Mars Aug 20th

[OXO]

After an early outting in the evening of which was awful seeing conditions i looked outside half heartedly and was surprised to see it had cleared up still not great but well worth trying my new setup out.

Did a very quick setup as it was 1.30am and i felt a little tired just pointed the mount North..

Aligned the Finder scope on the 8" Reflector with a 26mm EP Mars looked ok seeing was about 5/10(it was 2/10 earlier) started the drives and placed a 10mm ep in the focuser. The new HEQ5 mount is a dream to handle both with the quick responsive drives and manually moving the scope. Mars was quite big and showed many details whilst brief seeing conditions got better, now i thought well let's see how far i can go with the seeing and scope so i placed a 2x barlow in the scope with a 10mm ep.

Got Mars focused without any problem's Image shift etc etc WOW it was like looking in a 16" Dob never seen detail like it so i placed another 2xbarlow to stack into the 2x barlow and 10mm EP, Gobsmacked!

This gave an image of Mars that looked like a Photo in times of good seeing not very often but when it happened i nearly fell over Amazing.

No imaging from the Night as K3CDTOOLS registration had expired and i didn't want to leave Mars/Scope alone for one Min!

All in all the 2hrs i spent outside with Mars was a Shear Pleasure and with the thought of this getting even better i can hardly contain my excitement(Better Seeing condition's and Mars at 20arc secs plus higher in the Sky) :shock:

James :sunny:

[AndyMac]

Very interesting, James & glad you had a clear night. As I said on the phone earlier this week, Saturday was going to be a night of observing double stars etc. The moon became a very easy naked eye double on my way home from the pub last night!

[OXO]

The moon became a very easy naked eye double on my way home from the pub last night!

James

[russ]

Crikey James. You wouldn't think we own the same scope. I must have a lemon.

When i looked at Mars 2 weeks ago can't say i was too impressed with the Explorer 200. Tiny disk with the 15mm and still not that impressed with the image using 2.5x Powermate. And it point blank refused to stack two barlows and return anything other than a fuzzy blob. Contrast was really poor which meant detail didn't stand out and smack you in the face like the Mak or a refractor.

We've had a couple clear nights now but i can't be bothered with 200, at least not until new moon comes round and deepsky returns.

Perhaps i'll have to try again. Perhaps the conditions were so poor that night nothing would have worked.

They say it's the luck of the draw with Synta stuff....looks like you hit the jackpot James!!!!

Russ

[OXO]

It's a strange one that Russ cant say it was the Eyepiece's either as i was using quite cheap stuff the 10mm ep is a Synta one that comes with telescope bundle's(must invest in a decent one).

I did some imaging of Mars too i will post them in a short while.

Russ, i would check the collimation matey just in case cant say as i have with my scope yet...

James

[russ]

Collimation was spot on. Doubled checked before I started. Plus the star test was pretty good too. :?

I'll try eyepiece projection next time. Remembering back to my old 200 (Ant's scope), I couldn't get any decent image scale unless I used EP. 15mm Elite and 2.5x Powermate should do it.

It must have been an unstable night too because the visual view was pretty bad.

I'll report back later in the week. Looks like I may get a few chances to view this week.

Regards

Russ

[Ant]

If we are talking imaging then I've ever managed to get the scope to stack two barlows and produce a decent image.

But EP projection with the 10mm and the Toucam produced some nice images... that (IMO)is the way to go.

Ant

[russ]

Hi Ant,

Good job i didn't sell my Perseu EP adapter! Never thought i'd use it again.

Russ

[Ant]

Strange the things that you decide to sell, forget about and then thik - blimey glad I did't sell that...

I destroyed mine about a year ago, seemed like a good idea at the time... But I have a new adapter for the ToUcam so it'll fit into the projection tube... Film canister and lots of masking tape, works a treat.

Ant

[Rob]

Nice report James. Mars (I hope & feel sure) will be a stunner this year!. This is why I bought a 127 mak :shock:.

Not wanting to wish my life away here but.... roll on November!!!

I've always wanted to have a go at EP projection... put it on the list Russ!!!

Rob