Dion's Shed Polar Illuminator +

[TheThing]

Having had a bit of cash from the outlaws for my birthday, I decided to splash out on something I would never normally buy. A timely ad from Dion (aka Dion's Shed and Tophouse) caught my eye.

I have a polar scope with my 'EQ4' type mount, but have only tried it out once in the past. I found that it was too dark to see any of the graphics on it and just too much hassle. I have always used the trusted method on aligning Polaris in the finder and then EP of the scope and making do. This does lead to some furious 'knob twiddling' as the object I looking at gently drift thru the field of view and I'm have to move the Dec to keep it in view.

Dion's Polar Illuminator + seemed like a good idea and not too expensive. My 'EQ4' type mount has a pretty large apature for the polar scope, so a quick measurement and an e-mail to Dion resulted in a blank clip being sent to me for sizing. It fitted perfectly, so the order was placed.

Knowing that Dion was making me one to order and that this is a side line for him, I was expecting the item too quickly, but it arrived in a couple of days, which was excellent.

The Polar Illuminator was well packaged and robust, nicely put together. I would suggest keeping holf on the carboard ring that the actual illuminator comes in as it makes storage a lot simpler.

In the pack you get the illuminator - a red led on a plastic clip with power wired attached and the control box. Simply add batteries, plug the jack from the illuminator into the control box and your off. An on/off switch is provided for power saving and a neat resistor knob to turn the brightness of the bulb. Simply clip the illuminator in the polar scope turn it on, peer thru and align.

I have found that the brightness needs to be turned all the way down to effectively see polaris, but that may just be my own preference and the conditions in my area dictating that.

The red light illuminates the graphics on my polar scope nicely, without washing polaris out. I can ensure that the polar scope is correctly aligned as mine has pointed to Ursa Major and Cassiopea on it. The first time I used it I discovered that my lattitude adjustment was way off! A quick adjustment brought Polaris dead centre of the little circle and thus perfectly polar aligned. This whole process took me about a minute from start to finish.

I spent a little time imaging Jupiter as it wended its way between neighbouring trees and was very pleased that I did not have to touch the Dec control at all - a first for me!

All in all, a remarkable piece of kit, well made, well priced and pretty essential!

Thanks Dion!

[TopHouse]

Cheques in the post mate Many thanks.

[yeti monster]

TH's good with stuff like that.......