A new focuser and a fun evening.

[Ant]

I have just bought myself a new focuser. I now have a Dual speed Moonlight in red.

I know that the word WOW is generally frowned upon in a reveiw, but blimey it's a work of art. It is visually very impressive, the mounting kit includes several spacers so that the height of the focuser can be in 4 different positions - this is great news as I have a filter wheel that I wanted to throw into the light path.

I'm pretty certain that with the focuser in the position it is I have the required in focus for the dSLR and enough out focus for the H9.

I am lazy, I didn't remove the secondary as I really hate collimating. I was hoping that as the moonlight used the existing holes from the skywatcher one it might just work without re collimating.

Mmmmm I was wrong.

So by leaving the secondary in I risked damaging the secondary and also made the job much trickier than it should have been and I still have to collimate...

I also spent an hour drift aligning, it's the first time I've tried drift aligning and it wasn't as hard or complicated as I thought. The instructions I had, made a note that using a newt the directions are reversed. But what I also didn't realise was that using a CCD, the directions are also reversed...

So after about 30 minutes of the star moving quicker and quicker from it's starting point, I suddenly realised what was happening - started moving it in the other direction and bob your uncle things started to improve.

30 or 40 minutes later (and several trips in doors to play with Jamie before bed time) I had got the polar alignment pretty close. Certainly a lot closer than I usually get with the polar scope.

Usually using the polar scope method I get field rotation starting to creep in in a 10 minute sub, but alst night there wasn't any. There as a little movement due to flexure and of course the stars looked fine on one side of the FOV but were slightly out of focus on the other.

But I class the evening as a sucsess. I polar aligned fairly well, I managed 10 minute subs, the new focuser is an absolute dream to use. You really don't realise just how bad the R&P focusers are untill you get a really good replacement!

Jobs still to do 1. Collimate. 2. Brace the two scope together better to try and avoid flexing!

Please excuse the pictures, they were taken with a Blackberry in the dark

[barkis]

Neat stuff Ant. The new generation of focusers sure are attractive, and obviously a great addition.

I always used star drift to align my Polar Axis in the past, and will do so again. Fiddling about with a polar scope doesn't appeal to me at all. As your pier is a permanently sited one, once it's done, it's done, and no longer a worry.

I've been considering a Blackberry myself, looking at the Curve models. I need to think hard though, I'm not really into Mobile Phones. I have had a Siemens *** for years. Hey, it makes phone calls, job done..

Ron.

[Ant]

Cheers Ron,

I'm still with a tripod, so the scopes gets left out for an extended period of time with a tarp over the top. But (obviously) as soon as I pack it away I have to start again!

{off topic}

The blackberry is great for a business phone, email is great. Camera not so good! There are other better phones for personal use IMO.

{/off topic}

Cheers

Ant

[barkis]

Sorry mate, I thought you had set in a pier. I must be thinking about somebody else..

Any chance of installing one soon maybe? Or, were you talking about a possible move at one time? My memory's poor you know.

Ron.