Collimation: not quite right or monumentally wrong?

[Demonperformer]

A while back (October!) I bought a second-hand 6"RC scope and I am (never being one to rush things) just now beginning to think about using it and my first question was: is it collimated?

I know this is not a particularly good photo (phone held up to eyepiece), but (based on what I have read on t'internet) this, taken through my new cheshire, looks ghastly to me. None of it looks even vaguely central to the crosshairs and the innermost black circle is way off-centre to the rest of them. If it is as bad as I think it is, I find it incredible that the images I was shown before purchase would not have been far worse than they were. It is, of course, possible that the courier's tender care has not improved things any, but, before I go making massive adjustments that completely screwup the system, is it really really really bad, or is it in just "normally" bad (so only use 1/32 of a turn adjustment) territory?

(The pale blue lines on the left half of the bright circle are just the background in front of the scope.)

Thanks

[bottletopburly]

Why not do a star ? test first before thinking on tweaking 

[Peter Drew]

It does look a tad "out" but certainly in your latter adjustment scenario. I would expect to see the amount of offset shown, any other anomaly could be due to the difficulty of photographing it. Best to try it or do a star test initially as already suggested.   ?

[Demonperformer]

OK, so this is probably a really dumb question: but isn't the whole point of a cheshire eyepiece being able to collimate a scope without needing a star; in the daylight and with the scope not pointing upwards so dropped Allen keys don't fall onto the primary mirror?

[spillage]

I think the cheshire will help you get the secondary positioned correctly and the primary near enough. A star test will give you an exact reading and allow that final bit of fine adjustment. If you are just using the newt for visual then the cheshire should get you near enough on its own.