There's a Monster in my living room

[tonyh66]

Big scope, is that why you have 2 front doors?

[Ad Astra]

Big scope, is that why you have 2 front doors?

Sorry Tony,

that's just silliness on the part of the builder - strangely, it is not uncommon in America to have a front door entirely out of proportion to the house.

Still, I won't say it hasn't been useful!

Dan

[Adz]

That is gorgeous, what a sexy green too!

You look to have a lot of houses near you, do you have to break it all down to drive to a darksite in the desert?

[Ad Astra]

Hi Adam,

Since this is mostly a planetary / lunar scope - it does just fine on that plus clusters and splitting doubles without any trouble from the front patio. The dew / light shield on the front is over 12-inches deep, so it cuts off most of the stray light pretty well. I haven't done much deep space stuff with it - but I will be taking it 'on the road' to the desert later this spring.

Dan

[Vega]

Put that in your garden and you'll have Armed police and the anti-terrorist squad at your door within hours LOL

Seriously nice rig you got there. Man, Saturn is gonna blow looking through that!

Enjoy! I will be blaming every cloudy night this week on you

Matt

[astroeddie]

Getting back to my brothers thread,

If he can get one of these for £300, make it 2, I'll cancel my 12" NEQ6 Newt.

2 of those for Hartlepool if you please.

Awesome scope indeed. Cann't find the Focal length, objective size that it is ?

Please don't keep us in suspenders any longer.........

Eddie H

[Ad Astra]

Hi Eddie,

This is a 1996 Apomax - one of 23 made, and I believe the last one in the series. Designed and hand made by master optician Fred Mrozek, formerly of the Yerkes Observatory. It is a 133mm f/12, 4-element, oil spaced objective, 5 baffles in the tube to cut off stray light and improve contrast, monster 4"/2"/1.25" focuser at the back. Fred says his design corrects chromatic error from the near UV to a bit beyond the H-alpha region, and I've no reason to doubt him! The focuser is the only weak point, rather clunky rack & pinion that I'd like to replace when I have the $$$.

The views are fabulous - especially on lunar and planetary targets. We had it out against a C-11 and a Meade 10" LX-50, and the views crushed what those two could do, especially on faint, low-contrast surface features. Hunting the little moons, it was bested by the C-11, but not the Meade. 11" of aperture made seeing the faint ones like Mimas easier in the C-11. Coma on the Meade actually made it worse for little moons than the Apomax.

Cheers,

Dan

[Domis]

A nose cone and some tail fins on that and I"ll bet you will have a few less neighbors causing stray light issues. Of course, homeland security may be your next dinner guests.

[Ad Astra]

If I was going to do that, I'd paint a Libyan flag on it, wear my Mo Kadaffi mask and invite the Marines (US and Royal) to join the party!

Dan

A nose cone and some tail fins on that and I"ll bet you will have a few less neighbors causing stray light issues. Of course, homeland security may be your next dinner guests.

[astroimpulse]

It's awesome

I love those mounts too. Excellent piece of kit.

[Earl]

Sorry Tony,

that's just silliness on the part of the builder - strangely, it is not uncommon in America to have a front door entirely out of proportion to the house.

Still, I won't say it hasn't been useful!

Dan

Very handy for moving in the sofa

[Domis]

If you invite the "Royal's" remember your manners and have a pot of tea brewing.{Earl Grey} perhaps.

[robbie65]

holy moley that's a big scope