is it possible?

[krs01]

is it possible to get a wedge for the synscan as goto mount?as i want to dabble in lunar and planetery photography,and is a canon 1000d a suitable camera?

thanks

kris

[jgs001]

Kris, you don't need a wedge for Lunar and Planetary. I have done lunar with a NexStar SLT and it's the same mount I believe (or as near as makes no difference). The 1000d isn't ideal as the sensor size is too big (and unless you can convince it to do high frame rate video) the frame rate isn't fast enough. A webcam is a far better tool for this sort of thing... The MS Lifecam HD seems to be doing a good job for people at present.

[krs01]

cheers,will have a look into some webcams,and how much the the lifecam hd?

[krs01]

cost even,still early in the day.

[krs01]

another thing,is the mount suitable for bright dso photography?

[jgs001]

You mean like this ?? Both taken (I've got more ) with my NexStar SLT tracking in AltAz, ST80 and Canon 450d.

[krs01]

yep like that,they are impressive,the orion nebulae looks awesome mate,how many exspoures did they take?

[jgs001]

The first one, the shot details are in the border... Orion, is 47 frames of mixed exposure...

yes you can... there are limits, it's a case of finding them and tapping against them. I found the biggest issue was the mount and drive chain, get beyond a kilo in weight, and whereas below a kilo hitting 60 seconds was easy...2.5 Kilo, I was lucky to get 15seconds. You need to tail weight the scope, so not perfectly balanced.

[krs01]

thanks for the advice jgs,im using a 127 mak at the moment also got a 130 relfector,when i get some clear skies and am not working will give it a shot.

[jgs001]

The 127 Mak is gonna strain the mount and tracking for deep sky stuff.. be great for the moon and planets... I've heard that the 130 hasn't got enough in focus to achieve focus with an SLR... in which case, it might be worth looking at shifting the mirror up the tube a little way with the bolts... I've no clue how hard that would be as I've not user a newt...

[krs01]

it is hard to focous an the newt,will probly look into moving the mirror,im looking more at lunar and planetery work first,dont want to jump straight in at the deep end,will proberly get an heq5 later on too.

[jgs001]

that's a lot simpler (ish) and certainly doesn't require such tight tracking accuracy. The Mak will be great for it too.

[krs01]

thats what i thought want to work my way the getting used to the diffrent methods,whats the tracking like on the HEQ5?

[jgs001]

superb... With the current setup (7.5Kg of fracs and cameras on dualmount) with a normal polar align just using the polar scope, deep sky is good for 2 to 3 minutes exposures. For my lunar images recently, my polar alignment consists of sighting along a compass and along the axis and getting them in the right ballpark. It's hard to polar align properly when the sky is too bright to see polaris

[jgs001]

Just seen this posted up...

http://stargazerslounge.com/imaging-discussion/106757-eyepiece-projection-webcam-imaging.html#post1464399