Upgrade to Catseye collimation not -thoughts

[bottletopburly]

Had anyone upgraded their Newtonian  scope mine is (a sw200pds /badder steeltrack) to a cateseye system if so do you think it was worth doing and what tools did you buy to do so there is quite an array of tools and find their site quite confusing with different tools and upgrades or a la carte .

[davies07]

I would say that I never got my 10” F/4 Newtonian properly collimated until I bought a Catseye collimator. I bought the two-port auto-collimator and the 2” sight tube with a set of radiation marker centre spots. You would need to replace the centre spot on the primary with a radiation marker, but the effort was well worth it. 

The advantage of the Autocollimator is that it enables what I would call the ‘roll’ axis, or twist, of the secondary to be set correctly, looking from the focuser. I believe no other system (laser, mirror outline shapes through a camera or sight tube) has the accuracy and sensitivity of the Catseye system. It was expensive, but I recommend it. 
 

David

Edited February 26, 2023 by davies07
correct english

[bottletopburly]

10 minutes ago, davies07 said:

I would say that I never got my 10” F/4 Newtonian properly collimated until I bought a Catseye collimator. I bought the two-port auto-collimator and the 2” sight tube with a set a radiation marker centre spots. You would need to replace the centre spot on the primary but it was well worth it. 

The advantage of the Autocollimator is that it enables, what I would call the ‘roll’ axis, or twist, of the secondary to be set correctly, looking from the focuser. I believe no other system (laser, mirror outline shapes through a camera or sight tube) has the accuracy and sensitivity of the Catseye system. It’s expensive but I recommend it. 
 

David

Thanks david 👍

[jetstream]

2 hours ago, davies07 said:

I would say that I never got my 10” F/4 Newtonian properly collimated until I bought a Catseye collimator. I bought the two-port auto-collimator and the 2” sight tube with a set of radiation marker centre spots. You would need to replace the centre spot on the primary with a radiation marker, but the effort was well worth it. 

The advantage of the Autocollimator is that it enables what I would call the ‘roll’ axis, or twist, of the secondary to be set correctly, looking from the focuser. I believe no other system (laser, mirror outline shapes through a camera or sight tube) has the accuracy and sensitivity of the Catseye system. It was expensive, but I recommend it. 
 

David

I agree David the system is excellent.

These days I just use the Catseye cheshire for the primray and a glatter laser for the secondary, but this is after an autocollimation. In reality my truss dobs rarely need much if any collimation other than a touch up.

The Glatter TubLug , while handy for my 24" is always checked with Jim Flys Cheshire and is more accurate.

You should see me autocollimate the 24" f4.1!!