Time to check that equipment

[jonathan]

I know we're entering the 'light side' of the astronomical year but I think many of us still have some pieces of equipment that don't get much use, even during the winter months (or perhaps they saw a lot of use and were never maintained).  Today I decided to get my 8SE and NEQ6 Pro out to give it a systems check in daylight, I thought it might have been out of collimation but looking down the Cheshire tool I could only see perfectly aligned circles, I presume that means it's fine, I'll have to do a star test at some point but for now I'm happy.

One thing that came to light was that one of the power connections to my 12v battery had corroded to the point where most of the copper strands had turned to powder at the terminal, had to cut it back a good half an inch to get to clean copper wire.  A new spade connector later and it's good as new.  All else looked to be fine, although I think there may be some residue / dust / fogging on the inside of my SCT corrector plate, not sure if it's worth dismantling to clean (a future project perhaps!)

This looks like something I should probably have a go at:

 

[JG777]

Great video,  not sure about the squeaking noise when he was cleaning the primary!