Posts Made By: Bob Young

Been looking for information and reviews on this scope and came up empty. I imagine it's another Synta product. Has anybody looked through one? If so, what were your impressions? Any links to reviews?

Was always kind of interested in the Meade 7" Mak. Heard they were very heavy for their size and hard to cool. The Orion Mak is supposed to weigh 16 lbs. That could work on a SVP or a CG5.
Bob

...to set up the forum display so as to simply scroll through a thread and read each response in turn, without clicking on it? It's the way CN (Please don't Ban me! 8O ) and some other forums I frequent organize responses and I've found I prefer it.

I've been playing with the forum display preferences and have not found a selection that permits this. My apologies if the answer is right under my nose.
Bob

Is it possible for an amateur to trignometrically measure distances to neighboring stars? I understand that this would require stars near enough to exhibit significant "proper motion".

I also take proper motion to mean movement of a star relative to the background sky/stars as a result of earth's orbital motion. Is this correct?

If it is possible, what technique, equipment, measurements and calculations should be used?
Bob

http://www.buytelescopes.com/product.asp?pid=9960

Has anyone retrofitted their Televue focuser with one of these FeatherTouch units? ...or had a chance to use one? Looks like an attractive option if you're content with the stock TV focuser travel.

Was wondering if it performed to expectations and how difficult it was to install. How does it compare to the full FT focuser?

At $220 to $250 they seem a little pricey for what you get, but an easy bolt on upgrade beats replacing the whole focuser.
Bob

What's the difference between the Takahashi TOA scopes and their TSAs? Both are triplets, right? Do they use different glasses, different cell designs, or what? Would the TSA, for a given aperture, be inherently lighter than the TOA? Is the TOA an imager's scope while the TSA is for visual?

I'm aware that the only TSA is a 102mm and that the TOA design is either 130mm or 155mm(?). But I've seen talk on the web that larger TSAs are planned as well as smaller TOAs. So I'm wondering if there's any advantage of one design over the other.

To me it would've made sense to keep the FS doublet line going as a lighter, less expensive alternative to the triplets. But I've also heard there are issues with flourite glass availability.

Just askin'
Bob

...knobs for the RA and DEC axes on my Skyview Pro that have those long spring shaft extensions? I'm strictly manual on my mount and finding that the reach to the mount is quite inconvenient when a long refractor is in use. Yeah, I know, "buy some motors"...but I'm through fooling with cables, batteries, and connectors in the dark.

Don't even know what these things are called, so the searches haven't worked.

Thanks in advance.
Bob

The other night I observed Saturn at low power with my 4" APO. I was using a 40mm Pentax XL and the 2" dielectric coated diagonal that came with the scope. The image of Saturn at low power had a bright orange flare on one side that totally obliterated image details on that side. I could not get rid of the flare with focus. It looked like an orange flame shooting out of the side of the planet. I never normally look at the planets at such low power.

I've always had focus issues with this scope, mostly on bright images. At first I thought they were due to astigmatism. The manufacturer checked it out and pronounced scope and diagonal to be fine.

Next I put a Starlight microfocuser on it (pinion assy only) as I thought I was overshooting focus. By doing that I found that the scope actually had a fairly wide focus range, but that the bright images really didn't clean up with focus. Apparently, the flare is there to some extent on all bright images.

Next good night I plan to set it up side by side with my other APO (a 3" Tak which always renders clean images) and try to get to the bottom of this. I plan to swap diagonals and eyepieces back and forth and also try straight-thru viewing to see if the flare follows any of the lesser components.

I'm wondering if anyone here has additional ideas that I might try. I'd like to get this fixed.
Bob

After extending the dewshield on my 4" refractor, I typically add an Orion Flexishield to the end of it to get another 4 or 5 inches of dewshield protection. Paranoid about getting the objective dewed up, I guess. Have yet to get the lens wet using this approach.

Anyway, what am I sacrificing optically with this arrangement? Field of View? Brightness at edge of field? Anything at all? Little of consequence?

What if the DS sags or droops into the FOV? Will it affect the star test?

Thanks in advance for your response.
Bob

I've found the manual setting circles on my Orion SVP mounts to be a big help in locating objects under hazy/brightly lit skies. I find a bright star in the vicinity of my desired object, center it in the e.p. and set the circles to its RA/Dec coordinates (RA drive running). Then unlock the axes and move the scope until the object's RA/Dec coordinates are at the pointers. If done carefully the object is almost always in the FOV, often well centered.

The process is dependent upon having accurate, up-to-date coordinates for the initial bright star. Sometimes these are hard to come up with if the star isn't double or unique in some way. Where would I find printed coordinates for all the bright (1st Mag or brighter) stars? Picking coordinates off the chart just introduces another potential source of error.
Bob

While reading this I became convinced it was the fault of Astromart and CN. Everyone so busy arguing about the latest ED refractor that no one was watching the sky:
http://www.foxnews.com/story/0,2933,389061,00.html

But, my mistake. This being a southern sky event lets AM & CN off the hook. Guess if anybody deserves blame, it should be all those Hot Latinas
Bob (I know, not PC....so shoot me)