250mm Flextube Unboxing

[Mr Spock]

Well, as is usual for me, no boxes, just pictures 

Here we go...

Good news, my modified Celestron 50mm RACI fits the Skywatcher finder mount perfectly

Timey wimey bit

The place where a Moonlite needs to go

This top bit needs flocking

This bottom bit needs flocking too

Not bad really. Took me a while to assemble the base given my clumsy fingers. It does seem reasonably well made though. I don't like the fact it uses screws in the eyepiece holder rather than compression - I don't want my eyepieces marked. That tube inside is a bit more shiny than I expected, definitely needs flocking.

A brief check of the collimation shows it's in good order. Maybe give it a star test later if the sky stays clear. Plus I have to figure out how to set up that infernal Synscan device - I'm sure it's in the instructions somewhere... 😜

 

[Captain Scarlet]

Interesting, 6 mirror clips. My (rather older) 300p cell only has 3 clips.

[Mr Spock]

3 is the normal. I suppose 6 might stop any slight movement.

[John]

Very nice !

I had the older solid tube, non-GOTO 10 inch Skywatcher dob for a while a few years ago. That had 6 mirror clips as well.

I wondered at the time whether that was linked to the mirror glass of the 10 inch being Pyrex but there is probably no connection.

Hope you enjoy the scope Michael

[John]

Just now, John said:

Very nice !

I had the older solid tube, non-GOTO 10 inch Skywatcher dob for a while a few years ago. That had 6 mirror clips as well.

I wondered at the time whether that was linked to the mirror glass of the 10 inch being Pyrex but there is probably no connection.

Hope you enjoy the scope Michael

Actually I've just noticed that they don't use the 250PX coding now - it's 250P. Maybe Pyrex is no longer used ?

[Mr Spock]

I used to have a blue tube 250. I can't remember how many clips there were. I'm sure there were only 3 though 

[Paul73]

Very nice. Plenty of mirror for those faint fuzzies! I treated mine to a light shroud. Improved contrast and kept foreign bodies at bay.

Enjoy.

Paul

[Mr Spock]

Damn, If I'd known it was going to be this clear I would have had the scope out sooner. Just done it. It's been in the house all day being put together. I suppose it's a test of how well it cools.

[John]

It should be OK at low to medium power without much cool down. My 12 inch solid tube does OK in that respect.

 

[Mr Spock]

I do have a problem with tracking. The base seems to be clicking and jerking, and not tracking at all well. My first thought is it's too stiff. The alt seems ok, it's a lot less tight.

[niallk]

Very nice - congrats!  Hope the tracking is straightforward to sort.

I had a solid tube 250px (6 clips 😀 ).  Great scope!   I don't know if you've seen it before, but the Lacerta dual speed focuser upgrade for Skywatchers was the best add-on after a Telrad, imho.

Best of luck with it!

-Niall

[Mr Spock]

Pointing at the moon...

[Stu]

Looks good @Mr Spock. Did you manage to sort the tracking?

Does the OTA come off the base easily, or is it a one piece lift?

Enjoy the views.

[Pixies]

Now - I can't remember where it was, but earlier today I saw a post (Facebook, I think) about something similar. 

The poster removed the black plastic cover on the bottom of the base and found a spring had come unsprung. Reattaching it correctly meant all the gears were then held correctly and the tracking worked fine.

Worth a quick look?

[Mr Spock]

Tracking is no good. The base az is too stiff. I found the nut which tightens the base, that isn't it. I don't know enough about these to know what to do 😭 

The OTA comes off easily and the two parts are easy to lift.

Views of the moon were ok at x150; bumping up to x300 I could see the collimation needs adjusting. No problem that.

[AlexK]

Congrats, Michael! A decent light-gathering upgrade!
The stiffness could be normal for it actually. This is not a Dobson scheme with feather-touch push/pull action you might be used to. It's a GoTo attempt on a particle boards fork. You supposed to drive it with buttons, not by your bare hands. The manual pointing operation is more like just an afterthought in such a design, so it's not like on a Dob and not like on a real Alt/Az fork mount. 

So to avoid any confusion I would try simply following the instruction manual step by step for automatic pointing (GoTo) first. That would also help troubleshooting the tracking issue, as most likely you have missed the proper mount alignment steps or lost it manipulating it manually in an unexpected way.

Don't worry about your mechanical skills, it's still under warranty and on tech support, right? In fact, I would avoid any screwdriver tinkering with it for now, as that could void the former and make more expensive or lengthy the latter. Get to the support first (ditch it, and get a normal classic Dobson next <--- a joke, OK?).

Disclaimer: All of the above is my personal opinion exclusively and leveraging my freedom of individual expression, you have rights to ignore acting on it in any way or interpret it in any way you see fit.
(am I an ideal citizen now? )

[Mr Spock]

Had a good look at the moon tonight through a properly collimated scope  Sadly the seeing conditions here are unstable and everything was wobbling and fuzzy at high powers.

Very crisp contrast though and very usable at x171; going up to x208 didn't bring out any more detail and x300 was a step too far. The different shades of grey in this size scope are mesmerising. The smaller 120mm looks really dull in comparison.

The base has to go back to base for a fettle to the tracking. There's an intermittent clunking sound with an accompanying 'jerk' in movement. I'll leave that to the experts.

[garryblueboy]

Nice scope Mr Spock I had a while back gave some excellent views and was surprisingly portable