Saturn 14/09/24

[CraigT82]

Best 10% of nine 3 minute captures.
Then took those 9 sharpened images and stacked them together in AS3 (couldn’t be bothered with winjupos).

300p with ASI485mc and APM 2.7x barlow, and ADC. 

 

[Kon]

Very nice Craig. You have got some really nice banding too.

[CraigT82]

Thanks Kon, yes it’s a bit better than my last effort but again seeing was ok but not great. Plus I managed to damage my scope the other day and I think it’s not performing quite as it should now. Hopefully it’s a relatively easy fix.

 

[Kon]

1 hour ago, CraigT82 said:

Thanks Kon, yes it’s a bit better than my last effort but again seeing was ok but not great. Plus I managed to damage my scope the other day and I think it’s not performing quite as it should now. Hopefully it’s a relatively easy fix.

 

I hope nothing serious and you will be back imaging soon.

[morimarty]

Thats a good image Craig. There is some very nice banding showing through. I hope it wasn't the curse of friday 13th when you damaged your scope as I had a mishap that put me out of action too.

[orion25]

Look at those bands! 🤩

[geoflewis]

Very nice Saturn Craig. What and how did you damage your scope? Have you been able to fix it yet?

[CraigT82]

2 minutes ago, geoflewis said:

Very nice Saturn Craig. What and how did you damage your scope? Have you been able to fix it yet?

Thanks Geof.

Stupid accident really, completely avoidable. I was tweaking the secondary collimation as I'd been messing with the focuser position.  I was turning the central screw on the secondary boss, the one with the spring on to get the secondary centred under the focuser, and loosened it a bit too far and the secondary boss and mirror dropped off the end of the screw and went sliding down the tube and hit the primary.

Primary has a nice gouge in the coating about 2mm wide and 25mm long on it now, ad the secondary has a chip off the back edge about the size of a 5p coin.

I was initially doing these adjustments with the the horizontal to avoid this kind of accident but I tilted it up to catch some light as I was struggling to see, then it happened whilst tilted up... of course!

Was the out on Saturday night and whilst I had a star in the field of view and racking through the focus I could see that the breakout was elongated one way inside of focus and the other way outside of focus, so there is some astigmatism somewhere, just need to do some tests to figure out where.  To be honest it may be due to the way I've glued the secondary to the boss (3 blobs of silicone) - I didn't actually do that astigmatism check before the accident so the astigmatism may have already been there and the actual mirrors may be fine, if a little battle scarred.

[CraigT82]

16 hours ago, orion25 said:

Look at those bands! 🤩

Tanks Reggie!

[CraigT82]

17 hours ago, morimarty said:

Thats a good image Craig. There is some very nice banding showing through. I hope it wasn't the curse of friday 13th when you damaged your scope as I had a mishap that put me out of action too.

Lol thank Martyn it was actually Saturday but but might have been due in part due to one to many beers consumed on the 13th so we can chalk it up to that I suppose!

[geoflewis]

6 minutes ago, CraigT82 said:

Primary has a nice gouge in the coating about 2mm wide and 25mm long on it now, ad the secondary has a chip off the back edge about the size of a 5p coin.

That doesn't sound good....😱

[bosun21]

Lovely image of Saturn Craig. Nice and crisp showing good banding. I feel your pain in damaging your John Nichol mirror (Ouch!) Was this image taken after the damage? Sods law is real.

[CraigT82]

2 minutes ago, bosun21 said:

Lovely image of Saturn Craig. Nice and crisp showing good banding. I feel your pain in damaging your John Nichol mirror (Ouch!) Was this image taken after the damage? Sods law is real.

This image was after the incident.  Yes to say I'm gutted is an understatement!!!

[siatnite]

Very nice Craig some great detail on the globe.

[CraigT82]

2 hours ago, siatnite said:

Very nice Craig some great detail on the globe.  
 

Thanks Simon. Bit annoyed I didn’t go out last night as seeing seems to have been excellent by most accounts. I looked out at about 9.30pm and there was a lot of cloud around so decided to just hit the sack. 

[Space Cowboy]

Well captured Craig! Hope your scope is better soon.