Posts Made By: Kevin Brennan

Huh, surprised by that actually. I wouldn't have thought the corrected field would be any smaller in the TOA. Was that the same in all 4 corners?

Kevin

Are you sure the ME is that much more? I think you need several "accessories" with the AP that I thought brought the price up to about the same. I could very well be wrong. You might also consider whether you need that much load capacity. If not, I agree with you. Why not pick up an AP especially since some seem to be available.

Depending on your load requirements, you can also save alot with some other options, namely TAK, EM200, or NJP. The NJP hauls alot and is one of the most accurate mounts out there.

Kevin

I saw your post in the other forum and didn't really have anything to add, but since you posted here and appear to be interested in solar system stuff, I would say take your longest focal length, and if you have any kind of film or digital SLR, give some moon and solar shots (with Baader filter) a try at your earliest convenience at prime focus. A mirror a remote shutter release would help here. I am not much of an imager or an expert, an more or less putter with it from time to time. I will attach my FIRST EVER astrophoto of any kind. It was shot at prime focus through my C8 on a fork mount. It was on Fuji 800 speed film, and I can recall the exposure off hand, but I know I shot a series. 1/10, 1/30, 1/60 ect. I used a cable release an my old AE1. Spring 1999 I believe.

Then you can try some longer focal length shots of planets with a 4X barlow. If you don't have any cameras, you can get started in this area very nicely with freeware and a web cam.

If you have dark skies, you can also very cheaply get by with some piggy back shots hand guiding your refractor. Focus is easy/easier at infinity of a short focal length lens. Actually for 50mm, or less you wouldn't even need to guide.

You need not rush out and get hungup on equipment. So many times, I see cams or high end imaging mounts that say used once, never used ect.

Good luck,
Kevin

Depends on what your LX is like. And what you are referring to as far as "better". This was my personal experience with similar situation. I had a superb C8. I rated it perhaps at 1/5.5 or better ptv at the ep. Perhaps 1/6. I was trying to be conservative, but I know it was better than 1/5. It was also perfectly collimated which is critical for SCTs. Now my buddy that I observed with ALOT had a 210. The 210 was subtly better on doubles, and planetary contrast. Deep sky was subtly better as well, but I had an old orange uncoated C8.

Now another gent that we observed with alot had a M10. The 210 blew it away on stars and planets and that was cooled and collimated as well. The M10 was obviously better on deepsky due to aperture. I also owned 2 C11's that would not compare to the 210 or the C8 for stars/moon/planets. I had both my C11's cooled and collimated at ultra high mags.

So if you have a mediocre SCT, then the 210 would handidly outperform it. If you have a truely Diffraction limited 8, then I think like me you will see subtle difference. For me, it was hard to justify the 210 price difference.

Good luck,
Kevin

Outstanding shot, capturing some interesting detail. The feature toward the center with a string of stars is intriguing and completely absent from your earlier shot. I was amazed at that one in and of itself that it was shot with a web cam. I am surprised on that one that you didn't get alot of noise on the long Ha shots or did you modify it for cooling and such.

Kevin

Great image of one of my favorite objects.

Kevin

Another cool image of this favorite area!

Was curious what your subs were and if you had much deblooming to do.

Kevin

Wonderful image. Shoestrings on the stars or software?

Regards,
Kevin

I messed the timing up thinking it was tuesday. Really dumb to as I was out Monday nite. But I had a hell of a time observing a bunch of other stuff. I didn't even notice it was 8 deg when I went back in.

Kevin

Wow, great shots.

Is the white light image with the skynyx? Either that or I really need to learn how to finesse some detail out of my TOA/Baader images.

Kevin