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jrbarnett
Carpal Tunnel
Reged: 02/28/06
Posts: 2635
Loc: Petaluma, CA
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My Intes-Micro M715 MCT has seen quite a bit of use since I purchased it about a year ago. Frequently I use the built-in cooling fan to speed thermal equilibrium.
Yesterday, prepping the scope for a long road trip to a dark sky camping site I noticed that a great deal of dust had accumulated on the corrector. Using an air bulb I blew of most of the dust on the front surface only to find that there was quite a lot of dust on the inside of the corrector.
The flow-through ventilation is filtered and I keep the threaded visual back plug in place for storage (inside a closed soft case). Nonetheless, there's a lot of dust on the inside of the corrector. Much more than I ever had on my old Celestron Ultima after many years of use.
A couple of questions...
1. Has anyone else noticed lots of internal dusting on the Intes-Micro MCTs?
2. What would the safest, simplest way be to remove the internal dust?
Regards,
Jim
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"The Cosmos is all that is or ever was or ever will be. Our feeblest contemplations of the Cosmos stir us — there is a tingling in the spine, a catch in the voice, a faint sensation, as if a distant memory, of falling from a height. We know we are approaching the greatest of mysteries." - Carl Sagan
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rmollise
Carpal Tunnel
Reged: 07/06/07
Posts: 1564
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Quote:
My Intes-Micro M715 MCT has seen quite a bit of use since I purchased it about a year ago. Frequently I use the built-in cooling fan to speed thermal equilibrium.
Yesterday, prepping the scope for a long road trip to a dark sky camping site I noticed that a great deal of dust had accumulated on the corrector.
How much dust is a lot? How did you find it? Not by shining a flashlight down the tube, right? Unless it literally looks like the territory under your bed, leave the dust alone. It will take a killer dust bunny to make an observable difference.
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Uncle Rod
Watch for Rod's New Book:
Choosing and Using the New CATs--coming soon!
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jrbarnett
Carpal Tunnel
Reged: 02/28/06
Posts: 2635
Loc: Petaluma, CA
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Hiya Unk.
I used bright sunlight as I was doing rough collimation (pinhole at a distance of 20 feet; checking concentricity of the reflected elements. When I was up close tweaking the secondary adjustment screws, I noticed the inordinate* amount of dust.
I'll leave it alone if it's a pain in the tail to remove and replace the corrector, but if it's simple, I'm inclined to use an air bulb (only) to dislodge some of the dust.
*inordinate, as in enough dust that my first reaction was "wow, I don't think I've seen this much dust on any of my other scopes, including my Dobs' primaries." Not as bad as looking under the bed, but still pretty bad. It seems that there's much more dust inside than there was on the exterior surface. Methinks the filtration is only so-so.
Regards,
Jim
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"The Cosmos is all that is or ever was or ever will be. Our feeblest contemplations of the Cosmos stir us — there is a tingling in the spine, a catch in the voice, a faint sensation, as if a distant memory, of falling from a height. We know we are approaching the greatest of mysteries." - Carl Sagan
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amys
Carpal Tunnel
Reged: 06/12/06
Posts: 1763
Loc: Groton, CT
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If I shine a flashlight into the OTA on my I-M 703D, I see loads of dust. I'm assuming it's on the primary, no? I don't remember seeing any dust inside the NexStar 8i OTA but maybe that's because the corrector had a sort of fog on the inside, which one CN'er suggested was probably out-gassing from paint.
I've got enough things to bug me. I'm not going to let this worry me too. 
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Amy
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isramirez
scholastic sledgehammer
Reged: 11/04/05
Posts: 760
Loc: Mexico City
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Quote:
*inordinate, as in enough dust that my first reaction was "wow, I don't think I've seen this much dust on any of my other scopes, including my Dobs' primaries." Not as bad as looking under the bed, but still pretty bad. It seems that there's much more dust inside than there was on the exterior surface. Methinks the filtration is only so-so.
Jim,
I faced the same issue with my IM715 scope until i sold all the newts i had previously purchased... i strongly suggest to you to put for sale all those perverse newt scopes before you face the suddenly destruction of your russian maksutov
By the way it is very easy to remove that dust from your meniscus, for the external side i always use to do the following
- I blow away the dust with compressed air
- I use then a camel hair brush to finish the work
- ... no more
But before remove anything try first to clean the external side of your meniscus and re-evaluate then if the internal side is dusty... maybe you will be surprised 
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Santel MK91 & MK6
IntesMicro 715
Celestron SCT6 & ONIX80 EDF
Meade SN6 & AR6
Chinese 6in MakCass.Gregory
DBK + DMK + NexImage + LPI
CG-5 & LXD75 Mounts
many EP's, Barlows and Binoviewers
Great astronomic passion 
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rmollise
Carpal Tunnel
Reged: 07/06/07
Posts: 1564
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Quote:
Hiya Unk.
I used bright sunlight as I was doing rough collimation (pinhole at a distance of 20 feet; checking concentricity of the reflected elements. When I was up close tweaking the secondary adjustment screws, I noticed the inordinate* amount of dust.
I'll leave it alone if it's a pain in the tail to remove and replace the corrector, but if it's simple, I'm inclined to use an air bulb (only) to dislodge some of the dust.
*inordinate, as in enough dust that my first reaction was "wow, I don't think I've seen this much dust on any of my other scopes, including my Dobs' primaries." Not as bad as looking under the bed, but still pretty bad. It seems that there's much more dust inside than there was on the exterior surface. Methinks the filtration is only so-so.
Regards,
Jim
Shining a bright light down a tube, flashlight or sun, especially at an oblique angle, will make any optic look like hell. As the doctor said, "just don't do that."
--------------------
Uncle Rod
Watch for Rod's New Book:
Choosing and Using the New CATs--coming soon!
Edited by rmollise (08/12/08 08:12 AM)
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