Home made light shroud....

[dobserver]

We put the finishing touches on the light shroud for the 12" Dob today. I think we may have done OK

I bought a sheet of neoprene large enough to go round the beast (£18.00), then we cut it to size. I sewed a couple of channels round the top and bottom and we threaded cord through and fitted bungee doofers to tighten it up. Two strips of stick on velcro make the vertical join light proof and make getting it on and off a doddle. I'll stitch these on properly tomorrow when I have time....

Haven't tested it properly as I've been at work tonight, and I have an early start tomorrow - not to mention that Carl is fast asleep in front of the News! So we'll try it out tomorrow night with great anticipation. Did some viewing last night without a shroud and got on OK, although the moon was intrusive and everything I decided to look for was either hidden behind the extension or the fence.....Grrr!

I think I saw the two double clusters that are close together between Cassiopeia and Persius (sorry, but those interminable numbers and letters for labels really turn me off! I think they are NGC 869 and NGC 884 ) I'm going to call them Pinky and Perky

Was I seeing them both in my wide angled EP? Or was I just seeing one of them. The one to the bottom left of my view was brighter and seemed to have a larger cluster above and a smaller one below and to the right. The upper right hand cluster was dimmer but denser than the bright one - I tried to make this into a double cluster but I am not convinced that I could! lol

It will be good to look at it/them again tomorrow with the shroud and maybe the moon will not interfere so much. BTW Carl was incredulous that I could see them at all at first. The beast did look as if it were pointing straight at the extension roof, but when he looked for himself he did believe me! I can't wait now to set up at the front of the house tomorrow. Wish we could make it to the Salisbury plain meet tomorrow night - I bet the viewing will be amazing, but work will not allow....

Steph

[Doc]

That sounds like the double cluster to me Steph. And yes with a wide angle eyepiece you can fit them both into the same Fov.

[dobserver]

Cool - thanks for that Mick - it did look amazing! I looked for it/them again tonight and I think I saw them, but the viewing was awful..... Looked great earlier on while I was at work and then the high cloud ever so gradually crept in.....*sigh*

I am pleased with myself now though, cos I can go straight to M103 in the blink of an eye I hope to be able to do that with more and more objects soon...

I hope it is clearer tomorrow - there is so much I want to look for and learn about. To be honest I feel a bit (understatement of the year!) overwhelmed with the amount of new knowledge that I need to acquire. I hope the OU course will help me with that.....if I ever get a proper chance to get on with the coursework.

[Pablito]

I know that for making light shroud can be used black spandex fabric. It's shiny from one side and matt in the other. And it's cheap as chips

I am going to use it in my DIY project.

[gliderpilot]

Have you got any photos of the shroud? Sounds great what you have done.

Mark

[Pablito]

It's not my scope but light shroud is made of spandex.

Inside view is with flash. Just take a look:

[Milamber]

Here's the Big Blue 22" light shroud, this also is Spandex, matt inside. Looks neat I though, got the local seamstress to sew it up for me

Arthur