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Bagelhead
journeyman
Reged: 09/15/09
Posts: 8
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A few days ago I got my Zhumell Z 6mm and Celestron Omni 32mm eyepieces and they are definitely an improvement over the eyepieces that came with my scope. The 32mm got some great views, I saw the Andromeda Galaxy and Double Cluster with it. The 6mm seems like a good eyepiece, but I still can't seem to get my scope collimated, so I don't know what views I can get with it yet.
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FLYcrash
sage
Reged: 08/29/09
Posts: 231
Loc: Chicago, IL, USA
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Great to hear it! Don't give up on collimation; you'll get it. Good luck, and keep us posted!
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Raman
Young, myopic, non-astigmatic eyes; polycarbonate spectacles; Minox HG 8x33, 10x52 binoculars
Orion XT4.5 (114mm, f/8) Dob
TeleVue 40 Pl; Orion Sirius 25, 10 Pl; Vixen 17 LVW; Pentax 7 XW; Orion Deluxe 2x barlow
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KRS1
sage
Reged: 02/02/09
Posts: 220
Loc: Anglesey, UK
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I had real problems with collimation, mostly due to over complicated methods. I found this though and it made everything click into place and now I get it. So if its a newtonian that you have check out this link
http://www.astro-baby.com/collimation/astro%20babys%20collimation%20guide.htm
Good luck
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Chris
Skywatcher Heritage 130p
Orion XT10i
28mm Skywatcher Nirvana
19mm Panoptic
Nagler 12T4
8mm Ethos
x2 & x3 Televue Barlows
Skywatcher UHC filter
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Solar Ken
sage
Reged: 02/07/06
Posts: 381
Loc: Oregon
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I'll say the same as KRS1. Having owned an 8" SCT Go-To for 9 years, I got a 12" Dob this summer and was a little apprehensive about collimation. I over-researched collimation on the internet, printing out everything I could find until I had a large 3-ring binder full of info, most of it overly-complicated.
I had someone from the local astronomy club help and he put it all into perspective. It's easier than it seems.
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DAYTIME (Solar):
Lunt LS60THa/B600C
NIGHTTIME:
Meade LX90 SCT 8"
Orion XX12i Intelliscope Dob 12"
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cuir
Pooh-Bah
Reged: 03/03/07
Posts: 1143
Loc: Up north.
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Simple. Trough a cheshire, make sure the secondary is centered, if it is, use a laser collimator to center the primary's center dot in the beam, and your done. Most people are insecure about collimation. A lot of doubts arise from inexperience on whether the sky or collimation is at fault when view are only so-so, in reality, most beginer's common sense and gut instinct bring them to execute a quite decent collimation, however, the prevalence of bad seeing, and lack of knowledge about magnification's effects on the views tend to make them think they are not "there yet".
I was, myself, victim of that very sense of insecurity. I and actually realized I was suffering from bad seeing a lot more than from collimation problems. Though I had doubted my collimation efforts for a long time, they were later confirmed to be quite decent by an experienced peer at a starparty.
Do note that the 6mm will yields good views far less often than the 32mm. Side effect of it's high magnification is that it will also show atmospheric disturbances a lot more, thus, most of nights, yielding view not quite as crisp as the views on the rare good nights for high powered work.
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Seb
Eyepiece spreadsheet v6.8
Choosing the right eyepiece
Main scope: 150mm Maksutov
Scnd scope: 200mm Schmidt-Cassegrain
Favorite ep: 24 Panoptic and 11m T6 Nagler
Pref'ed filters: Lumicon 0III and UHC
Mounts: EQ6-Pro and Skyview AZ
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Bagelhead
journeyman
Reged: 09/15/09
Posts: 8
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I actually tried to collimate the primary mirror of my telescope, and it looked like I did a good job, until I tried out the scope, and found I had made the collimation worse than it was before I tried to fix it... Until I get this fixed, I'll just have to use the 32mm eyepiece since it doesn't seem to be affected much. I was actually out with it for a few hours with my copy of Turn Left at Orion, and revisited the Pleiades, Orion Nebula, Double Cluster, and Andromeda Galaxy, and then found M32(Tried to find M110 but I guess my sky is too bright), M35, and M36(I couldn't seem to find M37 or M38).
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WOBentley
Deep Sky Denizen
Reged: 09/16/09
Posts: 243
Loc: Pacific Northwest USA
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"Trough a cheshire"
Sorry for the newbie type question but...
I admit to absolutely no knowledge as to what this is or what it means....
Can you educate me please?
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My Sky; having the blues means sleepless nights...
"Clearsky" white means sleep tonight!
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Tiny
sage
Reged: 05/02/08
Posts: 290
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A cheshire is a collimation tool. Basically a collimating cap and sight tube in one with a crosshair in the barrel.
Looks like this:
http://www.scopestuff.com/ss_coll2.htm
Also you can watch this:
http://www.andysshotglass.com/Collimating.html
As mentioned though, even after proper collimation you may not get perfect views simply due to distortion in the earths atmosphere. This will prove especially true under very high magnification where images can often be blurry and hard to focus.
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WOBentley
Deep Sky Denizen
Reged: 09/16/09
Posts: 243
Loc: Pacific Northwest USA
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Awesome....great links and the video does a good job of explaining it! Something new learned today!
Thanks
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My Sky; having the blues means sleepless nights...
"Clearsky" white means sleep tonight!
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