Portable Astronomer (amateur)

[perfrej]

Folks!

I just thought I should share a working set-up for field work with stuff that should be a little too much to carry around...

In the picture below is the following:

Tripod and head for Skywatcher's NEQ6

Accessory carbon fibre case with everything optical

- Barlow

- Filters

- Collimator

- Adapters

- Hand controller

- EOS 1000D

- Meade DSI-II

Pelican case with power

- 4x 12V 7AH in parallel

- 12V to 5V converter (home brewed)

- USB hub

- 3 case mounted USB ports

- 1 NEQ6 power outlet

- 1 Charger connector

- 1 DB9 for hand controller comm

- 1 USB-to-Serial

- 1 USB connector to computer

Skywatcher Explorer 250P Newtonian with:

- Finder scope

- Orion Starshoot Autoguider scope with camera

- ONE cable containing 3 USB connections and 1 ST4

Counter-weights on shaft

Warm shoes

One snow shovel

Gloves, cap, hot chocolate, two sandwiches, Asimov "The Gods THemselves", three bottles of carbonated water, power cable for NEQ6, hand controller cable and a 10m USB extension cable.

Scope goes in the back seat, the rest in the boot.

Not in the picture:

1 Macbook Pro with Windows 7, Nebulosity2, PHD guiding and Stellarium

1 12-to-240 inverter for Macbook supply from car.

Oh, and the car has a Webasto diesel heater that keeps me warm when I read...

[RogerTheDodger]

Very tidy!

[Doc]

Are you a virgo by any chance?

Lovely selection of kit and as you say pretty portable.

[Ad Astra]

Sweet!

If you were in my club - I'd definitely have you for a scope buddy! I've never been that organized in my life!

Dan

[perfrej]

I think the most important thing is to have a solid set-up in terms of power and connectivity. I used nylon braided sleeving for all cables and tie-wrapped it all to the proper locations on the scope. The pelican case is great - I never open it as all connectors are on the outside of it.

And I do have a messy desk