Telescope Reviews: ETX-80 a planetary journey and beyond

Hello, it's been a while since I posted an observation reporte, so here goes. Last night the skies were mostly clear (for a change). Transparency wasn't the best, with seeing down to about mag 3, then mag 4.5 after I'd been out for a bit and my eyes became more adapted. (Still, not too bad given the light pollution I have in the back yard). Temps were in the mid 60's with light dewing. A very light breeze was just enough to make my "paper towel" eyepiece dew cover flutter a bit...

I carried the scope over to the side of the house that shields me from the surrounding porch lights and street lamp. From here the sky is dark enough that I can just make out the milky way, though with the light haze I have trouble discerning the stars of Sagittarius. No problem, as DSO's are not my target for tonight.

I aligned with polaris and leveled the scope, but kept the tripod at it's lowest height, as I've discovered that this is the perfect height for observing from a chair I had carried out from the dining room. Given the relatively narrow view of the sky I have from my location, I went for a one star alignment. I've learned that this still gets me pretty close to my intended targets, even if they aren't quite in the field of view after slewing to them (although the closer the target is to the alignment star, the better the accuracy). I told the little ETX to slew to Altair. Much to my surprise, it got it right the first time with very little tweaking to get it centered. Much better! (The past few nights I'd been having numerous problems with tracking, slewing and clutch slippage...I suspected this meant a battery change and sure enough, new batteries cured my woes...the old batteries had been lithiums and had logged about 30 hours of use so they were due.)

First target for the night (as it has been most nights lately) was Jupiter. My goal was to resolve the Great Red Spot and to test out a couple of new eyepieces (used Vixen LV's in 2.5mm & 5mm, more on those later). I had the scope slew to Jupiter and it got it just about right. In the 26mm EP Jupiter was about a quarter of the way from the edge of the FOV. I switched the 5mm and refocused. I could clearly resolve the primary belts and southern polar shroud, but no GRS. I switched to the 2.5mm. Definitely bigger, but not as sharp as it was with the 5mm. This puts me at the maximum power Meade recommends for this scope (160X), but it appeared to be just a touch too much for tonights conditions. Details were about the same as with the 5mm, but would occasionaly blur out as the seeing changed, so I went back to using the 5mm. (The 6.4mm and barlow probably would have been the best choice, but I'm getting tired of all the refocusing the barlow entails and wonder about the wear it may be putting on the focusing mechanism, so I didn't bother with it tonight). I attempted several filters: orange #21 (too dark), yellow green #11, light green #56, light blue #82A and the Orion V-block. None of them brought out the GRS, but I think I did see a fleeting oval in the Northern belt. Details seemed sharpest with the V-block filter. The green filter also allowed me to make out some scalloping of the belts. Also interesting was that while I was observing, Eurpoa and Ganymede were close and drawing closer during the session. When I began they were perhaps 7-8" apart which narrowed to less then 5" when my session ended. It made a nice little side show.

Next target was Neptune. I'd already prepared a sky chart, so I slewed the scope there manually (using the control box and 26mm EP). Neptune was star like, but did seem to have a noticable bluish hue. I tried the 2.5mm EP, but it made the planet too faint to see comfortably, so I backed down to the 5mm. Compared to surrounding stars, it seemed that Neptune was a tiny disk compared to the tiny cross like structures of the stars (slight astigmatism). The tiny disk also had a distinct bluish tint that seemed somehow different from bluish stars. Best EP seemed to be the 9.7mm and 6.4mm, as they allowed for a few more surrounding stars to be visible which added to the feelling of gazing into space

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After observing Neptune, I thought I'd try my luck with Uranus. I let the scope slew there this time (as I hadn't prepared any charts and it was a longer haul to get there). :rolleyes: After the scope arrived, I saw two stellar like targets that seemed to be about the right magnitude. I switched to the 6.4mm EP and the upper of the two seemed to be resolving into a tiny disk, plus it had a distinctly (but pastel) greenish color (greenish white would best describe it). I'd found my target!

Having logged a few planets, I thought I'd do a little stellar observing before calling it quits. I had thought of scanning some milky way star fields, but by now the moon was beginning to creep higher into the sky so conditions wouldn't have been the best. How about having another go at Epsilon Lyra? I slewed there and there she (he...a couple perhaps?

) was. I went through all the eyepices, and it seemed like the pair was beginning to split into 4 with the 6.4mm EP (but they were still touching). It wasn't unitl I'd gone all they way down (up?) to the 2.5mm EP that I could clearly see dark sky between one of the pairs. The other pair was almost but not quite not touching. I considered that a success given my previous experience with this double.

By this time, it was getting pretty late, but I didn't want to quit just yet, so I decided to pay a new friend (having "discovered" it a few weeks previously) a visit. I slewed over to Altair and then continued to head a bit left (as it appears in the scope). There he is...Tarazed! A very pretty star with a distinct reddish orange color. This time, I noticed something I hadn't noticed before, just to the right of Tarazed (again, as seen in the EP) is a pretty serpentine chain of stars. The entire chain of consisted of about 6 or 7 stars, and the fainter ones were best with averted vision. I later checked on Starry Night and the faintest star in that chain is mag 11.43...not bad for the little ETX given the conditions...not bad at all!

This one will be a showpiece to show when giving stellar tours. The combination of the serpentine chain of stars (it reminded me of delicate jewelry) in the same FOV as the bright and colored Tarazed makes for a very pretty sight indeed. Best EP here was the 9.7mm, as it still allowed for a nice FOV while darkening the sky to an attractive black.

I thought about going back to Jupiter, but decided that by now the GRS will have rotated out of view and besides...it was 2AM and I have to get up for work tomorrow!

Overall, a very successful evening. Oh...and about those Vixens. I loved the long eye relief, but the 2.5mm took just a bit of practice to avoid vignetting. The bad thing about them is the reflections. Jupiter was bright enough that I could see the faint glow across the entire FOV when it came into view and would remain even after moving the planet just out of the FOV. I might have been able to resolve the GRS if it hadn't been for the loss of contrast due to this...so looks like my quest for the ideal planetary eyepiece will continue....

Thanks for sticking with me through this...I hope I wasn't too wordy!
Craig