a 80ED.

Come to think of it, reflector + refractor might not even work..?

[gorann]

4 minutes ago, jjosefsen said:

Do you really need that though? It seems your fov is much smaller on the 150 scope, so there is a margin for inaccuracy..

I am asking beceause I am considering going dual rig, as I now have a 130PDS and a 80ED.

Come to think of it, reflector + refractor might not even work..?

I do not see any reason why a refractor and reflector would not work side by side (just make sure that the camera on the reflector points outwards?). However, I do recommend that you get an adjustable mounting plate for one of the scopes. I started off using a double mounting plate like this one:

https://www.teleskop-express.de/shop/product_info.php/info/p4430_TS-Optics-Side-by-side-mounting-plate---Losmandy-Level.html

But I never got the scopes to point close enough at the same object so I felt I had to buy the adjustible one after recommendation from Sara Wager. I guess it is possible with washers or other things to somehow solve it in a cheaper way, but I have noticed that just removing the scopes and putting them back (in my climate I do not like to leave them up if I take a breake between imaging sessions) slightly shifts their alignment so I usually have to play a bit with the adjustment. However, I can agree that the adjustable plate is a bit expensive. I have not seen any alternatives to this one and maybe there are no any other manufacturers of such things.

[Guest]

What a fine collection of outstanding images Göran, I really enjoy following your posts - keep them coming!

David

 

[wimvb]

7 hours ago, gorann said:

Baader 3.5 nm = 365 Euro, Astrodon 3 nm = 1260 Euro (TS prices for comparison - I ordered my Baader even "cheaper" from FLO).

Would 0.5 nm make much difference except in the wallet??

According to Astrodon it does, of course. Here's a link to their marketing hype.

https://astrodon.com/products/astrodon-narrowband-filters/

?

I especially like this part:

"Random tests of a competitor’s low-cost 7 nm H-α filter showed %T values ranging from 86% down to 71%. Random selection of 5 nm Astrodon filters measured %T values at the H-α emission wavelength of 93, 98, 97 and 98%.  You will never know that you are using their 71% filter compared to a 97% Astrodon filter because they do not guarantee this important performance parameter.  They recently came out with a 3.5 nm H-α narrowband filter and those results are even worse, ranging from 3-70% at the emission wavelength.  Similarly, analysis of different 2016 lots of Astrodon 3 nm H-α filters measured 97, 97, 97 and 96%T.  Yes, our filters are more expensive, but you always know what you are getting with Astrodon Narrowband filters – the best performance in the market – guaranteed." (My italics)

AfaIk, there's only one "competitor" marketing 3.5 nm filters.

In all fairness, the narrower filters are more difficult to manufacture. Not only does the coating need to be uniform across the filter, it also has to be uniform across the deposition chamber, since no manufacturer would make these filters one at a time. And 0.5 nm will make a difference. A lot of R&D goes into filter design and manufacture.

[wimvb]

6 hours ago, jjosefsen said:

Come to think of it, reflector + refractor might not even work..?

 

6 hours ago, gorann said:

I do not see any reason why a refractor and reflector would not work side by side

I do see a reason.

Reflectors (RC and Newts) create spider diffreactions, so a hybrid image can end up with spikes in one part, and absence of spikes in another part. Reflectors also have a stronger halo due to the central obstruction. While it is possible to combine data from the different types of scope, you may be fighting an uphill battle during processing.

But there's only one way to find out ...

[jjosefsen]

50 minutes ago, wimvb said:

 

I do see a reason.

Reflectors (RC and Newts) create spider diffreactions, so a hybrid image can end up with spikes in one part, and absence of spikes in another part. Reflectors also have a stronger halo due to the central obstruction. While it is possible to combine data from the different types of scope, you may be fighting an uphill battle during processing.

But there's only one way to find out ...

That was what I was thinking as well.. once I get some data with my newt I can test it, but seems logical that it would be problematic.

[gorann]

10 hours ago, wimvb said:

 

I do see a reason.

Reflectors (RC and Newts) create spider diffreactions, so a hybrid image can end up with spikes in one part, and absence of spikes in another part. Reflectors also have a stronger halo due to the central obstruction. While it is possible to combine data from the different types of scope, you may be fighting an uphill battle during processing.

But there's only one way to find out ...

 

10 hours ago, jjosefsen said:

That was what I was thinking as well.. once I get some data with my newt I can test it, but seems logical that it would be problematic.

I have to admit I did not immedeately think of the star spike issue, probably since I never had a Newton or RC on my rig. However, it should still be doable if you use the Newton for collecting lum and the refractor for RGB. That would give you weak witish spikes, which could look nice. I would guess it would be even worse with two Newtons on the rig since aligning the spikes would probably be quite a challenge.

[wimvb]

2 hours ago, gorann said:

I would guess it would be even worse with two Newtons on the rig since aligning the spikes would probably be quite a challenge.

 

I don't know if anyone has attempted that. But ASA has a pier/mount with a dual RC rig.

https://www.astroshop.es/ecuatorial-con-goto/asa-montura-direct-drive-mount-ddm160-twin/p,46103

When combining a reflector and a refractor, and collecting lrgb data, I would use the system with best pixel scale for L, regardless of scope type. But if pixel scale is about the same, using the refractor for L will probably result in tighter stars. If the spikes are in the colour data, then lrgb combination will remove them, because spikes are related to intensity (L) more than to colour.

[Jkulin]

1 hour ago, wimvb said:

I don't know if anyone has attempted that. But ASA has a pier/mount with a dual RC rig.

https://www.astroshop.es/ecuatorial-con-goto/asa-montura-direct-drive-mount-ddm160-twin/p,46103

Hi Wim,

I'm so tempted with that set up, I'll have two ?, £37k it is beautiful but you need a serious bank account to even contemplate that, not in my lifetime though!

[gorann]

20 hours ago, David_L said:

What a fine collection of outstanding images Göran, I really enjoy following your posts - keep them coming!

David

 

Thanks a lot David, much appreciated!

[gorann]

15 hours ago, wimvb said:

According to Astrodon it does, of course. Here's a link to their marketing hype.

https://astrodon.com/products/astrodon-narrowband-filters/

?

I especially like this part:

"Random tests of a competitor’s low-cost 7 nm H-α filter showed %T values ranging from 86% down to 71%. Random selection of 5 nm Astrodon filters measured %T values at the H-α emission wavelength of 93, 98, 97 and 98%.  You will never know that you are using their 71% filter compared to a 97% Astrodon filter because they do not guarantee this important performance parameter.  They recently came out with a 3.5 nm H-α narrowband filter and those results are even worse, ranging from 3-70% at the emission wavelength.  Similarly, analysis of different 2016 lots of Astrodon 3 nm H-α filters measured 97, 97, 97 and 96%T.  Yes, our filters are more expensive, but you always know what you are getting with Astrodon Narrowband filters – the best performance in the market – guaranteed." (My italics)

AfaIk, there's only one "competitor" marketing 3.5 nm filters.

In all fairness, the narrower filters are more difficult to manufacture. Not only does the coating need to be uniform across the filter, it also has to be uniform across the deposition chamber, since no manufacturer would make these filters one at a time. And 0.5 nm will make a difference. A lot of R&D goes into filter design and manufacture.

Well, I can find out using the spectrophotometer I have at work to check the transmittance spectrum of the Baader filter. If it is much wider than 3.5 nm I guess I could complain.