Thanking my lucky stars

[Crossway]

I had my scope out last night setting up a new finder which I had just made and relishing the seemingly once in a while really decent  clear skies.  I  had just targeted into the Hyades  which were at a moderately high altitude  when  my scope ( a reflector )  slid out of the dove tail and crashed  down onto a  hard paved surface.  The noise of the crash was awful and  it was a while before  I dared pick it up and didn't know what to expect in the way of damage  ........at the least some misalignment of  optics  or worse, a cracked primary..   But how very very fortunate to find that the only   evidence   of the  calamity was the  eyepiece of the finder which had been pushed into the barrel.  And absolutely minor.

A very carless  and avoidable  accident.........  the azimuth  knob  is the same pattern as the  dove tail  knob and  I just happened to  turn the wrong one.     Had I been working with my refractor I reckon the damage could have been  much worse.   I never want an experience like that again so have now devised a simple  " Preventer!  arrangement  between the OTA and the tripod head.  I have also fitted a  cover over the dove tail  knob.  Should  have done this before,

Pete

 

 

 

 

 

 

[Z3roCool]

Wow! Very lucky. Glad all seems to be fairly minor.

I always go through a chant when setting up, making sure I put the bolts in before the weights, weights on before scope, double check all knobs are tights and bars are in correctly.

A few times I still get too excited or distracted and end up with my mount crashing down when I put the weights on! Painful!

 

Tom.

 

 

[Peter Drew]

A good lesson, on the cheap this time!    ?

[John]

I'm glad there was no real damage. Scopes are surprisingly tough - I had something similar happen with my Vixen 102 ED refractor - the crunch as it hit the ground was a horrible sound but the damage was very little indeed - a few marks on the dew shield plus a graze on the diagonal.

Perhaps we need to re-surface our patios / paving with that soft stuff they use on childrens play areas !

[Merlin]

It can help if we paint the knobs white, the better that we can see them in the dark.

[Astro Imp]

That is seriously scary. So pleased to read you had a relatively happy outcome.

[Crossway]

My post this a.m about this calamity was  curtailed prematurely by a domestic  arrangement to do with  shopping!!!

Having made sure that my scope had suffered no exterior damage  I  set it all up again and  checked the optics and was astonished to find  that the collimation was absolutely intact.  My  finder scope was pointing somewhere  else but soon got it back on line.  So the system is  OK again.

I am sorry to hear that other stargazers have had some  hairy moments as well ......its a nasty jolt.

I have now had time to examine the dovetail  assembly and  although the  Celestron   anchorage bolt seems perfectly adequate I wondered whether  to  drill through  the  dovetail on the opposite  site and insert another bolt.

In the meantime though   the  "preventer " belt  I fitted is a bit incongruous  but I'll see how  I get on with it.

Pete

[Carbon Brush]

I have a friend who knows someone that once had a scope slide out of the rails. In this case onto the wood observatory floor.

Apparently his heart rate went to a life threatening number and the surrounding air became ionised by his language.

Like your experience, there was no serious damage. A minor tube dent and paint chip. Even collimation (Mak Newt) remaining good.

I did mention to this friend that if he had bothered to fit stop screws at the end of the dovetails, that he kept talking about but had never been put to the top of list, this would all have been avoided.

He did though fit gym matting over the wood floor so eyepieces would bounce better.