Image of the day

Captured by
Ralph Ford

M31 with Redcat 51

About Astromart

My Account

New to Astromart?

Register an account...

Need Help?

Posts Made By: Rod Mollise

June 30, 2012 01:53 PM Forum: Equipment Talk

Toronto store, Efstonscience is closing!

Posted By Rod Mollise
Some brick and mortar stores will survive. Namely, those who go out of their way to support their customers. Those who DON'T GET IT will fail. Those who don't understand that to survive in competition with Internet stores who can sometimes offer lower prices, they have to offer their customers MORE VALUE.

July 5, 2012 10:16 PM Forum: Equipment Talk

New Orion Sirius EQ-G Goto power failure

Posted By Rod Mollise
Assumning the power connection to the mount is secure, and it is not plugged into the HC by mistake, the problem is the HC/HC cable/connection. Could even be your motor control board. For some reason the HC is not communicating with the MC board.

July 14, 2012 01:27 PM Forum: Antique/Classic/Vintage Optical Instruments

15 Eerie Abandoned Observatories

Posted By Rod Mollise
Nice pictures...somewhat dumb captions. wink

July 17, 2012 08:51 PM Forum: ASTRONOMY

Have some equipment to sell

Posted By Rod Mollise
Assuming this is serious... wink

First off, sounds like you have telescopes, not microscopes. Microscopes are for looking at wee little stuff down here. Telescopes are for looking at way big stuff out there.

Secondly, neither is "big" as scopes go. These are small telescopes. The C90 might bring as much as a couple of hundred bucks depending on condition and configuration (does it have the mount/drive base?).

As for the TeleVue. Depends on which one it is. First thing to do is determine how big it is. 880mm is its focal length. What matters is the size (diameter of the main lens). Depending on that size and the model, it can be worth a couple of hundred to considerably more.

As for the lenses, the eyepieces, how much they are worth depends on exactly what kind they are. Model and maker.

July 17, 2012 08:54 PM Forum: Binoviewers

reaching focus

Posted By Rod Mollise
david goldman said:

My suggestion would be to cut the tube down.

Not what I would suggest for this telescope (!).

Options? Several makers have auxiliary lenses to bring binoviewers to focus with refractors and reflectors. Check with Denkmeier. A barlow will do it, but you may not want the extra power...

August 28, 2012 12:15 PM Forum: Eyepieces

ES 25mm 2" 100 AFOV

Posted By Rod Mollise
That's a good idea. These forums seem even deader than usual if that is possible.

As for the eyepiece, I reckon it will be out when its out. Took a while for the big 9, too. 8)

August 28, 2012 10:44 PM Forum: Equipment Talk

11 inch Celestron/Meade SGT or larger DOB?

Posted By Rod Mollise
Allan Staib said:

Hi all, I'm getting back into the hobby after many years away. I bought the Meade LS 6 inch last year but it is just too small a scope and I have a limited open sky view which makes the LS features a waste. I plan to sell it on this site and buy a good, used larger scope. (Will of course cost more than I get for the LS 6!) I will be observing and not doing astro photography. For the same money, I can get a good used 11 inch Nexstar type scope or maybe a 14 inch DOB. Any thoughts or comments by any of you with greater experience with both types of scopes? I'm nervous about tracking planets with the DOB at moderate magnifications, say 100 X.

Thanks!

Allan

It's really quite simple:

If you are SURE all you will ever want to do is visual observing, mostly of the deep sky, get the Dob. If you think you might want to do something else eventually, get the SCT.

The planets? If your interest is high power planetary observation, get the SCT--or some other scope with a drive. I have tracked the planets at crazy high power with my Dob with great success--and I mean 700 - 1000x, but I am mostly a casual planetary guy.

August 30, 2012 06:12 PM Forum: After Dark

Sighting in pre-dawn Oklahoma sky 8/30/12

Posted By Rod Mollise
NASA launched the Radiation Belt Probes on an Atlas V this morning at 4:05 EDT

August 31, 2012 06:45 PM Forum: CCD Imaging and Processing/Deep Sky

M27 - C14 Edge F7.7 Narrow Band

Posted By Rod Mollise
Beautiful.

September 7, 2012 07:39 PM Forum: Home Observatories

Dewed Telescope

Posted By Rod Mollise
Bryan Henry said:

I finished my observatory early this Spring and greatly enjoy all the benefits it provides. I was wondering what to do with the scope if it dews up. Of course prevention is the best method but the other night I was tweaking the polar alignment when the corrector dewed up. I was done with the session and wondered about the best way to deal with the dew. I suppose I could put the heater strip on but that takes a while on a 10-inch Mak-Newt corrector. I ended up placing a cover over the uncapped scope and closed the observatory. I thought about some desiccant packs in the lens cover or the hair dryer treatment. Of course before the observatory I would just carry the scope inside and let it dry out. Any thoughts about covering a dewed scope uncapped and closing the observatory?

Bryan

Never cap a dewed up scope. That's how mold/mildew/fungus grow...

Funding Member

Sponsors


View all sponsors

Search