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Help with removing Orion optics mirror


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Hi

Anyone had any experience with taking out an Orion optics reflector mirror? The cell is one quite different from a skywatcher.

I want to remove the mirror on my oo vx scope to clean it.

I've removed the mirror cell from the tube, do I have to first unscrew the collimating bolts all the way out & take off the section with the fan to be able to get to the bottom of the mirror clips to undo them?

Just checking as I don't want to ruin anything. If anyone has any pictures of the process that would be great to.

Thanks

 

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See if yours is silicone glued to the mirror cell? Mine was from 3 points on the side connecting to the clips and on the bottom where the little nylon pegs hold the mirror in the sell. Youll need to get rid of the silicone somehow if thats the case, with box cutter or similar. Careful not to scratch the mirror of course!

Also, if that seems like too much trouble you dont have to remove the mirror from the cell to clean it.

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I cleaned my OOUK mirror without removing it from the cell.

As long as you allow it to fully dry before powering up the fan again it will be fine.

Distilled water and cotton wool balls is the way to do it.

 

Only needs cleaned if there is a lot of dust on it though , a small amount will not matter a lot.

My mirror had several years of dust build up so did benefit from cleaning.

Pour the water over the mirror first to wash off any loose dust, then just be very gentle and wipe from centre to edge using each cotton ball just once,

 

 

 

Mirror clean jpg.jpg

Edited by fifeskies
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Although I have cleaned quite a few mirrors, my only OO experience has been with their older scopes, fitted with agricultural cells.
Where possible, I leave the mirror in the cell as it eases handling, and more options on storage for water run off.

Not having sight of the fan, I would say remove to avoid getting it wet.
Some fans are very basic brushed motor types (100+ years old technology) and will dry in an hour or two.
However, if it a brushless type there is a (hidden somewhere inside) circuit. This may not be waterproof and could take days to dry out without a lot of heat.
There is also the matter of water in bearing sleeves for any fan.
But if the fan fails at some point, they are not expensive.

HTH, David.

 

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2 hours ago, yelsac said:

Hi

Anyone had any experience with taking out an Orion optics reflector mirror? The cell is one quite different from a skywatcher.

I want to remove the mirror on my oo vx scope to clean it.

I've removed the mirror cell from the tube, do I have to first unscrew the collimating bolts all the way out & take off the section with the fan to be able to get to the bottom of the mirror clips to undo them?

Just checking as I don't want to ruin anything. If anyone has any pictures of the process that would be great to.

Thanks

 

Yes I've done this a few times now with both my OO mirrors. I did consider cleaning them whilst still in cell, but decided in the end to completely remove it.

Unfortunately yes you do need to completely remove the rear section by removing the collimation knobs. You then need to unbolt and remove one of the "clip units" (two bolts and possibly a grubscrew. With one clip unit removed, you can then remove the mirror "sideways". It needs great care, of course.

Magnus

Edit: I plan at some stage to grind away  the top part of the mirror-retaining clips and replace with a more removable or rotatable pin arrangement, so that I can simply lift the mirror off vertically. I haven't designed it yet, but it shouldn't be too difficult.

Edited by Captain Scarlet
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1 hour ago, ONIKKINEN said:

See if yours is silicone glued to the mirror cell? Mine was from 3 points on the side connecting to the clips and on the bottom where the little nylon pegs hold the mirror in the sell. Youll need to get rid of the silicone somehow if thats the case, with box cutter or similar. Careful not to scratch the mirror of course!

Also, if that seems like too much trouble you dont have to remove the mirror from the cell to clean it.

Thanks for your reply, yes there is silicone there, but it seems it's not stuck to anything just there. Maybe it was stuck originally like your say but not anymore.

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1 hour ago, fifeskies said:

I cleaned my OOUK mirror without removing it from the cell.

As long as you allow it to fully dry before powering up the fan again it will be fine.

Distilled water and cotton wool balls is the way to do it.

 

Only needs cleaned if there is a lot of dust on it though , a small amount will not matter a lot.

My mirror had several years of dust build up so did benefit from cleaning.

Pour the water over the mirror first to wash off any loose dust, then just be very gentle and wipe from centre to edge using each cotton ball just once,

 

 

 

Mirror clean jpg.jpg

Interesting, would never have thought of cleaning in the cell. Thanks for your comment

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1 hour ago, Carbon Brush said:

Although I have cleaned quite a few mirrors, my only OO experience has been with their older scopes, fitted with agricultural cells.
Where possible, I leave the mirror in the cell as it eases handling, and more options on storage for water run off.

Not having sight of the fan, I would say remove to avoid getting it wet.
Some fans are very basic brushed motor types (100+ years old technology) and will dry in an hour or two.
However, if it a brushless type there is a (hidden somewhere inside) circuit. This may not be waterproof and could take days to dry out without a lot of heat.
There is also the matter of water in bearing sleeves for any fan.
But if the fan fails at some point, they are not expensive.

HTH, David.

 

 

1 hour ago, Captain Scarlet said:

Yes I've done this a few times now with both my OO mirrors. I did consider cleaning them whilst still in cell, but decided in the end to completely remove it.

Unfortunately yes you do need to completely remove the rear section by removing the collimation knobs. You then need to unbolt and remove one of the "clip units" (two bolts and possibly a grubscrew. With one clip unit removed, you can then remove the mirror "sideways". It needs great care, of course.

Magnus

Edit: I plan at some stage to grind away  the top part of the mirror-retaining clips and replace with a more removable or rotatable pin arrangement, so that I can simply lift the mirror off vertically. I haven't designed it yet, but it shouldn't be too difficult.

Appreciate the advice.

It's a fairly recent scope with their 9 point mirror cell, the mirror was kept in a shed & is rather grubby.

The silicone doesn't seem to be stuck anymore although it's still there, the mirror is loose in the cell, I can actually move it by hand from side to side.

Not sure whether to re-silicone it or put some rubber shims in to secure it a little better.

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1 hour ago, yelsac said:

 

Appreciate the advice.

It's a fairly recent scope with their 9 point mirror cell, the mirror was kept in a shed & is rather grubby.

The silicone doesn't seem to be stuck anymore although it's still there, the mirror is loose in the cell, I can actually move it by hand from side to side.

Not sure whether to re-silicone it or put some rubber shims in to secure it a little better.

The whole point of the cell design is that the whiffle-trees (the three triangles each containing 3 nylon supports) have freedom of movement. The silicone prevents this and is unnecessary, indeed destructive to the whole purpose of a cell.

I bought my 300mm cell a few weeks ago new from OO. There was no silicone, quite rightly. I bought my 200mm within a VX8, and the whole cell was slathered in silicone, top, back and sides. And whoever did it made a real mess. I dismantled it and removed all the silicone and it now behaves as it should. Aside from the difficulty getting the mirror out to clean, the cell is IMO a good design. Why they feel the need to silicone everything up I have no idea.

Magnus

Edited by Captain Scarlet
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51 minutes ago, Captain Scarlet said:

The whole point of the cell design is that the whiffle-trees (the three triangles each containing 3 nylon supports) have freedom of movement. The silicone prevents this and is unnecessary, indeed destructive to the whole purpose of a cell.

I bought my 300mm cell a few weeks ago new from OO. There was no silicone, quite rightly. I bought my 200mm within a VX8, and the whole cell was slathered in silicone, top, back and sides. And whoever did it made a real mess. I dismantled it and removed all the silicone and it now behaves as it should. Aside from the difficulty getting the mirror out to clean, the cell is IMO a good design. Why they feel the need to silicone everything up I have no idea.

Magnus

Interesting Magnus, so may I ask when you fitted the new cell to your 300mm mirror was your mirror tight to the clips or did it move around?

I noticed there is nylon screws through my clips that could be tightened up to the mirror to stop any horizontal movement.

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44 minutes ago, yelsac said:

Interesting Magnus, so may I ask when you fitted the new cell to your 300mm mirror was your mirror tight to the clips or did it move around?

I noticed there is nylon screws through my clips that could be tightened up to the mirror to stop any horizontal movement.

Those nylon grubscrews are there to constrain the mirror's side-to-side movement (using nylon rather than the metal of the clips themselves), but not tightly constrain. They must not be tight to the mirror's edge, they must be infinitessimally clear of the mirror, so the mirror is constrained, but not put under any pressure (even a little pressure causes astigmatism - my brother-in-law once asked me "why are the stars triangular?" when I'd made that mistake). What I do now is screw those nylon grubs in until they just touch the mirror, then unscrew about 1/8 turn. You may be able to feel a very small amount of "rock" as the mirror shifts when, say, you're carrying the tube out to the mount - that slight amount of movement is fine.

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Interesting so a small amount of movement isn't a problem. I'm used to an old skywatcher mirror cell where the mirror was held firm no movement.

I suppose I was just concerned about collimating the scope. I really enjoy planetary imaging where collimation is important.

With the movement, every time you slewed your mount to another target or had to do a meridian flip you'd have to constantly re-collimate.

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8 minutes ago, yelsac said:

Interesting so a small amount of movement isn't a problem. I'm used to an old skywatcher mirror cell where the mirror was held firm no movement.

I suppose I was just concerned about collimating the scope. I really enjoy planetary imaging where collimation is important.

With the movement, every time you slewed your mount to another target or had to do a meridian flip you'd have to constantly re-collimate.

I would expect the effect on collimation of that tiny amount of lateral movement will be completely negligible, especially compared with the astigmatism you’d have from tight grubscrews.

M

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