Posts Made By: Walter Hamler

While I won't venture the opinion that they are the darkest, they are sure the best around here, and that would be Astronomy Village in Chiefland, FL. The November Star Party skies there can be exceptional, not only for darkness, but for steadiness as well. I will be going this year, as I am sure, many hundreds more are as well!! See you all there.

Walt

I have a Moonlight on my 10" dob and like it very much. However, I have to be upfront in that I don't much care for their method of attaching to a curved sutface, ie, a tube. They use a couple wedges and spacers and since the mounting holes are not symetrical to the center hole of the focuser, you have to "square up" the focuser with leveling screws. It works but is a little time consuming to say the least. Once done it should be good to go for a long time, and the focus is very smooth, especially the "slow motion" side.
A friend who has a truss dob with a Feathertouch says the moonlight is as good as his in every respect. However, the Feathertouch units are available with a shorter height if you need/want that feature.

Walt

http://www.roystarman.com/C-av.com/index.html

Their web hoster spld theit domain before it expired. There will be a new domain name forthcoming soon.

Walt

Victor, how about making your own? The attached pic is my TAL-100 refractor on the TAL-2M mount. The origional pedastal was for a newt but I replaced the center colume with a scrap piece of 4" ID aluminium tube that I picked up at a scrap place for 15.00. The TAL feet are about 18" long and make for a stable platform. You may be able to buy a set of legs from TALScopes in Canada, or contact me if you are interested as I have an extra pedastal and legs. I would be willing to sell the legs only.
I'm not sure how your mount head is dsigned to fit a pedastal but it shouldn't be too hard to do.

Walt

What are you going to use the scope for; visual only, astrophotography, ??
What is the f/ratio of the scope?
Dob or equatorial mount?
These are all factors I would have to consider before deciding which focuser.
If it is a heafty mounted GEM of about f/5 or so and photography was my prime concern I would probably go for the Clement. OTOH, if visual and digital type photography were my prime uses I would go for the Feathertouch, or even the Moonlight. If visual only, I would go with a JMI reverse crayford. That is probably one of the most underrated focusers out there for visual use.

Walter

Floyd, unless I am very mistaken, Joe is not with Moonlight Focusers. He makes a Helical type focuser and other focuser products. You are probably thinking of the Clement Focuser.

Walt

Lee, I have done the same thing after only a few hours, but I was probably VERY lucky.
I would say that as long as the silicone was fresh stuff and it has been curing at normal A/C room temps and humidity levels, you will be ok.
Just keep the tube nose low most of the time!!!

Walt

Dan, a year or so ago I made a 12.5" f/5 dob that was patterened after a Starmaster with 4 truss tubes. I made a square upper tube plate to attach the tubes to, then attached a round secondary cage. In the inner cage ring, next to the square plate, I cut two 45* arcs with a router. Then I put two 1/4-20 bolts and wing nuts through the plate and inner ring so that the wing nuts could be loosened and then the cage could be rotated the 45* allowed by the arcs. It was aligned so that the eyepiece would rotate from almost parallel to the ground to almost vertical.
It worked very well and I hade no problems maintaining collimation.
Sorry I don't have pics anymore, the files got deleted somehow.

Walt

John, since no one jumped on your question, I will attempt an answer.
The stars that make up the densest part of the milky way arms are probably not much, if any, denser than the region right here where we are. The nearest star to us is a little over 4 ly, and there are perhaps dozens within a 10 ly range, maybe more since I'm not real sure.
In the denser star cloud regions, such as NGC7000, there would be many more stars, but the net density would still be only a little greater than we experience. Maybe stars as close as a couple ly??
Now, go to a globular cluster, and the core density will be 10's of stars per cubic ly, MANY times greater than here. The view would be awesome indeed.!
The disappointing (at least to me) fact is that the experts tell us that even if we could get real close to something like the Orion Nebula, so that it filled the sky from horizon to horizon, it would still not exhibit color, and would be just a little brighter than the core of the milky way under really dark skies. However, having experienced the southern milky way under truly datk skies, it is indeed a sight to take your breath away, even if it is only B&W!!

Walter

Nope, sorry, I ain't buying it!! You got a satellite link to Cassini!

Walt