Astro Engineering 0.6x 1.25" Focal Reducer

[davy999]

Reducers/Flatteners - Astro Engineering 0.6x 1.25" Focal Reducer

I have just purchased one of the above focal reducers for my nexstar 6SE from FLO and thought I would show the difference before and after focal reductions should anyone be considering purchasing one in the near future.

Pic quality is poor due to me, not the focal reducer!

The price of this one is 1/5th the cost of the celestron one for my scope so it is an absolute BARGAIN!

[riklaunim]

Note that filter threaded reducers doesn't correct the field. For small CCDs (1/4 webcam, 1/3" Titan) it's not that important at medium focal ratios, but when you push it more you will get nasty results like this one (SCT 8" + 0.5x focal reducer at about f/3, DMK21 (Altair is the big thing)). Coma, filed curvature and whatever the scope has - it will be magnified many times . I also used in a f/5 Newtonian making it f/2.75 Newtonian and except of big coma in DMK it did allow to capture faint objects at very short exposures. At 1 sec I got this

[davy999]

Not bad for a 1 sec exposure!

The first picture is rather nasty, I will be trying the reducer out in the next few days and will hopefully get some clearer results to post.

The pics I uploaded were at midday today, its really hot and you could see the heat haze rising so fast in the EP, plus I was imaging through a double glazed window. I know this is all against what you should do but I just wanted to give it a go to understand it a little more before I start wasting valuable dark hours on setting up and using it.

[riklaunim]

Those reducers have the advantage that you can control easily their power just by changing slightly the distance to the CCD/eyepiece. If you get that blurry tails then it's getting to strong reduction (for SCT that would be about 6-7 cm distance, which is a lot). Sometimes the tails can be reduced by some precise focusing, and if they are placed in one corner/side then the collimation is bad.

Start testing it on Saturn or Jupiter. Bright, easy target and the moons will also help estimate changes in brightness, scale etc.

[Star-Gazer]

How did you get on with this reducer please?