12025 replies to this topic

[deSitter]

M41 -37--38-36 and 35 last nite.

 

You OK? Deep sky guy?

 

-drl

[CHASLX200]

You OK? Deep sky guy?

 

-drl

No planets anymore.  Gonna pack it all up until Sept AM.

[ccwemyss]

Not quite yet a classic scope, but riding on the classic AP600E. With good balance, it's amazing how stable it is. I forgot to lock the axes about half the time, while I was switching between some fairly heavy eyepieces, and it never budged. 

 

M36, 37, 38, 42, 45 and Jupiter. First clear night in a while, but mediocre seeing and transparency, giving poor contrast and shimmering. 

 

Chip W. 

[highfnum]

summer is almost here

M13 Tasco 8V

[highfnum]

Tasco 8V Jupiter 

 

 

[highfnum]

Tasco 8v m13

I think this one is cleaner

[Garyth64]

Tasco 8V Jupiter 

 

 

Capture 2025-04-17T20_53_51T8vrL.jpg

Nice, better than the other picture on the 16th.  Proof that bad seeing degrades an image.

Edited by Garyth64, 18 April 2025 - 08:11 AM.

[highfnum]

correct

[Jay_Reynolds_Freeman]

I was out tonight chasing Messier objects with several telescopes, among them a Takahashi Teegul-60 (60 mm f/8.33 refractor). I had nice views of M68, M83, M5 and M13 at a magnification of 42 (12 mm Brandon eyepiece). I have attached tube rings to the optical tube assembly, with a Vixen dovetail on one side and a Vixen-style finder shoe on the other, to facilitate using a PiFinder, which speeds up finding things a great deal.

 

 Clear sky ...

[John R.]

Had a peek of Jupiter with my 60mm x 700mm very old refractor. 
It was picked up in a Goodwill about 35 years ago as an incomplete and very rough OTA. 
Don’t know who sold it, there was no branding on the pieces I bought for $5. 
It has mostly sat, forgotten until 2 years ago I decided to fix it up. I filled the holes with JB Weld epoxy, sanded it down and painted the tube. Made the plywood cradle and used the focuser from a Svbony SV501. It is sitting on a light duty homemade EQ mount, cobbled together with a couple of SW dec slow motion pucks. 

 

 

I used a 25mm eyepiece to find Jupiter (28x) and then switched to a Orion 6mm Expanse (116x) Besides the two main equatorial belts there was little more I could detect on the planet surface. 
Although the view was steady, my feeling was the 60mm just ran out of light by that magnification. I believe it would behave better at 100x with a 7mm EP, but at present my next size up is a 9mm for 77x. 

 

Edit; The homemade EQ can handle up to 5 lbs. but no more. This weighs 2.75 lbs. with the cradle and diagonal and finder eyepiece. Damp time is less than 2 seconds. 

 

Edited by John R., 19 April 2025 - 08:00 AM.

[John R.]

I was out tonight chasing Messier objects with several telescopes, among them a Takahashi Teegul-60 (60 mm f/8.33 refractor). I had nice views of M68, M83, M5 and M13 at a magnification of 42 (12 mm Brandon eyepiece). I have attached tube rings to the optical tube assembly, with a Vixen dovetail on one side and a Vixen-style finder shoe on the other, to facilitate using a PiFinder, which speeds up finding things a great deal.

 

 Clear sky ...

Had to look that one up. A 60x500mm, finally. Not in my hobby income bracket but nice to know it was made. About 3 years ago I was musing that a 60mm x 500mm refractor would be very useful for a small G&G. But search as I might, all I could find were 60/700 or 60/360 ‘travel scopes’ specs. Then a thread here at CN caught my attention. There was a newish company selling a refractor with that specification, Spectrum Optical Instruments still has it in their lineup as the ‘TourStar 60’. And, in my price range! It is a lovely little refractor that at least meets the Sedwick standard for achromats. 
Don’t know why these 60/500’s are so rare, they are truly ‘Goldilocks’ refractors. 

[deSitter]

Had a peek of Jupiter with my 60mm x 700mm very old refractor. 
It was picked up in a Goodwill about 35 years ago as an incomplete and very rough OTA. 
Don’t know who sold it, there was no branding on the pieces I bought for $5. 
It has mostly sat, forgotten until 2 years ago I decided to fix it up. I filled the holes with JB Weld epoxy, sanded it down and painted the tube. Made the plywood cradle and used the focuser from a Svbony SV501. It is sitting on a light duty homemade EQ mount, cobbled together with a couple of SW dec slow motion pucks. 

 

IMG_0487.jpeg

 

I used a 25mm eyepiece to find Jupiter (28x) and then switched to a Orion 6mm Expanse (116x) Besides the two main equatorial belts there was little more I could detect on the planet surface. 
Although the view was steady, my feeling was the 60mm just ran out of light by that magnification. I believe it would behave better at 100x with a 7mm EP, but at present my next size up is a 9mm for 77x. 

 

Edit; The homemade EQ can handle up to 5 lbs. but no more. This weighs 2.75 lbs. with the cradle and diagonal and finder eyepiece. Damp time is less than 2 seconds. 

 

 

Focus knobs with insets were seen on some Sears 60mm scopes. Towa.

 

-drl

[Bomber Bob]

Had to look that one up. A 60x500mm, finally. Not in my hobby income bracket but nice to know it was made. About 3 years ago I was musing that a 60mm x 500mm refractor would be very useful for a small G&G. But search as I might, all I could find were 60/700 or 60/360 ‘travel scopes’ specs. Then a thread here at CN caught my attention. There was a newish company selling a refractor with that specification, Spectrum Optical Instruments still has it in their lineup as the ‘TourStar 60’. And, in my price range! It is a lovely little refractor that at least meets the Sedwick standard for achromats. 
Don’t know why these 60/500’s are so rare, they are truly ‘Goldilocks’ refractors. 

If you're open to used / vintage, Yamamoto (& Vixen) made a boatload of 60mm F7 scopes back in the '70s & 80's.  I used the former (branded Lafayette) for years, then swapped it for a decade newer Vixen.  It's short, sharp, and stays in the shed year-round (in a case with a bunch of desiccant pax!).  This Vixen was a guidescope, but has the same quality optics as the POLARIS / SP 60 F15 models...

 

BIF:  The Kenko GS-540 "Go Scope" 60 F9 had great optics, too...

 

 

Forgot I had these:  I didn't do many DPACs during The Lockdown, but this set is for another very fine Kenko -- the KDS 63-800:

 

 

[I had my first Glare Shield for the 3 LEDs installed, but my PITA all-auto Nikon camera found a bright spot anyway!]

 

IOW:  Kenko sourced some optics as good as Vixen during the 1980s/1990s.  This model shared hardware with the BORG scopes -- and the same photographic design...

Edited by Bomber Bob, 19 April 2025 - 11:00 AM.

[John R.]

Focus knobs with insets were seen on some Sears 60mm scopes. Towa.

 

-drl

The original focuser is long gone. I took one off a Svbony SV501 because, I could buy them for about $25 from Svbony’s eBay store, and for plastic it was fairly well made with an aluminum 1.25 visual back.
But it could be a Towa. It was already old and battered when I got it in ‘89. It was only the OTA with that altitude slow motion rod hanging off the tube, and the focuser was .965, which I discarded long ago. The objective cell is metal and threads onto the tube, the metal dew shield threads onto the cell. The doublet is spaced by a plastic ring. And no, I have never miked the ring to see if it has an even thickness around its circumference. There was no yoke or tripod. 
 

[Airship]

I previously used my trusty Twilight I mount with my 6" f/5 Jaegers, but I wanted to try something a little more robust and a little taller, so I switched over to my Twilight II. To Ballance the system I mounted my 5" f/5 Jaegers on the other side. I wasn't really planning on comparing the 5" and 6" and the Twilight II turned out not to be well suited to do this anyway and the two telescopes are so far apart it isn't comfortable to switch from one to the other and the two side are poorly aligned with only about a 1/5 field overlap between the two, so I settled in using the 6" for most of the evening. I used a 2" Meade 32mm RG Wide Angle (24x) most of the time, switching to either a 1.25" 14mm Meade UWA (54x) or 8.8mm UWA (87x) for narrow fields. I caught the Pleiades low in the west before I lost then into the trees and then swung up to Capella to start a really nice star-hop around Auriga. The 32mm was fantastic doe wide fields, and the UWAs did a nice job increasing the scale and contrast making some of the open clusters really pop. From Auriga I swept up to Gemini and M35 and NGC 2392 (the Eskimo Nebula) and then on over to Cancer take a peek at Iota Cnc, M44, and M65, and then on to Leo for Algieba, M95/96/105 and M65/66. The galaxies are faint puffs, but still fun. From there I swung over to M53 and M3. It was sooo neat seeing them in the 32mm and then zooming in with the 14/8.8mm and the improved contrast from my Bortle 8 backyard. My last stop was T CrB. I have been observing the Blaze Star with my Seestar S50/30 since last March and I am very familiar with the field, though I haven't seen it visually very often. The 6" f/5 did a wonderful job! It looks great seeing the field from Epsilon CrB all the way to T CrB. It was particularly rewarding to see the 10.6 Mv and 11.2 Mv stars that I use to calibrate by Seestar images. I definitely want to get to know this field visually as I am _very_ curious to see what the star looks like when it erupts. To see the exposed core of a star as it fuses hydrogen into helium should be pretty amazing.

 

 

Neat stuff.

 

P.S.

 

I gotta get this scope out under dark skies!

Edited by Airship, 19 April 2025 - 08:20 PM.

[Jay_Reynolds_Freeman]

Had to look that one up. A 60x500mm, finally. Not in my hobby income bracket but nice to know it was made. About 3 years ago I was musing that a 60mm x 500mm refractor would be very useful for a small G&G. But search as I might, all I could find were 60/700 or 60/360 ‘travel scopes’ specs. Then a thread here at CN caught my attention. There was a newish company selling a refractor with that specification, Spectrum Optical Instruments still has it in their lineup as the ‘TourStar 60’. And, in my price range! It is a lovely little refractor that at least meets the Sedwick standard for achromats. 
Don’t know why these 60/500’s are so rare, they are truly ‘Goldilocks’ refractors. 

I am not sure what optical materials are used in the Teegul-60, but it is not a conventional-glass-type achromat. (Inam sure the manual explains it but I can't read Japanese ...)

 

Clear sky ...

[cavedweller]

Falcon 9 launched from Vandenberg SFB through my C8. I knew the trajectory from west to south, so I set the polar axis to the northeast and was able to track it manually very easy that way. The second stage exhaust plume was very bright in the sunlight while the predawn sky for me remained dark. I witnessed the faring separation through the C8 and, for the first time from Ridgecrest, I saw the reentry burn of the first stage booster through binoculars. 

[davidmcgo]

Nice!  I just missed it by a few minutes.  The trail was still very bright in the twilight went I went out.  I got up but to take out the little C90 Astro to catch a ringless Saturn this morning and also a spectacular lunar terminator with the big crater chain right on it, the Appenines jutting into the darkness, the illumination view of the Straight Wall.  To get a good view I had to plop the drive base on my deck rail with a mouse pad underneath for some grip.

 

Dave

[cavedweller]

During the countdown, I noticed that the SpaceflightNow broadcast was running behind the SpaceX feed by over 10 minutes. Then, while I was watching the launch and listening to the SpaceX feed, the feed was behind actual events by about two minutes. As the feed called out “lift off” I could already see the rocket over the local mountains.

Edited by cavedweller, 20 April 2025 - 11:06 AM.

[Airship]

The weather wasn't the greatest this evening, but I wanted to check out my 'new' set of Brandons on my 1969 Questar Standard. After a quick peek at Sigma Orionis I swung over to Jupiter and watched Europa emerge from Jupiter's shadow. T'was a wonderful show, and the new eyepieces work great!

 

Fantabulous!

 

[cavedweller]

Lyrid Meteor Shower with my classic eyeballs.  I observed from 12:30 am to 2:30 am and saw a total of four small meteors. They appeared to radiate from Lyra. I was surprised not to have seen at least a couple random ones.

 

I also observed M13 and M4 with my (new) 12" LX90 ACF. M13 was high up and seeing very nice. I was able to see a view full of pinpoint stars in an Orion 12mm EF Widefield eyepiece (254x). I think I will try a side-by-side with this and a Meade 8" RG tomorrow night.

Edited by cavedweller, 22 April 2025 - 05:24 AM.

[Jay_Reynolds_Freeman]

I recently took delivery of a Takahashi Teegul-100 -- a 100 mm f/7.7 Dilworth relay Cassegrain made in the 1990s on a simple Takahashi altazimuth mount -- and gave it first light on the night of April 21-22, 2025. Seeing was so-so, so I did not get a chance to check out the optics in detail, and I have not gotten the right bits and pieces to attach my PiFinder to it, so I spent a few hours chasing Messier objects at low magnifications (31x and 43x). I caught M79 just before it slid behind a tree line to the west, glanced at M1, the Orion Nebula, and M78, resolved all the late-wintertime Messier open clusters, then moved on toward the Virgo galaxy cluster. The Teegul delivered entirely respectable performance for its aperture: M104 showed its classic edge-on shape with central bulge and dust lane, and all the Virgo Messier galaxies from M61 north through M88 and M91 -- my northern limit for tonight -- were easy and showed at least a hint of shape. I spotted NGC 4388, which makes a smile face with M84 and M86, and also logged all the bright galaxies in Markarian's chain as I star- and galaxy-hopped up toward M88. The only difficult object of the evening was M83, down in the top of a light dome to the south. I logged a few more globular clusters as well -- M5 and M13 were beautiful -- and as I was about to leave I noticed that Vega had risen, so I paused to find M56 and M57's tiny ring. It was a good night -- I logged 37 Messier objects and seven others in about three hours.

 

The Messier stuff in Leo, Coma, Ursa Major and Canes Venatici were neck-twistingly near the zenith, so they will have to wait for another night. The Teegul-100 is a very quick setup and very compact to transport, so it will likely accompany me for backup when I am carrying bigger iron.

 

 

Clear sky ...

 

 

[deSitter]

I recently took delivery of a Takahashi Teegul-100 -- a 100 mm f/7.7 Dilworth relay Cassegrain made in the 1990s on a simple Takahashi altazimuth mount -- and gave it first light on the night of April 21-22, 2025. Seeing was so-so, so I did not get a chance to check out the optics in detail, and I have not gotten the right bits and pieces to attach my PiFinder to it, so I spent a few hours chasing Messier objects at low magnifications (31x and 43x). I caught M79 just before it slid behind a tree line to the west, glanced at M1, the Orion Nebula, and M78, resolved all the late-wintertime Messier open clusters, then moved on toward the Virgo galaxy cluster. The Teegul delivered entirely respectable performance for its aperture: M104 showed its classic edge-on shape with central bulge and dust lane, and all the Virgo Messier galaxies from M61 north through M88 and M91 -- my northern limit for tonight -- were easy and showed at least a hint of shape. I spotted NGC 4388, which makes a smile face with M84 and M86, and also logged all the bright galaxies in Markarian's chain as I star- and galaxy-hopped up toward M88. The only difficult object of the evening was M83, down in the top of a light dome to the south. I logged a few more globular clusters as well -- M5 and M13 were beautiful -- and as I was about to leave I noticed that Vega had risen, so I paused to find M56 and M57's tiny ring. It was a good night -- I logged 37 Messier objects and seven others in about three hours.

 

The Messier stuff in Leo, Coma, Ursa Major and Canes Venatici were neck-twistingly near the zenith, so they will have to wait for another night. The Teegul-100 is a very quick setup and very compact to transport, so it will likely accompany me for backup when I am carrying bigger iron.

 

 

Clear sky ...

 

The Dilworth is a very interesting design with many positives, but the figuring and alignment of the many surfaces leaves no room for error. There is a Mangin mirror corrector (aluminized on the back surface so 2 optical surfaces with 3 transitions) plus 2 or 3 relay lenses widely separated.

 

-drl

[highfnum]

visual -- sun with  Tasco 132T

this small scope (600mmFL) works amazingly well 

[Orion68]

Had a great night with the Swift 831 last night. Conditions started poorly but improved after 10:30 with very steady seeing. Every double I viewed looked better than the last one.

 

Prize of the night was a tie between the beautiful triples - 17 Draconis and Mizar/Alcor. Many other doubles were stunning as well - Algieba, Cor Caroli, 54 Leonis, 24 CRB. I lost track of time and forgot the cold for hours, mesmerized by the crisp views. My most used eyepiece of the night was a 7mm Nagler Type 1 smoothie. It delivered breathtaking views of so many doubles.