Some TLC for the SCT

[Luke]

“Just seen the new prices on Celestron Edge HD scopes,” said Space Hopper in a recent thread about price increases. “Open mouthed...........the 8" has gone up by a over third !!”

I hope I am not tempted to sell mine! Let me see, how much did I pay. £1100! And about £100 less for the reducer than its current price. Gosh, just look at the date of the order confirmation. I bought the Edge 8 NINE YEARS AGO! But I can’t sell it, can I? Admittedly, I have not been using it much. I did love using it for a bit of lunar imaging, but I don’t image any more. Well I can’t leave this scope just sitting there, especially now it just got more expensive!

So out comes the 8 inch SCT, still in pristine condition. But there’s a problem. I want to use the HEQ5, something I have not done for years! Although the little light bucket goes a treat on my trusty Giro mount, I am dead tired from the previous, spellbinding night with my 10 inch dob. I fancy some help tonight locating things. But can I remember how to set it up?

First challenge is to line the mount up with Polaris. Now, is it this star here, or that one there? Oh, I’ll just pick this one and hope the mount works it out when I align the stars! So off we slew to Arcturus. No wait, mount, you’ve shot past it. And then some. My goodness, you’re a long way off, mount, and I thought I was bad at navigating!!!

And it didn’t help that I’d forgotten to line up the Rigel Quikfinder for the scope – it was clearly some way off for the SCT, perhaps I’d last used it on a frac. I centred what might be Arcturus. I say centred, but my 40mm Tele Vue Plossl was not the ideal precision tool for this task. Might this be Capella? Off to Phad next – this star, maybe?

Well, HEQ5. Are we in business? - “Alignment Failed.”

 

Oh. Now it comes back to me. THIS star is Polaris! How could I forget? Well, I’d forgotten because the pencil markings on the patio had long gone showing me where to place the tripod legs. The handset’s previous date was in 2016! This time I take no prisoners with the alignment (apart from still using the 40mm Plossl). This is definitely Arcturus. And I even take a mo to line up the Quikfinder.

Capella, check! Phad? Most definitely! Done! Well, HEQ5, what say you? - “Alignment may be inaccurate.” I take it as a compliment.

I pop in the 17.3mm Delos and punch in M51. The HEQ5 places the Whirlpool dead centre. WOW! The view is stunning. I think I’m seeing spiral structure! Though I did eat two Curly Whirlys earlier. Through the night, the SCT serves up tasty views of galaxies. The Cigar was fab. That and M51 were better, I felt, than in the dob the previous night! Perhaps it was time to collimate the dob again, not that I’ve ever managed to get it that sharp at higher mag. And I was throwing more power at the galaxies, stepping up to a 12mm Delos I think. The barred spiral NGC633 was nice too.

Good on galaxies, the SCT was glorious on globs! I’d forgotten that we had upgraded the focuser to a Feather Touch and it felt easy to bring things to a sharp focus. The best view of M13 – with an 8mm or 10mm Delos, I think, again tops the dob – the higher mag I am pretty sure is part of it and I find using the goto mount very helpful here. I can leave a higher power eyepiece in and not worry about that making it harder to find stuff.

Lots of stars resolved in M5. M10 a bit faint, but sweet. M12 looks good with averted vision. M3 is impressive. M14 improved later in the night. M107 is tough, but possibly down in the the light pollution a bit. NGC7006 is barely visible. Caldwell 47 in Delphinus (nice to see the dolphin back!) is small and faint with the 12mm Delos, but well worth looking at!

 

 

At some point I suddenly remember that I had been struggling to find the Eskimo Nebula of late. There it is! So it hadn’t gone fishing after all. I check out the Cat’s Eye. Looks to me a bit like Blinking Planetary minus the blinking. M27 the Dumbell Nebula, big ‘n bright – love it!

I figured I’d leave open clusters for another night, possibly with the 0.7 reducer to widen the views. Though I couldn't help myself, I had to check out the beautiful Owl Cluster. It looked splendid, one of my best views of it, I would say! The SCT has a nice sharpness to the views that seems not a million miles away from my refractors.

Enjoying the sharpness and Feather Touch, I fancied trying some double stars. 17 Cygni, I see a large blue and a small yellow or red. 61 Cygni is tighter, both stars look yellow to me. Is one of them whiter or bluer? And I really like 95 Herculis. Close and similar sized. Last up for the doubles: Sigma Cassiopeiae. Now this is a much tighter pair! With the 17.3mm Delos in, it first looks like a star slightly out of focus. With the 10mm Delos, it looked like it was on the brink of splitting. With the 6mm, I had a definite but blurry split.

It had been a fab evening again. But there was one final thing I wanted to try. Howz about the Veil with an OIII filter? I seemed to recall OIII was recommended for larger apertures, but nothing ventured, nothing gained! I wasn’t sure how to punch in the Veil in the handset, so panned around the area. I couldn’t make out anything, alas.

Gosh, I am really tired now! That's three nights out of four. I enjoy finding stuff manually with the dob, but tonight I have really appreciated the goto in my tired state. And the 8 inch SCT had reminded me of what excited me about it in the first place: compact and light for its aperture, it packs a surprising punch. Just like the very first SCT we owned, the unassuming, but very capable C6. I don’t plan on selling the 8 any time soon.

Edited April 8, 2021 by Luke

[Davey-T]

Great night then Luke, my 10" SCT is generally set up for imaging but if we get an exceptionally clear frosty winters night it's great for whizzing around the sky just looking at stuff without having to worry if the tracking's alright or something else has gone amiss as soon as I take my eyes off it.

Dave

[Nik271]

Gosh, @Luke you make me want to get a C8! (...and I already have too many scopes  )

[Luke]

On 08/04/2021 at 14:10, Davey-T said:

Great night then Luke, my 10" SCT is generally set up for imaging but if we get an exceptionally clear frosty winters night it's great for whizzing around the sky just looking at stuff without having to worry if the tracking's alright or something else has gone amiss as soon as I take my eyes off it.

Dave

That sounds lovely Dave. I've never had a Meade telescope. I'm not sure if I have had anything from Meade, unless the SolarMax 60 counts! Not even an eyepiece I think. I feel like I should get something Meade when funds allow!

 

[Luke]

8 hours ago, Nik271 said:

Gosh, @Luke you make me want to get a C8! (...and I already have too many scopes  )

How many scopes have you got, Nik?!  I think the right number of scopes is one more!

That looks like a nice compact scope you have tucked under your arm in your profile pic. Is that the SkyMax? I don't think I have had a look through one of those, I've been very happy with my Skywatcher scopes. I'm especially fond of my SW ED100, which I love to use for solar with safety filters of course.

[faulksy]

that is a brilliant report Luke, could feel your joy and excitement

[Sunshine]

On 08/04/2021 at 06:59, Luke said:

“Just seen the new prices on Celestron Edge HD scopes,” said Space Hopper in a recent thread about price increases. “Open mouthed...........the 8" has gone up by a over third !!”

I hope I am not tempted to sell mine! Let me see, how much did I pay. £1100! And about £100 less for the reducer than its current price. Gosh, just look at the date of the order confirmation. I bought the Edge 8 NINE YEARS AGO! But I can’t sell it, can I? Admittedly, I have not been using it much. I did love using it for a bit of lunar imaging, but I don’t image any more. Well I can’t leave this scope just sitting there, especially now it just got more expensive!

So out comes the 8 inch SCT, still in pristine condition. But there’s a problem. I want to use the HEQ5, something I have not done for years! Although the little light bucket goes a treat on my trusty Giro mount, I am dead tired from the previous, spellbinding night with my 10 inch dob. I fancy some help tonight locating things. But can I remember how to set it up?

First challenge is to line the mount up with Polaris. Now, is it this star here, or that one there? Oh, I’ll just pick this one and hope the mount works it out when I align the stars! So off we slew to Arcturus. No wait, mount, you’ve shot past it. And then some. My goodness, you’re a long way off, mount, and I thought I was bad at navigating!!!

And it didn’t help that I’d forgotten to line up the Rigel Quikfinder for the scope – it was clearly some way off for the SCT, perhaps I’d last used it on a frac. I centred what might be Arcturus. I say centred, but my 40mm Tele Vue Plossl was not the ideal precision tool for this task. Might this be Capella? Off to Phad next – this star, maybe?

Well, HEQ5. Are we in business? - “Alignment Failed.”

 

Oh. Now it comes back to me. THIS star is Polaris! How could I forget? Well, I’d forgotten because the pencil markings on the patio had long gone showing me where to place the tripod legs. The handset’s previous date was in 2016! This time I take no prisoners with the alignment (apart from still using the 40mm Plossl). This is definitely Arcturus. And I even take a mo to line up the Quikfinder.

Capella, check! Phad? Most definitely! Done! Well, HEQ5, what say you? - “Alignment may be inaccurate.” I take it as a compliment.

I pop in the 17.3mm Delos and punch in M51. The HEQ5 places the Whirlpool dead centre. WOW! The view is stunning. I think I’m seeing spiral structure! Though I did eat two Curly Whirlys earlier. Through the night, the SCT serves up tasty views of galaxies. The Cigar was fab. That and M51 were better, I felt, than in the dob the previous night! Perhaps it was time to collimate the dob again, not that I’ve ever managed to get it that sharp at higher mag. And I was throwing more power at the galaxies, stepping up to a 12mm Delos I think. The barred spiral NGC633 was nice too.

Good on galaxies, the SCT was glorious on globs! I’d forgotten that we had upgraded the focuser to a Feather Touch and it felt easy to bring things to a sharp focus. The best view of M13 – with an 8mm or 10mm Delos, I think, again tops the dob – the higher mag I am pretty sure is part of it and I find using the goto mount very helpful here. I can leave a higher power eyepiece in and not worry about that making it harder to find stuff.

Lots of stars resolved in M5. M10 a bit faint, but sweet. M12 looks good with averted vision. M3 is impressive. M14 improved later in the night. M107 is tough, but possibly down in the the light pollution a bit. NGC7006 is barely visible. Caldwell 47 in Delphinus (nice to see the dolphin back!) is small and faint with the 12mm Delos, but well worth looking at!

 

 

At some point I suddenly remember that I had been struggling to find the Eskimo Nebula of late. There it is! So it hadn’t gone fishing after all. I check out the Cat’s Eye. Looks to me a bit like Blinking Planetary minus the blinking. M27 the Dumbell Nebula, big ‘n bright – love it!

I figured I’d leave open clusters for another night, possibly with the 0.7 reducer to widen the views. Though I couldn't help myself, I had to check out the beautiful Owl Cluster. It looked splendid, one of my best views of it, I would say! The SCT has a nice sharpness to the views that seems not a million miles away from my refractors.

Enjoying the sharpness and Feather Touch, I fancied trying some double stars. 17 Cygni, I see a large blue and a small yellow or red. 61 Cygni is tighter, both stars look yellow to me. Is one of them whiter or bluer? And I really like 95 Herculis. Close and similar sized. Last up for the doubles: Sigma Cassiopeiae. Now this is a much tighter pair! With the 17.3mm Delos in, it first looks like a star slightly out of focus. With the 10mm Delos, it looked like it was on the brink of splitting. With the 6mm, I had a definite but blurry split.

It had been a fab evening again. But there was one final thing I wanted to try. Howz about the Veil with an OIII filter? I seemed to recall OIII was recommended for larger apertures, but nothing ventured, nothing gained! I wasn’t sure how to punch in the Veil in the handset, so panned around the area. I couldn’t make out anything, alas.

Gosh, I am really tired now! That's three nights out of four. I enjoy finding stuff manually with the dob, but tonight I have really appreciated the goto in my tired state. And the 8 inch SCT had reminded me of what excited me about it in the first place: compact and light for its aperture, it packs a surprising punch. Just like the very first SCT we owned, the unassuming, but very capable C6. I don’t plan on selling the 8 any time soon.

This image is very interesting, it has a soft nebulous effect to it which i really like.

Edited April 9, 2021 by Sunshine

[Marki]

GReat report!

'Though I did eat two Curley-Whirleys earlier' made me actually laugh out loud

[Nik271]

14 hours ago, Luke said:

How many scopes have you got, Nik?!  I think the right number of scopes is one more!

That looks like a nice compact scope you have tucked under your arm in your profile pic. Is that the SkyMax? I don't think I have had a look through one of those, I've been very happy with my Skywatcher scopes. I'm especially fond of my SW ED100, which I love to use for solar with safety filters of course.

Indeed there is always a telescope missing from any collection

I have the Skymax 180 Pro, as well as the little brother Skymax 127, and a 6 inch Newtonian, but I've always been tempted by the SCT, they are quite a bit lighter than Maks with larger apertures and produce wider view. The Skymax is superb on planets and double stars, but the widest I can get is .8 degree and they don't take reducers.