Posts Made By: Dan Goldberg

Motors will let you focus without causing vibrations in the scope. They may give you finer focusing ability too, but Crayford's should be smooth and offer very accurate control either way. Some motorized systems include counters as well.

It's a CG-5/EQ-5.

All GoTo does is turn your drives for you and point stuff out. If you can find stuff yourself, or want to, then forget GoTo. Technically, all you would really need is a RA drive, but both axes might be nice anyway and I doubt they come separately from Celestron anymore. I'm surprised you didn't get them along with the scope/mount - are you sure your mount's not motorized? A polar alignment scope (if you don't have one) will be useful, but not as much so for your type of photography.

With the object in the field of view, you will probably want a Mogg adapter for your Toucam so that you can fit it in place of 1.25" eyepieces, or use it with barlows and any other number accessories. Other than that you don't need anything else. If you plan on doing long exposures with your webcam (probably not) then some of the things that the Celestron guy suggested would apply.

Honestly, though, with a bit of practice you could do without motors as well. You're not going to be taking long exposure shots, and even if you were you could still do without motors on a quality mount

Look more closely at the photograph. There are some streaks...

GoTo and DSC's will require about the same initial setup before each use and have a typically similar (and shallow, I should say) learning curve. The only difference is that with DSC's you move the telescope and with GoTo it moves itself.

What exactly about the DSC's is trying your patience?

For reference, Purolator is the most careful courier I have ever dealt with. Their insurance is extremely expensive, but I have to wonder whether it's because they actually pay you when they break stuff. Never had to file a claim.

I hope everything gets sorted out to your liking.

Probably stolen to order. No thief would be stupid enough to take a scope like that on a whim, and if that's the case then it's probably gone for good.

My local scope shop was broken into a few times at its old location and not a single telescope was ever stolen. Binos and EP's on the other hand... yoink!

Nothing a couple resistors won't fix. If you're already bringing a battery with you, then why not rig up the scope with a simple heating system?

When you say "reflex finder" do you mean Telrad? If so, there is a product specifically made to snap onto a Telrad and heat it. I haven't tried it, but it's not rocket science so I doubt it's bad. With the Telrad, I imagine you could easily make your own heater and even use the AA batteries inside. They'd run out more quickly, but you can get high capacity NiMH rechargables.