Posts Made By: Floyd Blue

How many here have resolved Titan as a complete disc with color.
What sized scope was used?
Did it show as a full disc like a smaller Mars?
I saw Titan last Saturday night with a clarity that I have never seen before. It was smaller than Mars, but it still looked like it. The color almost looked like banding or mottled in apearance.
Have you seen it look this way.
I am asking because I have never heard anyone say they have seen this in the past.
Floyd

Well, I got the DOB refinished, assembled and collimated today.
Looks like a new scope. I promised to post pics, so here is a series of them.
Floyd

It is all ready to go! Came out very nice. Here is a picture of the finished project.
Floyd

Here is a Picture of a new site we just got on a private preserve. The scope is my 15" DOB with all the trimmings
Floyd

James,
Very nice!
Here is a pic of my newest scope. 12.5" DOB that I refinished and updated.
Floyd

I am wondering if anyone knows af a Mirror Coating Service in the Los Angles area? I hate to have to drive all the way to the Bay area for AlCoat.
Floyd

Anyone know a Coating company in the L.A. area?
I have sent an e-mail to QSP, but I heard they are no longer doing this.
Floyd

I just got the chance to take the 12.5" DOB out for a test drive. The night was reasonably clear and upper air was pretty good.
The first thing I noticed is how long it takes to cool down the mirror with no fans! Wow, took about 2.5-3 hours to get it near equalibrium.
Next I saw a little coma, not much, but it is there. Checked collimation several times and it seemed well collimated.
After it cooled down I was able to get a nice image of Saturn at 381X with my 4mm UO Ortho. That is the highest magnification EP I have. The Cassini was very good and banding on the planet was clear.
Star testing looked pretty good, with some coma and what looked like a small amount of astigmatism, very little however and it might have just be me. The secondary is glued to the mounting plate like my 15" DOB was (same man built both scopes) so I may need to remount the secondary.
The coma and astigmatism was not bad and it looked about the same as another club members 12.5" DOB with a Discovery mirror. SO it is probably normal.
It is not as good as my 15" Swayze, but it is pretty good. The 15" Swayze mirror is excellent and this mirror is deffinately not a Swayze competitor. ;^) But it is good for the cost and all.
I am pleased with the outcome. I believe I need a new secondary mirror though as it has a bit of small scratches and marks on it. The Primary could use a recoat I believe as it has spots of something on it that will not clean with water and soap or alcohol. I did not try Acetone.
The Trapizium showed 5 stars with the "E" star being a little hard to resolve. I could not quite get the pinpoint for the stars like I can with the Swayze mirror. The conditions may have contributed to this however. I will have to wait for a good night to take it to a real site as my backyard is not a good observation site, it is way to light polluted and I am at 400' altitude in a valley.
I guess you could say that I am pleased and hoping to fine tune it and get even better results.
Floyd

I took the mirror out today and installed a 3.5" 14cfm fan below the mirror in the mirror cell. It blows very well and does curl up over the edge of the mirror.
I did not install a mirror to blow across the top of the mirror, because the mirror box is a little smaller than the 15" and the same method will not work.
I may install a second fan later, but I will try it for now and see how well it works.
I also cleaned the primary with acetone and got a lot of the spots and specks off the surface without any damage to the coatings. Maybe got 85-90% of them off. Some were just not effected by the acetone. It looks much better now and is deffinately more reflective and clear looking.
I found that the bolts for the mirror clips were touching the primary and holding it tight! Pinched optics! Not good, so I put another washer on the bolt and got the mirror free floating. :^) I hope this helps with the images too. I suspect it will improve them.
Now I need another night to try it out and see how long it takes to cool down.
One other benifit was the battery for the fan took the place of a wieght I added for balance with the 20mm and 31mm Naglers. Dual purpose is always nice.
Hope you all have better weather than we have predicted for the next few days.
Floyd

Anyone have any thought as to the quality of the Meade ellipitcal flats for diagonal mirrors?
I am concidering getting one as a replacement for mine that is scratched up.
Floyd