What should I take...?

[Helen]

We're off to France on Saturday for a couple of weeks. We're taking the car and driving through France down to the Mont Blanc area. I'll have room for some astro gear, so am wondering what to take...

We'll be staying in a town, not in the dark countryside so its more grab and go than serious stuff.

The PST is first on the list, and the best mount for that if I want to take photos is the Celestron SE. So I'm mulling over what scope to take for night-time views. Options are: Megrez90, Celestron 102, or ETX125.

What I have decided is that we'll take a blanket and go and find some dark skies for the meteor shower

Helen

[simon84]

Hi Helen,

I'm off on hols on Friday and I've decided to keep it simple.

I'll be taking my SW AZ mount, my WO66 and a handful of EP's. Might take the QHY6 just to muck about with as I've not taken any images with it yet.

Oh and my Baader solar filter, not got a PST yet but I'm hoping to rectify that soon.

Happy holidays,

Simon.

[GJBC]

don't know the Celstron that well myself never had one. i would not hesitate to take the etx125 and some nice eyepieces though and and if you have a way of doing some wide field imaging with just a DSLR camera then if you do get the chance of dark skies your covered.

Grahame

[Rusty Strings]

Just come back from a few days in North Wales, I took my C80ED on SW AZ3 and Meade 4000 plossels, didn't take up too much room, easy to setup, pity about the clouds.

[barkis]

A spare Fan Belt Helen, and tools to fit it. You more than likely won't need it, but it's not going to take up much room .

Lovely trip, driving through France. I hope you get some pristine skies, and have a lovely time.

Ron.

[jgs001]

I reckon the C102 Helen, I'm guessing it's smaller and lighter. I'm doing something very similar in a couple of weeks... I'm planning on taking my ST80 clone and my ep's (they all fit in the one case), my redsnapper tripod which will mount most things on it, and my eq1 and drive, that'll do for some widefield camera stuff. I'll probably take a pair of binos too. Thanks for the idea... bet put my camera lens solar filter cell in too.

[NickH]

See if you got round to modding that PST, you'd only need to take one scope :-), and a Vixen A80 makes a nice night time casual viewing one at that...

[Helen]

Don't talk about that Nick... Still waiting for my friend to make the back end part. I've proved the concept though and got a blocking filter onorder :-)

Helen

[NickH]

B1200 or BF10?

[NickH]

As if the B1200's do work (and if Stephen is at SSP, I will test it first hand, and do a straight A/B against the BF10 for quality test), then that's a really good way to circumvent that problem!

(and by work I mean...work to my quality standards!)

[GJBC]

Lovely trip, driving through France.

Ron.

yep i done the drive to Olly down in Ettoile St Cyrice a few years back an very easy route to follow i dont think you go as far south

though you turn left at Macon towards Geneva i stayed overnight in the Mercure hotel (gated which was good as the car was full of my stuff) at the service station just before Macon it was the best placed service station for a petrol stop as well i filled up here it was the first stop since I left home.

don't know if you have done this drive before but check the cost of fuel over in France it might be cheaper to judge your journey so you have to fill up just after you get off the ferry i know i missed out it was much cheaper for fuel over there when i went. i topped up in the last service station on the way back as well. saved me a fortune. enjoy the trip

Grahame

[Capricorn]

The Megrez 90 will probably give the best viewing, not lightweight.

The ETX is basically all one piece but a little chunky. My 105 is smaller but is a handful to grab easily. Simple enough to enter but it would need new location data if used as a goto.

The 102 is not a heavy as it would seem and will I assume fit the Celestron mount(?)

Rotten choice, I would go with the ETX, if you have a car supply for it, it would locate objects and so save time. Still like the Megrez 90 however.

[Helen]

B1200 or BF10?

B1200 Nick, after a load of thinking and discussing I decided to go with a Lunt filter set with the B1200. I'm hoping that'll cover all the bases - use with the Vixen/PST for imaging and resolution, and with one of my apos for visual grab and go and travel. (The Vixen is a bit of a handful on the mount I'm using for grab and go, and can't be used around midday because it fouls the base )

I'd love you to test the set up for quality!

Helen

[Helen]

Thanks for all the suggestions everyone I forgot to mention that the ETX is OTA only, so it'll work on the SE mount. I think that's what I'll take. It'll be good to run it through its paces, I've never really had a good go with it as the ETX mount was so unreliable I got frustrated, and it's been with Jean since deforking (I've got it at the moment while she prepares to move house).

I think I'll take to 0.5 focal reducer for a wider field, the barlow for planetary and a few reasonable eyepieces. That should all fit neatly in the little bag

And being realistic, that reduces the value of the kit so its less of a worry leaving it in the car.

Looking forward to it now!

Helen