Colimination Advice

[Abernus]

Just looking for a little advice before I start to fiddle. I have been using my telescope for a few weeks now and have been wondering if the colimination is off. The reason I ask is that when viewing the moon etc I have to look off centre.

as you can see from the diagram I have to look from the lower left to upper right to see anything. I am sure I should be able to look dead centre. As I said I have learnt to view objects like this, but I can't help think that Colimination is off and I am missing the true potential of the telescope.

please advise.

Thanks

Stephen

[stev74]

Hi Abernus,

It'd probably help if you let us know what type of scope you have? Also I can recommend astro_babys guide she's a member of SGL here's the link Astro Babys Guide to Collimation. Near the bottom of the guide there is some useful pics of what a star looks like if collimation is out or in - so it's a good starting point. Please note the guides are for Newtonian Reflectors which are the most common scopes to have collimation problems. I'm thinking you may have a problem with your secondary mirror alignment if it is a newt you have - again in the guide there is a way to check this.

Cheers

[Abernus]

Hi Abernus,

It'd probably help if you let us know what type of scope you have?

Cheers

Good point It's an old Meade EQ 1-B 4" Reflector. Will have a look at the guide now.

[Astro_Baby]

It could be down to the eyepiece as well - sometimes some eyepieces (especially short focal length ones) have a tendenecy to 'black out' can you tell us what the EP is ?

[Abernus]

It happens on my Meade 25mm and my Meade 9mm. As it's been a few nights since I was last out if my memory is correct it's more noticable on the 25mm, although to some extent it's noticable on the 9mm as well.