GRRR - Already got the hump!

[danielson23uk]

Hi Gang,

Not long been in from the garden with my relatively new acquisition (SW 130P, EQ2) and I'm starting to regret plumping for this wee beastie.

I find myself battling with the EQ mount. Polar align is rough and so, ok, I expect to be onto a hiding to a certain extent.

My reason for going for the above was because I could learn the ropes with EQ mounts and then bolt on some imaging hardware and a motor for some imaging. But no sooner was the purchase made than I discovered I wouldn't be able to get a dslr to focus and even a spc900 needs extention tubes apparently. Given this, will I be adding a motor to the EQ2.... erm no.

I've come to the conclusion I'm an Alt/Azimuth kinda guy and the way you guys talk about Synscan picking out M42 and other such wonders makes me think that there is a much more fun side to Astronomy and it involves technology!

Having vented my spleen, I do need to report one success.... My 7 year old is locating (RDF spotting), and picking and choosing her EPs, and enjoying Astronomy. So I think we can see where my 130P might end up going. Maybe it's just that transition when a parent loses the ability to program a video recorder.

Thanks for listening.

[rowan46]

You just need a bit of practice once you've mastered it you'll wonder what the fuss was. goto is as steep a learning curve. "problems with synscan" is about 2nd most popular question after. Which telescope? followed by problems with eq mount in third place. anyway suffering is good for the soul.

[BazMark]

I concur with Rowan,

I purchased my scope with Synscan and though I had no problems with it after learning how to use it, for me I found it a novelty that quickly wore off. I never use it now. I find things to view by reading, learning where to look with star maps and the like and then hunting them down with the slew controls. I find a pair of 10x50s at my side is also useful. I wish now that I'd purchased it with the Supatrak and spent the spare cash on better EPs.

[danielson23uk]

Thanks Rowan. Just sounding off, you know. I was chuffed to bits with my little 'un getting stuck in.

I think my problem is that having taken up the hobby in Jan and being plagued by cloud cover, I'm in too much of a hurry to get observing. I need to get into the habit of taking my time polar aligning and then I'm sure it'll drop into place.

I checked the collimation today and it seemed good (from what I know) so I'm now doubting the 'cheap as chips' EPs that come with the scope.

The thing for me is that I see such beauty that I want to capture it, and yet my scope is to unable to help because of the issues with getting photographic hardware to focus.

I won't give up though, I doubt my 7 yr old will let me now!

[JamesF]

For a fair bit of my observing I don't worry too much about polar alignment and so on. If you just want to view some DSOs, say, just arrange the mount so it's approximately right and use a finderscope or RDF from there so you get used to manipulating the scope on the mount. If you leave the alt/az settings alone it isn't too hard to find things by just moving the scope around the RA and dec axes. Once you're comfortable with that, you may find the rest comes more easily.

James

[Sharpiejas]

Keep going mate, i'm sure you will just pick it up one day and everything will click into place.

[Luke]

Is the problem that you can't get enough in-focus with the SLR? (i.e. the focal point is near the tube fully in rather than tube fully out).

If so, if you have a Barlow you could try giving that a go, I believe Barlows push the focal point out (and reducers pull the focal point in, I can't use a reducer on one of my scopes due to not enough in focus).

[danielson23uk]

Luke,

I think the problem as I understand it is that the T-Mount adapter pushes the camera even further from the maximum in focus.

I tried using the T-Ring on its own screwed directly onto the viewer to get the camera body as close as I could but it still didn't work.

I'm led to believe that I'd still need a barlow even with the SPC900.