Posts Made By: vladimir steblina

I have a AP900GTO and would like to control it with a laptop running Windows 2000. I already have the laptop and CCD Soft loaded on it.

I was going to purchase a copy of Sky X Serious Astronomer to control the mount. Then I find out that Sky X requires XP to run and a Pentium 4 chip. The current laptop is a Pentium 3.

Any other software packages that are simple enough to run on a Pentium 3 with Windows 2000 and have the drivers to control a AP900??

I am sorry to see the small size of elk in Oregon. Here are some pictures from our deck in central Washington.

http://camasmeadows.blogspot.com/

Click on the picture to enlarge to full size.

The pictures were taken through a Orion ST-80 with a Pentax 110D digital camera attached. See you can see the softness of the image in the corners. I think I am going to need a field flattner if I use this for astrophotography.

"Panels are advertised as weatherproof, that sounds like it's ok if they get rained/snowed on. I'm planning on framing some plexiglass-or chicken wire?- to protect from hail and lawnmower debris. Not finding convenient sizes off the shelf."

Solar panels are sensitive to any sort of shading. The plexiglass or chicken wire will drop your output. Most panels are rated for outdoor use and that includes hail.

Sun angle matters much less in winter than in summer. For your application I suspect setting it for winter will also generate plenty of power for summer.

Did it come with a diode to prevent reverse current flow??

Vladimir

Back in the late 1990's I traveled with my dual-fork C5. I believe it is slightly larger than the C5+. I repackaged the C5 into a soft sided luggage, with the C5 cradled in foam on the inside. It worked great.

I would not check any telescope through baggage. I checked a DOB (with mirror removed). The DOB was was constructed so that it was a wooden box with handles. It was stickered fragil, optical instrument, etc. etc.

When I got it from baggage. There were pieces of plywood busted off and deep gouges throughout the outside. I have no clue how they managed to do that, but they had to work at it!!!

That said it was great to have a good scope at southern latitudes.

Have to tell you my UFO story.....1994. There were forest fires all over eastern Washington. After working three weeks on fires I got several days off. One night the local observing group went out to a ridge outside of town to observe. The night was partly cloudy and we were waiting for the clouds to move on.

So we opened a beer and sat talking in the dark. Looking towards town I saw a faint, saucer shaped object traveling over town. No lights on...just the glow from town illuminating the object. I turned to the guy next to me and said " I hope you didn't see that". His response was "I was thinking the same thing".

Fortunately, we were staging firefighters out of the former airbase at Moses Lake. So Monday morning at work I asked the guy that worked Moses Lake that weekend if anything was going that weekend. Yep, he said the military was having war games even had those F117A fighters there. You know they look kinda oblong when they are flying.

If it wasn't for that I'm not sure what I would have been thinking.

Thank god he was there...otherwise I would have never had an explanation for what we saw.

Saw the program last night. In both the regular def and high def version. There is no comparison. If you know someone that recorded it in high def it is definitely worth viewing in that format.

Quit all the griping....remember only kids and Democrats are allowed "do overs".

Heath Kit SB-310. If it glows.

If it doesn't Panasonic RF-2900.

Paul Wysocki said:

I want to put out to the forum a simple query...if you had a chance to buy a piece of dark sky property for the purpose of observing (approx. 3 acres in the "blue" on the bortle scale and cheaper than a EM200/Mewlon 250 setup) or don't buy it and observe on some open Federal Land property just several more miles away in the dark grey/black on the bortle scale what would you do? Save the money and observe in the very black conditions or "call it your own" and observe in the blue where the differences visually speaking are slight? Oh you can get a cell phone call out in the blue sector put perhaps spotty or non-exsistent in the grey/black region.... Thanks Paul.

Having retired from the Forest Service a few years ago I can tell you that the days of fairly unrestricted public use is pretty much over. The public lands are rapidly heading towards a refuge system for wildlife species, corporate uses such as cell towers, ski resorts, and depending on administrations energy development. However, in all cases those uses are much more in tune with wildlife management that public recreational use.

So I am not sure how much longer you will be able to use that public land. The public is going to be herded into campgrounds in the next couple of decades. So they will be more like state parks than the public lands we know and enjoy today.

David Cox said:

Hello all,

I've started looking into building a Home Observatory for imaging purposes.

I'm not in a tax bracket that allows me to do everything all at once "top of the line", so...

Is there a logical way to incrementally add pieces over time, or is it better to save and do it all at once?

What do you wish you'd known prior to building your own?

How much over budget did you go?

What is your experience with the Exploradome brand?

Thanks,
Dave Cox

I have built FOUR bad observatories. The worst observatory is better than the best open air site.

The first observatory was 8X8 with plywood screwed to 2X4's. The end pieces situated such that they bolted together. Roof was a simple take off roof. Floor was pressure treated wood.

Total cost was $200. It is even cheaper today since wood prices have gone down significantly since I bought it.

For imaging....if you can do it remotely so would not need anything fancier.