First Light - Askar200/ASI2600MC

[Laurin Dave]

It is always very dangerous browsing on FLOs website at this time of year with so many tempting offers on display, I did this on Monday 7th December and before I knew it an Askar 200 f4 lens and ASI2600MC were on order.  The camera was quoted as out of stock with a lead time of 15-20 working days but to my surprise both turned up on Saturday morning together with FLO's seasonal warning of snow, even more surprising was that for the first time in weeks a clear sky was forecast that evening.   The new system was quickly attached to the mount using a vixen saddle which I screwed to the piece of wood between my scopes that carries all the cables (actually a piece teak from my school physics lab bench where my dad was the handicraft teacher) and darks and flats were taken.   At nightfall the lens was quickly focused using a Bhatinov mask and the coarse and fine focusing rings.   My main target for the evening was going to be a mosaic of IC348 and NGC1333 in Perseus but in the hour or so before they rose high enough I went for the area around the Fireworks Galaxy.  In total I got 1 hour on the Fireworks, 2.5 hrs on IC348 and 1,5 hrs on NGC1333 before the clouds rolled in.

Processing was relatively straightforwad although when debayered the 150subs took up 45GB, the darks look very good with and very CCD like with as promised no amp glow, the flats were flat, very little vignetting and no dust bunnies.  

The results are below.... (I've added my hi-res Fireworks galaxy to the first image).   There are some spacing and tilt issues to work through but overall I'm very pleased with the results for such short integrations times, particularly with the richness of colour  that the camera picks up in the dust which I always struggle with on my mono setups.   Even more so since these are from Bortle4/5.

Thanks for looking

Dave

The Fireworks Galaxyand Barnard 150

 

IC348 and NGC1333 in Perseus

The new scope between its bigger brothers..

 

Edited December 17, 2020 by Laurin Dave

[geeklee]

Great first light Dave.  Good to quickly pull in a few targets like that to try out the lens further.  "IC348 and NGC1333" looks lovely.

[tooth_dr]

Very nice Dave, NGC1333 is particularly nice.  I recently tried it at 180mm with my Nikon, and go nowhere near that quality with double the exposure.

[gorann]

Nice images and good star shapes Dave!

But a bit qurious why you whent for the Askar 200 f/4 from Sharpstar instead of the well proven and less expensive Samyang 135 f/2 with more aperture (twice the lightgrasp)?

Edited December 17, 2020 by gorann

[Laurin Dave]

2 minutes ago, gorann said:

Nice images and good star shapes Dave!

But a bit qurious why you whent for the Askar 200 f/4 from Sharpstar instead of the well proven and less expensive Samyang 135 f/2 with more aperture (twice the lightgrasp)?

I’ve already got one.  All part of the plan 

Edited December 17, 2020 by Laurin Dave

[gorann]

Just now, Laurin Dave said:

I’ve already got one.  

Ah, you are like me - getting into the buying mode when clouds settle in for too long

[Laurin Dave]

 

4 minutes ago, gorann said:

Ah, you are like me - getting into the buying mode when clouds settle in for too long

Indeed .. gives us something to do..  hopefully get some clear skies soon 

[gorann]

PS. You bought an outstanding camera for sure, and lucky to get one in these times!

[Allinthehead]

Great first light Dave. Nice surprise to have it show up like that.