Mars nov 4th 2009

[neil phillips]

I am still struggling with my Setup, using a modified secondary with a loose washer holding collimation. Star images are not what they should be something i am going to talk to Orion about and possibly here. But i so wanted to start imaging again, so i just went with it.

This was probably the tightest capture of the night. Resized. Times i will post if anyone wants to know. 30 fps at 1/30 secs exposure DFK. stacked on k3 ccd tools

[Clayton]

Lovely shot Neil. I hope you can get your collomation woes sorted out soon.

Colour and exposure look good, and lots of detail lurking 8" disc is a pretty tough target. I expect that around opposition with a fixed secondary etc., that You will be pumping out some real beauties weather/seeing permitting:wink:

[neil phillips]

Thanks Clayton a singing system is so very important. My out of focus star images recorded for this night with camera attached, look bad, one side is being pulled over, It might be thermal problems, or it might be a mirror clip is slightly too tight, ( as i reset it recently )

Before i i loosen them, i want to try filming the out of focus star images with the fan running to see what effect it has. I may upload a short avi showing the problem here at some point.Also one side of the out of focus star images look fairly defined, the other side looks so bad i cant even make out, the out of focus rings that aid collimation. I mentioned this to Orion but they didnt seem concernerd. But after seeing it on film, i think i will re film this, and send it to Orion as it looks pretty awful. something i wouldnt expect for a 1/12th wave set of optics.

Who ever said this game on a budget was easy. Which reminds me need to check my lotto ticket lol. Hope to get a more confident system working by opposition, as obviously a lot more detail is coming our way. BTW think i read on your post you was trying mars at 30 degrees. Thats going to be real tough Clayton, seriously need full height for this tiny globe, this was fairly high up here. Even so one edge was not tight. Probably the problems already mentioned.

[Taff]

Hi Neil' it's nice to see your captures' again.That's a nice one with the polar caps on show.Mark

[legion48]

Great shot Neil. I'm interested in the capture time as the image says it was taken in Essex. I'm in Essex (Harlow) but Mars doesn't clear my neighbours house until 04:00.

[Nick Smith]

Very nice shots Neil!

If you are that bothered about the quality of your scope I would sell it. I recently sold my C11 for £800 and that was a gem of a scope. Not 1/12 wave optics, but probably 1/6 wave or better. I don't know how much you paid for your newt, but a C11 should be within your budget.

I know a lot of C11/C14 owners in the UK and none of them are worried about the quality/collimation of their optics.

Cheers

Nick

[Beyond_Vision]

Despite your collimation worries that is a very respectable looking Mars image

Regards

Kevin

[neil phillips]

Thanks for the comments guys time logged by my pc was 5.09 GMT

Nick A good C11 is something ive wanted for a long time. I do wonder if there are good uns and bad uns though. I did briefly own a old C11 that had a badly slipping mirror. Even after servicing by D HINDS the problem remained, the images i got with it, fell far short of what i was getting with a 10" Orion. So the experiance shook me a little. However this was a bad un im sure, Not sure if that can happen with a new model or not ? ( consistency )

Your C11 was defiantly a singer though Nick, i was greatly impressed with the images you took with it. So much so, that i havent been able to forget about this model. I will have to think long and hard about selling my newt. I would prefer to work with Orion on getting this scope doing what i feel it can, as i have taken a couple of reasonable quality shots with it briefly, that suggest it has promise. And i would like a C11 as a second scope possibly.

But if funds dont allow, i might sell it and switch to the C11. If ever there was a lunar imager who has convinced me of the virtues of a good C11 under UK skys, its you. As i clearly remember your saturn and lunar images taken with it. World class

[brianb]

I do wonder if there are good uns and bad uns though.

Don't know about "bad" but these are mass produced items & there will be some variation between them.

So far as I'm concerned (being primarily a visual variable star observer) the CPC1100 is the best compromise between aperture & portability. For planetary work I reckon the Orion Optics (UK) SPX 250 f/6.3 1/10 wave + fan should be a better bet for UK conditions, though on an adequate mount I wouldn't consider it portable. The C11 optics aren't actually specified for quality, I reckon they're probably about 1/4 wave though I'm sure the odd one is significantly better than that. The C11 also takes a long long time to cool, and that's critical to getting really sharp images with it.

[Doc]

One of the best images I've seen for a while. Alot of details in there and I'm loving the polar caps.

[dweller25]

There can't be much wrong with your optical train to produce a great image like that :-)

[tooth_dr]

Exactly, that is cracking image of Mars. I woke up at 5am the other morning (with a sore head!), looked out and it was clear. So i went out to the garden for five minutes to see Mars. I couldn't bring myself to setup to image it though, but seeing yours does giv me some encouragement!

[Clayton]

Thanks Clayton a singing system is so very important. My out of focus star images recorded for this night with camera attached, look bad, one side is being pulled over, It might be thermal problems, or it might be a mirror clip is slightly too tight, ( as i reset it recently )

Before i i loosen them, i want to try filming the out of focus star images with the fan running to see what effect it has. I may upload a short avi showing the problem here at some point.Also one side of the out of focus star images look fairly defined, the other side looks so bad i cant even make out, the out of focus rings that aid collimation. I mentioned this to Orion but they didnt seem concernerd. But after seeing it on film, i think i will re film this, and send it to Orion as it looks pretty awful. something i wouldnt expect for a 1/12th wave set of optics.

Who ever said this game on a budget was easy. Which reminds me need to check my lotto ticket lol. Hope to get a more confident system working by opposition, as obviously a lot more detail is coming our way. BTW think i read on your post you was trying mars at 30 degrees. Thats going to be real tough Clayton, seriously need full height for this tiny globe, this was fairly high up here. Even so one edge was not tight. Probably the problems already mentioned.

Some of these problems can be difficult to suss out.

I recently managed (with help) to crack a problem with my Newtonian (after about 12 months) that I was almost sure was due to a dud secondary, as I had eliminated every other component, but turned out to be simply the wrong spacing from the primary to the secondary . Images here

Equipment pictures by claytonbigwood - Photobucket It was only when I actually went to order a new secondary that the cause came to light

I hope the solution though hard to identify is simple to fix as I'm sure it will be, as Newtonians are about as simple as it gets.

[neil phillips]

I certainly agree Clayton some problems mimic others. Sometimes its hard to tell whats going on. if you or anyone else is interested heres a stacked image, i had lots of cooldown, but temperatures might have been falling.

will do the same test with fan running next time. If i dont cure the problem, ill loosen the 3 clips holding the primary. though if that is the cause, clearly its one clip causing this. wondering if i can suss out which one, image taken with a 3x TV barlow and baarder red filter. the avi certainly shows a bad thermal problem so it might be that. ill upload a avi, for others referances to similar problems, and or my own advice, Cheers

[barkis]

If a scope of mine produced an Image that good, I would give it a biscuit and a warm glass of Milk:D

It really is very well detailed.

Ron.

[johnh]

Hello Neil, the Mars image is really very good for such a small sized planet and it is still low but I find the IR742 transforms contrast and takes away some atmospheric wobble.

Sorry to here of your continuing troubles with the OONewt, I had a mirror clip pinching my SPX to begin with and it gave elongated star just off focus and a cross shape in focus? I also carried out a star test avi and get different patterns intra/extra but some of the images I have been getting have been wonderful so I cannot complain - visually I can resolve globulars with sharp star points at 320x in a TMB supermono ep so I stopped worrying. It took me a year to get my SPX understood.

I also bought 'Bob's Knobs' which are way better than the screw driver damaged screw head business that inevitably arises.

The line across your diff rings is certainly weird looking.

John.

[neil phillips]

Thanks again for the comments guys, Trying to push a system is all about perfection, and clearly this star test is far from perfect so although it can perform, i need to work on the fine things to squeeze better performance out.

Brian i always seem to see two types of C11 astro imagers those whose results are less than perfect, and those that just excel.

ive never figured why this is so, but maybe the consistency question applies, i really dont know ? wish i had a good one though.

John that line is odd isnt it, but i think it might be a fault in the Baarder IR filter ill test this next time. Maybe try 2 different cameras too. If i cant replicate your star tests ill be asking Orion why, Work in progress, but the avi clearly shows a bad thermal current, so im hoping that is most of the problem, ill post a avi soon, see what the coincenus is from you guys. But i seem to have done better with planets than the moon so far. something i didnt expect

[Clayton]

I'm not going to say too much as I am far from an expert when it comes to interpreting these things. Firstly the rings look oval? But if you use a compass to trace out the circles they look pretty good at the bottom but distorted at the top. Secondly things look fuzzier on the top half than the bottom (at 1-2 o'clock the rings are not well defined) I'm not saying for certain but I would looking closely at tube currents as a starting point, rather than the clip

[MartinB]

Beautiful Neil. Don't know about your scope problems but you've obviously squeezed a heck of a lot out of it with this capture. Mars is still very small

[neil phillips]

Thanks for the input Clayton, thats what i thought, it does look thermal doesnt it.

I also have the luxary of seeing the avi, which clearly shows a huge current circling either around the mirror or tube. Seeing as its not particulaly easy to loosen the clips, obviously my next step is to film with fan running to see what beneficial effects it has. And take it from there. if it is thermal, it should to a degree modify this edge distortion. It may be no surprise to me that i think better images seem to happen when i have the fan running while filming. ( something i didnt do this night ) I suspect the longer tube maybe having thermal issues, longer than say f4.5 that is. if this is the case then i may well film with the fan running all the time.

Cheers Clayton.

Just as a after thought when you try mars again my advice is to get to at least about 6000 mm focal length if the gain wont take it at the exposures you prefer, then just as a experiment set the exposure to 1/30 th secs even if gain is maxed out lots of frames can be got over 5 or 6 mins to cope with noise. If you get bad edge distortions ( you may not it might be my poor star test ) But if you do, drop brightness to 0, and watch the effect improve. it did with me. And if your going to bother with mars i also suggest you film to full height. Good luck. Im not positive this advice will be right for you. or indeed the best way to tackle the little sucker. But my results with this approach, acheived what you see here, with a less than perfect system working. Another thing that might be worth trying if you get reasonable captures is a 2x stack on K3 ccd tools, registax shows finer detail but k3 will be larger and much smoother ( Especially at 200% ) something that will help with both the noise problem ( gain maxed out at 6000 mm FL ) And mars tiny size

[Clayton]

Thanks Neil

I would love to be able to experiment with longer FL's. At present I simply don't have the gear, hopefully Santa may come to the rescue. The other problem I have is that from My latitude 35 South. Mars doesn't get much higher for this apparition. It was close to daylight when I took the posted shot as it is almost Summer here.

[neil phillips]

Cheers Martin it surprised me how well the processing went when i started, it doesnt look all that live.

You wait till the big guns start imaging it with C14s at 10,000 mm FL the limitations of this will soon be apparent. One reason i want to get the scope doing the best it can, so i can reach those Focal lengths with a sharp capture, if i ever achieve that ill be a happy bunny. But for the time being its great to see Mars back isnt it. Lets hope a dust storm dont kick up at largest size. Its happened before

Clayton apologies i thought you was in the uk, I understand the 30 degree capture now

[Coco]

Great Image Neil, polar caps look superb..

Guy..

[rawhead]

Very nice Neil

[Tim]

Oh thats a lovely Mars, one of the nicest I have seen for ages.