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Posts Made By: George Blahun

May 6, 2005 11:38 PM Forum: Binoviewers

disassembling Pentax XW series

Posted By George Blahun
I am determined to use the Pentax XW14 in a binoviewer, but in the event the eyecup is too wide I want to be familiar with its disassembly. I have removed the rubber grip and see the two sections of the eyecup assembly. The Pentax Customer Service rep said he thought there was a set screw, but there is not. I don't want to screw things up or down too far and in the wrong direction. Does anyone know how to get these two pieces apart without damaging the eyepiece? Thanks for any advice.

George

May 7, 2005 07:54 PM Forum: Astro Binoculars

Re: Inexpensive Ones

Posted By George Blahun
Hugh:
I think you first need to get the highest quality optics and then the largest objective possible. If you look at Fujinon, Canon, etc. you can't go wrong. I know 200 is a lot of money, and you can probably find some used Fujinon 7 x 50's for that price, however, if you can squeeze out another 200 the Fujinon 10 x 70's are spectacular and still portable. My current astronomoical binoculars are the Fujinon 10 x 70's, and even if I win the lotto and get the giant 150's I would still keep these. In all the Fujinon astronomical binoculars, the stars resolve into perfect points of light, have very little false color and yield high contrast wide filed images.

George

November 29, 2008 09:26 PM Forum: SCI-FI

Farewell To The Master- The Day The Earth Stood St

Posted By George Blahun
My favorite movie of all time, the 50's version of "The Day The Earth Stood Still" is having its remake released in early December. I've not heard how truly it conforms to the original movie or to the short story upon which it was based, "Farewell To The Master". Has anyone heard of any leaks about the plot and ending? I wouldn't be too disapointed if the new version ended like the original movie or the story (which were quite different). I'm hoping, however, they didn't stray too far from one or the other. The enhanced special effects should be nice, but will not compensate for too much artistic license with respect to the story line. :S

December 12, 2008 11:32 PM Forum: SCI-FI

I saw, The Day The Earth Stood Still

Posted By George Blahun
I saw the remake today, I won't give away any specific plots, but overall I'd say it was "OK" not great, not terrible, just OK. It could have been excellent, but the writers chose a canned appeal to the masses approach rather than an intellectual one. The movie could have saved some money and chosen a different title and left out a few names the original had. The plot was vaguely similar to the original movie, and the ending was different than either the original movie or the short story "Farewell to the Master". One glaring error, I wish I could replay it for confirmation, is in a scene were a military guy is talking about the robot, he says it is "silicone" based life not "silicon". For anyone going to see it, perhaps you can confirm what I heard. The movie smacked of a Steven King script and not Harry Bates.
Anyhow, it's probably worth seeing but don't try to compare it to the original, you'll most likely be disappointed. :S

January 23, 2009 01:26 AM Forum: Solar System Observing

Venus in Daylight

Posted By George Blahun
While this photo is certainly not the most spectacular you will see on Astromart, I think it's so cool that you can now see Venus during the daytime. I took this about 3:50 pm today from southeastern CT. Venus is in the upper right corner, clouds to the left. This was with my Nikon D80 and no scope.

George

March 5, 2009 01:53 AM Forum: Politics

Re: How bad will it get?

Posted By George Blahun
Jim:
Panarin's view might make for an interesting political or science fiction movie, but it's nothing more than wishful thinking from the vestiges of Stalinism. BTW, the last thing China wants is for the US economy to crap out. We owe them tons of money and they sell us way too much to hope we disappear as an economic force.
Do you really think about the statements you write before posting them?
One of the features I love about AM is that all of our posts are catalogued. While you were speaking of climate change you said the following:

"There are those who make a profit by feeding into an apocalypse frenzy. There are those who have profited by fueling the creation of western civilization. The majority are some place in between these extremes. It appears that many here tend to play into the doom and gloom predictions of Al Gore and others like CBS who simply exaggerate the science to line their pockets. The media loves a good disaster and there is no shortage of nuts who will try to convince you that the sky is falling."

The notion of the sky falling is relevant to this topic as well.

your friendly, partisan, extremist, liberal smile
George

March 5, 2009 08:56 PM Forum: Politics

Re: Linus

Posted By George Blahun
Jim:
Granted President Obama uses the teleprompter more than previous presidents, but they have all used them after its invention. Exactly how much teleprompter use would be ok with you and how would you determine the amount of usage?
On another unrelated note, I'd like to step away form the political pimp slapping for a moment, and I am sincere about this next observation and question. Most of us here on AM who post opinions on the political and other non astro topics also post on the Astronomy related subjects as well. Since your profile doesn't give a whole lot of info and the predominance if not totality of your comments here are of a political nature, do you in fact have any interest in Astronomy? Even if you don't, that's ok with me, not that you need my approval. I like to try an understand why a person feels the way they do rather than just listen to their viewpoint. Since you have no profile entered, no classifieds, no auctions, no ratings, I only know you are from NE. If you don't care to answer, I'll respect that, but this is an honest inquiry.

George
smile

March 9, 2009 09:25 PM Forum: Astro Binoculars

Fujinon 25X150

Posted By George Blahun
The other night at my astronomy club's (Thames Amateur Astronomical Society) winter party I brought up the topic of the Fujinon 25x150 binoculars. I indicated I was starting to save up for a pair and wondered why I almost never see any used ones for sale. Is it because they are so good that no one would ever think of selling theirs? Are the people who buy them living forever or willing them to others? Even with some rare high end scopes, it's possible to occasionally see them on the used market, but why not the Fujinons? No one had any really good answer. How about you?

George

December 12, 2009 03:48 PM Forum: After Dark

It's always somethin'

Posted By George Blahun
Just when we think we're finally closing in on a real picture of the universe we get data that changes things substantially. Not too long ago it was the observation that the expansion of the universe was accelerating. Now we have this, it's really mind boggling and intriguing beyond words.

December 15, 2009 09:18 PM Forum: APM

Which binoculars do I have?

Posted By George Blahun
I recently bought a used set of APM Binoculars. Over the years, the specifications have changed somewhat and the manual only says I have something in the 800000 series. The eyepieces which came with it are 20mm and 10mm SWA yielding 20x and 40x. So, I must have a 400 mm focal length. But the person I bought them from said the eyepieces yielded 25x and 50x. The tubes don't seem long enough for this to be so, but I don't know how much the prisms or any additional optical elements add to the fl. Does anyone know when these were made, how many elements in the objective and what type of glass in the objective. They accept and bring to focus my 24mm Panoptics and 13mm Naglers. Thanks for any information. BTW they perform very well.

George

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