1316 replies to this topic

[KevH]

Not as small but not really too big either, my AT102EDL on the GP2. Definitely more capable in all aspects just multiple trips to set up.

 

 

 

 

 

[revans]

Not as small but not really too big either, my AT102EDL on the GP2. Definitely more capable in all aspects just multiple trips to set up.

 

102EDLedit.jpg

I have one that I use on a HAZ31 placed on a Manfrotto 161Mk2B tripod.  I only set up on a deck outside my office and only need to move the rig about 20 feet, but I can usually manage it in two trips... one for the scope and one for the mount and tripod.  The AT102EDL is a particularly nice scope because of its compact size and light weight for a 4 inch refractor.  It works fine for both visual and AP.

 

Rick

[KevH]

I have one that I use on a HAZ31 placed on a Manfrotto 161Mk2B tripod.  I only set up on a deck outside my office and only need to move the rig about 20 feet, but I can usually manage it in two trips... one for the scope and one for the mount and tripod.  The AT102EDL is a particularly nice scope because of its compact size and light weight for a 4 inch refractor.  It works fine for both visual and AP.

 

Rick

The HAZ31 looks like a really nice mount. I have recently been looking at some of the lightweight strain wave mounts for a future purchase. I'll add the HAZ31 to my list of candidates.  I agree about the 102EDL.  There's really nothing to complain about with it.  It's just a really versatile and capable telescope. 

[revans]

The HAZ31 looks like a really nice mount. I have recently been looking at some of the lightweight strain wave mounts for a future purchase. I'll add the HAZ31 to my list of candidates.  I agree about the 102EDL.  There's really nothing to complain about with it.  It's just a really versatile and capable telescope. 

Yes, I've been using my new 6 inch f/8 refractor this week and compared to the 102EDL it is a baby elephant to work with... and the field of view of the larger refractor is notably more restricted.  Except for special use situations, it makes more sense to use the 102EDL most of the time. 

 

Rick

[John R.]

Put my small refractor to use last night. This photo of the partially eclipsed moon was taken with a cell phone attached to an Orion 10mm plossl, with ‘Goldilocks’, my Spectrum 60/500mm refractor. 
 

 

AZ mount with slow motion. Just the way it came out of the cell phone camera, I don’t do post processing. 
(Never learned how.) 

 

One more, 

 

 

 

 

 

Edited by John R., 14 March 2025 - 04:25 PM.

[Wolfwatcher]

I had surgery for a small hernia a couple of days ago and the doctor said I shouldn’t lift anything over 10 pounds for a month. Fortunately, a ready to observe Galileoscope mounted on a Manfrotto 190 tripod and 128LP fluid head has a doctor approved total weight of less than 7 lbs.

 

IMG_3304.jpeg
 

While a Galileoscope won’t normally come to focus with a star diagonal, threading a Barlow lens onto the nose of a diagonal makes focus easily achievable. The location of the Barlow lens as show below gives the Barlow an effective 2.85x magnification factor.

 

IMG_3301.jpeg

 

A 15mm TeleVue Plössl gives a very sharp 95x magnification for very nearly 2x magnification per mm of aperture. The northern and southern equatorial belts of Jupiter, the rings of Saturn, mottling on the disk of Mars, and the four brightest stars of the Trapezium are all easily observed on a good night.

 

IMG_3299.jpeg

Thanks very much for the Barlow/diagonal tip! I've ordered a Galileoscope for a family reunion project for kids and worried some about the viewing position problem. Will certainly try this!

Jett

[Polyphemos]

Thanks very much for the Barlow/diagonal tip! I've ordered a Galileoscope for a family reunion project for kids and worried some about the viewing position problem. Will certainly try this!

Jett

You next challenge will be focusing using the sliding draw tube. It helps to keep the rear optical tube retaining ring loosened so that the draw tube slides more easily, and to move the draw tube out using a three finger pinching action; this will make more sense once you’ve got the scope in hand.

[Terra Nova]

My AT80EDT on my vintage Bogen 3040 is an eminently transportable, grab and go, small refractor package.

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[Jon Isaacs]

You next challenge will be focusing using the sliding draw tube. It helps to keep the rear optical tube retaining ring loosened so that the draw tube slides more easily, and to move the draw tube out using a three finger pinching action; this will make more sense once you’ve got the scope in hand.

 

 

If I can get it close and are using a diagonal, what I do is focus by sliding the eyepiece.  It's surprising how accurate this can be, I have focused an 80mm F/3.75 finder scope this way and been able to split doubles like Porrima..   I call it "slip-sliding" focusing or "twist and slip".  

 

Jon

[Erik Bakker]

Last night was cold and late, yet the moon, low in the southern sky was calling me.

So I decided to take my small scope and observe through my bedroom window, sitting behing my alt-az mounted 82mm ED scope at 50x. Even through two pieces of window glass, what an enjoyable view of the moon I was rewarded with, wow 

 

And yes, it was warm and comfortable.

[radiofm74]

Last night was cold and late, yet the moon, low in the southern sky was calling me.

So I decided to take my small scope and observe through my bedroom window, sitting behing my alt-az mounted 82mm ED scope at 50x. Even through two pieces of window glass, what an enjoyable view of the moon I was rewarded with, wow 

 

And yes, it was warm and comfortable.

I've done pretty much the same thing for observing the sun around midday last week… I was working at home and lacked the time to take it all downstairs then upstairs but our star really beckoned. So I opened the windows in the room for rough acclimation while continuing to work, then when I felt it was chilly enough I put my SD81s on the good old APZ, with an Altair Wedge in the back, found the sun using the shadow of the scope, and just enjoyed a deeply rewarding 20 minute break. Seeing was not great, and I'm sure the room/outside thermals added to it, but the full disk in my little scope and elegant LV 18 eyepiece was so beautiful! It made my day!

[Joe Bergeron]

I call that window seeing. 

[Jay_Reynolds_Freeman]

I call that window seeing. 

Some would call it window pain ...

[PKDfan]

Some would call it window pain ...

Butta Boom !


CSS

[mikeDnight]

Last night was cold and late, yet the moon, low in the southern sky was calling me.

So I decided to take my small scope and observe through my bedroom window, sitting behing my alt-az mounted 82mm ED scope at 50x. Even through two pieces of window glass, what an enjoyable view of the moon I was rewarded with, wow 

 

And yes, it was warm and comfortable.

I did just the same using my FC100DZ mounted on a Gibraltar. Looking through double glazing at the low moon in my south east and using a 27mm panoptic, I had a really enjoyable time for at least half an hour just admiring the moon hanging in space, and with some beautiful detail on view. At such low power and wide field, the moon took on an almost 3D look, made all the more impressive with the occasional cloud slowly drifting across the field of view.

[jcj380]

Looking through double glazing at the low moon in my south east and using a 27mm panoptic, I had a really enjoyable time for at least half an hour just admiring the moon hanging in space, and with some beautiful detail on view.

George Alcock co-discovered a comet while looking through a window in his house with binos.  Sometimes it's ok to stay inside and warm. 

[Erik Bakker]

George Alcock co-discovered a comet while looking through a window in his house with binos.  Sometimes it's ok to stay inside and warm. 

 

 

 

[Jon Isaacs]

Last night's story....

 

Erik and others have been observing with their small refractors through double pane glass.  Due to the age of our home and the climate, we only have one window with double pane glass and it's access to the sky is blocked by shrubbery.  Because of this, I was forced to go outside to the backyard to do some observing..   

 

Venus is about to pass between the Earth and the Sun and I wanted to get one last glimpse.  Last night it was about 10 degrees from the sun and about 7.6 degrees elevation at sunset.  I chose to use my new to me AT-70 ED and used my normal technique to find Venus in the twilight, a digital level held to the tube by a rubber band.  I positioned the scope so the sun was behind a tall house and began searching when Venus was at about 14 degrees elevation.. The sky was bright..,. 

 

I was about ready to give up but with Venus at 8.4 degrees elevation, I finally spotted her,.  1.7% illuminated, pretty thin.  I cranked up the magnification to about 130x and watched her sink into the sunset.  At about 5 degrees, a neighbors roof put an end to the evening.

 

I messed around with my 10 inch Dob for a couple of hours and then decided it was time to pack up.  This is where things got interesting.  In another thread, someone had mentioned the view of Algieba in a 4 inch achromat..  It's a pretty wide double, 4.7" and unequal by about 1.3 magnitudes, that's a factor of over 3.

 

Tony Spina had given me an older made in Japan 60mm F/5 Meade achromat and I thought I would give it a try... I dug up a 1.25 inch diagonal, it happened to be a prism type star diagonal and with the 22 mm Panoptic, I easily found Albieba... Cranking up the magnification with the 3.5 mm Nagler (86x), things did not look good. There was a strong flare, something I had seen before with this scope. I could make the split but it was not pretty.

 

I only have one decent quality 1.25 inch diagonal, an older Vixen/TeleVue unit I have with the Ranger.. I went inside and dug it out...  I found Albieba again and cranked up the magnification to 86x.. 

 

WOW  The flare was gone leaving just a beautiful pair, clean and bright.  At 60x, it was a clean split, at 120x it was a clean split.. What I thought was a substandard scope turned out to be just a case of the wrong diagonal..

 

I have used prism star diagonals in ST-80s without too much difficulty in the past, maybe this is just a poor quality prism diagonal..  I am pretty excited.. That little Meade turned out to be quite good and I just need to get a decent mirror diagonal for it.

 

 

Jon

Edited by Jon Isaacs, 19 March 2025 - 11:43 AM.

[John R.]

Thanks for sharing Jon. Always love hearing how experienced observers use inexpensive equipment to still get good results. 
I was curious about the diagonal story however. In one photo of your equipment I saw a Svbony sv188p dielectric 1.25 diagonal. I would not think it would come up to TeleVue standard, but I have two and they seem to be ok, although truth is I have no ‘gold standard’ diagonals to compare them with. 
The first 188P I bought did have a problem, the interior was not dead black and was unusable until I fixed it. The second came properly blacked out inside. 
Just wondering what your thoughts are regarding sub $100 diagonals. 

Edited by John R., 19 March 2025 - 11:16 AM.

[Jon Isaacs]

John:

 

Funny you should ask... I've never owned a SV-188 diagonal but as of 5:30 am this morning, one is on the way and should arrive tomorrow. 

 

I had read that there was a problem with the blackening so I'm glad to know that seems to have been addressed. 

 

I value your experience in this matter. One reason I enjoy this particular thread is that it keeps me grounded, balanced.. fancy equipment does not make one a skilled observer, making the most of what you've got, that's what it's all about..

 

"Things turn out the best for those who make the best of how things turn out.". Coach John Wooden 

 

I'm general, I've never seen a significant difference between decent entry level Meade, Orion and Celestron star diagonals and the premium diagonals. Some correct image diagonals use small prisms and are limited but otherwise they're all decent..  Mirror star diagonals usually have the mirror held in place with a blob of silicone and are not collimated but the still perform reasonably well.

 

Last night was really the first time I've ever seen any real difference when switching diagonals and the difference was dramatic, a crappy messed up view suddenly became this seemingly perfect split.

 

I'll let you know what I think of the SV188 but it looks like a well made diagonal.

 

Jon

Edited by Jon Isaacs, 19 March 2025 - 12:10 PM.

[maniack]

Thanks for sharing Jon. Always love hearing how experienced observers use inexpensive equipment to still get good results. 
I was curious about the diagonal story however. In one photo of your equipment I saw a Svbony sv188p dielectric 1.25 diagonal. I would not think it would come up to TeleVue standard, but I have two and they seem to be ok, although truth is I have no ‘gold standard’ diagonals to compare them with. 
The first 188P I bought did have a problem, the interior was not dead black and was unusable until I fixed it. The second came properly blacked out inside. 
Just wondering what your thoughts are regarding sub $100 diagonals. 

I think I have 2 or 3 SV188Ps on hand and a few others given away. It's a pretty good diagonal for a very low price. There are some weird inconsistencies between the units I had (location of thumbscrew for example), but they all work well.

[CrazyPanda]

Jon, if it's this diagonal, it's quite bad:

 

https://www.svbony.c...iagonal/#F9171B

 

I bought two (one for each of my 70EDs) to give to the kids, and had to return them.

 

Both of them:

 

1. Hazy dielectric coatings, and I mean *hazy*

2. Absolutely no baffling in the nose piece at all, which made the already bad light scatter even worse

3. Significant astigmatism even after letting them acclimate for an hour. Slightly defocused stars in the center of the field were UFO-shaped. This was true in all my refractors (at the time two 70eds and the 130EDT). One was slightly better than the other in this regard, but both quite bad.

 

Meanwhile I also have two of these "undesignated" Svbony diagonals that you can't seem to get anymore:

 

https://www.amazon.com/dp/B07QXW921T

 

Both also have hazy coatings (one with worm-like defects that are visible when shining a bright light at it), but one of them handily out-performs my A-P Maxbright for figure and sharpness and ability to split double stars. It is noticeably dimmer, however.

 

The other had some bad astigmatism but I was able to mostly correct it by strategically shimming the diagonal.

Edited by CrazyPanda, 19 March 2025 - 02:03 PM.

[tony_spina]

 

Last night's story....

 

Erik and others have been observing with their small refractors through double pane glass.  Due to the age of our home and the climate, we only have one window with double pane glass and it's access to the sky is blocked by shrubbery.  Because of this, I was forced to go outside to the backyard to do some observing..   

 

Venus is about to pass between the Earth and the Sun and I wanted to get one last glimpse.  Last night it was about 10 degrees from the sun and about 7.6 degrees elevation at sunset.  I chose to use my new to me AT-70 ED and used my normal technique to find Venus in the twilight, a digital level held to the tube by a rubber band.  I positioned the scope so the sun was behind a tall house and began searching when Venus was at about 14 degrees elevation.. The sky was bright..,. 

 

I was about ready to give up but with Venus at 8.4 degrees elevation, I finally spotted her,.  1.7% illuminated, pretty thin.  I cranked up the magnification to about 130x and watched her sink into the sunset.  At about 5 degrees, a neighbors roof put an end to the evening.

 

I messed around with my 10 inch Dob for a couple of hours and then decided it was time to pack up.  This is where things got interesting.  In another thread, someone had mentioned the view of Algieba in a 4 inch achromat..  It's a pretty wide double, 4.7" and unequal by about 1.3 magnitudes, that's a factor of over 3.

 

Tony Spina had given me an older made in Japan 60mm F/5 Meade achromat and I thought I would give it a try... I dug up a 1.25 inch diagonal, it happened to be a prism type star diagonal and with the 22 mm Panoptic, I easily found Albieba... Cranking up the magnification with the 3.5 mm Nagler (86x), things did not look good. There was a strong flare, something I had seen before with this scope. I could make the split but it was not pretty.

 

I only have one decent quality 1.25 inch diagonal, an older Vixen/TeleVue unit I have with the Ranger.. I went inside and dug it out...  I found Albieba again and cranked up the magnification to 86x.. 

 

WOW  The flare was gone leaving just a beautiful pair, clean and bright.  At 60x, it was a clean split, at 120x it was a clean split.. What I thought was a substandard scope turned out to be just a case of the wrong diagonal..

 

I have used prism star diagonals in ST-80s without too much difficulty in the past, maybe this is just a poor quality prism diagonal..  I am pretty excited.. That little Meade turned out to be quite good and I just need to get a decent mirror diagonal for it.

 

 

 

Jon

 

Jon, 

The Meade 277 does pack a punch. Great little scope.

 

I'm glad you are enjoying the scope. Love reading your stories on how you are using it

[rgk901]

Jon, if it's this diagonal, it's quite bad:

https://www.svbony.c...iagonal/#F9171B

I bought two (one for each of my 70EDs) to give to the kids, and had to return them.

Both of them:

1. Hazy dielectric coatings, and I mean *hazy*
2. Absolutely no baffling in the nose piece at all, which made the already bad light scatter even worse
3. Significant astigmatism even after letting them acclimate for an hour. Slightly defocused stars in the center of the field were UFO-shaped. This was true in all my refractors (at the time two 70eds and the 130EDT). One was slightly better than the other in this regard, but both quite bad.

Meanwhile I also have two of these "undesignated" Svbony diagonals that you can't seem to get anymore:

https://www.amazon.com/dp/B07QXW921T

Both also have hazy coatings (one with worm-like defects that are visible when shining a bright light at it), but one of them handily out-performs my A-P Maxbright for figure and sharpness and ability to split double stars. It is noticeably dimmer, however.

The other had some bad astigmatism but I was able to mostly correct it by strategically shimming the diagonal.

I took a chance on that no-name 2" svbony above as well and will say it's pretty darn good!

there was some haze around Jupiter which I thought was because it's cheap.. BUT took out the mirror and actually saw the haze as a film on the mirror....after cleaning it, painting the whole thing with Musou Black as well as shimming it to get it collimated better... I stuck it back in and pointed at Jupiter and am very happy with it.

too bad it's not available anymore...was an easy return if it was really bad.

[Jon Isaacs]

Jon, 

The Meade 277 does pack a punch. Great little scope.

 

I'm glad you are enjoying the scope. Love reading your stories on how you are using it

 

Thanks Tony and thank you for the scope. I'll be iusng it a lot more now that I know how good the optics are. 

 

Jon