Enjoying the second episode of Virtual Revolution. Lots of views on politics and censorship. Very interesting and very thought provoking. Gives me great faith in the future and a great curiosity on what will await my children in the coming decades. An end to party politics? An end to censorship? A single global community? Lets hope so.
Very interesting episode of Horizon last night talking about ageing. I was expecting another re-hash of the Aubry de Gray nonsense but was surprised by new findings and actual products for sale. We certainly live in interesting times and I’m sure Ray Kurzweil is taking notes. Lots of potential “bridge” technologies on offer at the moment. Damn expensive though at £25,000 per year.
Just watching “The Virtual Revolution” on BBC2, excellent program about the birth and meaning of the Web. Looking forward to the next 3 episodes.
Last night was an very clear (and very cold!) night. The moon was full and Mars very bright. I didn’t get a chance to get the ‘scope out but the conjunction looked great. I can imagine there would be lots of great photos on the forums. Makes me wish we had more clear nights!
I recently wanted to purchase an ST80 or an ST102. I was undecided which to purchase and a wanted advert for an ST80 turned up 2 people wanting to sell me an ST80 AND an ST102. In such a pickle I decided to buy both so I could compare and then sell the one I liked least. I thought I’d share my findings here for those interested.
The ST80 is an 80mm f/5 (400mm) OTA and the ST102 is 102mm f/4.9 (500mm)
Both examples are made by Synta and are in Skywatcher blue. You can see the difference in size isn’t massive, with the ST102 being slightly larger. The weight of both tubes is comparable although when weighed “in the hand” I could tell the ST102 was slightly heavier.
Removing the dew shield revealed the lens cells. The ST80 seems to be made from plastic which perhaps isn’t a bad thing as it makes it lighter but it gives me concerns about the durability of the ‘scope. The ST102 lens cell seems to be a combination of metal and plastic, which is perhaps SLIGHTLY better than the ST80. Neither seem to be collimatable.
The lens cell on the ST80 is screwed to the tube whilst the ST102 (I presume) is screwed a la the ED80.
Viewing down the barrel the ST80 is well baffled and whilst the lens is coated it isn’t fantastic. That being said these are nice and cheap so I can’t really complain.
The ST102 is equally well baffled, but again the coatings leave something to be desired. I think the ST102 appeared a little better than the ST80 but thats subjective with both examples being second hand (although in good condition).
The ST80 has a cast aluminum 1.25” rack and pinion focuser whilst the ST102 has a 2” cast rack and pinion focuser. (Note the focus wheels on the ST102 have been replaced at some point, but this is a small modification). Both have been regreased but experience tells me that if brought new would be full of “syntaglue”. Easily fixed but god knows what the engineers were thinking when they used this “grease”.
All the following shots were taken with my Nikon D70 DSLR at prime focus. I’ve not had the opportunity to test both ‘scopes at night yet due to the weather (snowing here!).
The chimney was fairly close, about 300 meters. You can see the difference in focal length immediately with the ST102 giving more magnification from the outset. You can also see that the ST80 image appears to be washed out a lot more than the ST102. I’m not sure if this was a function of the weather or if it’s due to the change in aperture. The ST102 definitely seems clearer though and despite it’s fast f/4.9 focal ratio in these daytime shots I can’t see much colour in either shot. I didn’t get a chance to barlow up to take a closer shot with both scopes but perhaps I need to test in that configuration too.
ST80
ST102
Taking a 100% crop of both these images from the 6 mega pixel originals gives more information. Again the ST102 seems MUCH clearer than the ST102 and I’m beginning t think that the added resolution of the 4” compared to the 3” lens makes a big difference, at least for these daytime shots. I was expecting the ST102 to show more colour as it’s f/4.9 not f/5 but to my eyes I can’t see much difference. Perhaps some moon limb shots will tell more.
ST80 Crop
ST102 Crop
All in all at the moment the ST102 is winning due to the larger aperture, however the ST80 is still the more portable OTA. Night time tests to follow as the weather allows!
Originally posted 24 January 2007
I stood in a QUEUE outside Lidl this morning at 8am to get my grubby hands on a pair of the 10x50’s that they are selling for £9.99. I missed out last time they were selling these so made sure that I got a pair this time round! They are also selling a 90mm Spotting ‘scope for £99 but whilst I did consider that too, decided against it as it’s not ideal for astro work. Although i am in the market for a little grab and go ‘scope.
Anyway, on to the bins! They come in a nice salmon pink box (which is odd) and took me a while to locate them in the “bargain bin” that my Lidl seems to use for precision optical instruments!
The box on a few seemed damaged so I made sure to get a good one by having a good rummage!
The back of the box shows all the features off, which is actually impressive in such a cheap pair of bins:
50mm Objectives
BaK-4 prisms
Fully coated lenses (god knows what with though)
Long Eyerelief eyepieces with twist up eyecups
Diptre adjustment on the right eyepiece
threaded support for tripod use
carry bag
neck strap
mine came with 2 lens clothes, not sure if i should have only got one
they also come with a 5 year guarantee!! which to me sounds pretty damn good, although im not sure if it’s worth the box that it’s written on!
It seems a little bit of engrish has crept into the packaging as well as this part made me smile: “Particularly high resolution and clear image”.
Anyway, on to the goods
The bins came wrapped in a plastic bag, along with silica gel and placed inside the provided carry bag for protection. A good idea, someone was thinking when they designed the packaging process! I half expected the carry bag to be stuffed ontop of the bins but no.
The bag is fairly low quality but it does the job, my zip on the front pocket needed a little persuasion to work but got there in the end. The pocket however is tiny and I could just about fit the lens cloth into it!
The body of the bins is rubberized and actually feels quite nice to the hand. It’s the right shape and the weight is just about right. It sounds odd but I think if they were much lighter they wouldn’t have felt “right”.
The eyepiece caps in my opinion are a bad idea however, they are not captive and i think will easily get lost. There seems to be some provision to attach them to the neck strap but on mine the rubber hoops were broken so I didn’t bother to work it out. I think the caps will just go in the bin.
The objective caps however will have to stay, although again they are not captive and are just push fit. They are the winning contender for “first piece of equipment lost in the field on a dark night”!
The objective lenses seem quite nice actually, and the blurb says they are fully coated (note not fully multi coated) which I assume means that only one surface has a coating. At least they are not ruby coated! They do seem to vanish though so whatever the coating is it does work, but theres no green or purple tinge to the lenses.
The eyepieces are the fixed eyecup twist up kind, which isn’t a personal favorite but is good for eyeglass wearers (I do wear glasses but not for viewing as i can focus out my short sightedness). Personally I prefer the fold down design, but for a tenner I’m not going to complain too loudly.
On the moon this morning they worked well and gave a very crisp clear image that seemed well collimated. I have yet to star test them though but so far they are doing well. There are no internal reflections that I can see but time will tell once they’ve been used more.
As always I’ll add to this as and when I have more to say!
Originally posted 7th December 2006
Well my 12” Lightbridge arrived today thanks to Steve at First Light Optics. The ‘scope arrived in 2 large boxes, one for the IKEA style base and one for the OTA. The boxes were single skinned which is a shame as it wouldn’t have cost much more to double skin the boxes and even though my Lightbridge wasn’t mishandled and arrived intact, I can imagine others being easily damaged. Anyway, it’s a small thing.
The first box contained the base which is made from standard MDF fibre board covered in Formica.
The needed tools were supplied (Allen key) and it was very easy to put together. There was a disc of roller bearings supplied which is sandwiched between 2 sheets of Teflon (?) and then the top board and ground board. There is a central bolt which can be used to adjust the tension between the 2 boards (the Az tension). You can see me industrially putting the base together in this image and you can see the bearing sandwich in the background. (You can also see the OTA and is a bit of a giveaway that I didn’t put the thing together in the right order as I was too eager to see the mirror hehe, but I’ll write this review in the right order!)
The second box contained the mirror ‘box’, the UTA and the trusses. It also contained the 2” 26mm QX series 4000 eyepiece. I was a little concerned about the mirror cover as I’d read in other reviews that it had come loose and damaged the mirror coatings with other people. I was confused at first then to see the mirror cover resting on the TOP of the box. Upon unpacking it seems Meade is getting around the problem of the mirror cover scratching the mirror by NOT installing it in the first place! The mirror box was simply in a plastic bag with nothing covering the mirror. Seems like an effective and simple solution to me!
Putting the OTA together took even less time than the base. Just 3 truss sections, the mirror ‘box’ and the UTA. The UTA (Upper Truss Assembly) is thankfully very light, just 7lbs. This makes it easy to lift and attach the truss poles. The mirror ‘box’ is the heaviest component (obviously) containing the 12” mirror and the 2 aluminium bearings. The tolerances are very tight and the bearings slightly catch on the base making the Alt movements a little tight. I’m sure though that after some use it will “break in”. The base uses just felt as a bearing surface and I am unsure as to the ability of felt to stand the test of time (felt compresses) and I may replace the felt with Teflon at some point in the future.
Once the OTA was sat on the base pretty much everything was done. It took me less than 30 minutes to put everything together and that included opening the boxes! I was very pleased at the lack of tools needed also as this means less fumbling in the dark when using the ‘scope in anger. I did notice that the OTA base does just catch the Az tension adjustment screw which is a shame as a few extra mm in the side boards would have cleared this. I did have a quick look at the collimation and found it to be WAY out, but I haven’t had a play yet as I have a set of Bob’s knobs on order from the states so until they arrive in the next day or two I’ll leave it be.
Here’s another picture of yours truly to show the scale of the 12” scope. (You can also see the bags under my eyes too due to my daughter going through a growth spurt and wanting to be fed every 2 hours! I’ll have to have a shave at some point too). I’m 5’8” for reference.
This is the largest scope I’ve owned (perhaps the 8” f/8 was a little longer but the 12” is certainly fatter!) and over all I’m very pleased with it so far. I’m 100% sure that there will be thunder and torrential rain until Christmas now but I’m in no hurry for first light! The Lightbridge is now safely stored in my astro shed under lock and key, and the 80lb weight shouldn’t be too much of an issue as I only have to drag the whole thing 6 foot to use it.
As always I hope to update this thread once I’ve had a first light!
[update]
Finally managed to get a good first light of my 12” Lightbridge tonight. The night started out clear at about 6pm but by the time I’d had my dinner and got outside it was misty! Thought it was going to be another useless night and nearly opened a bottle of merlot but by 8pm the mist had cleared enough to make me think it might be worth going out for an hour or 2.
I dragged my Lightbridge out in 2 trips: I keep the OTA assembled and sat on the base in my shed and I took the OTA out in the first trip and (gingerly) placed it down on the collimation screws. I REALLY need to sort out some rubber stoppers for the OTA base so I can set the OTA down on its end without knocking the collimation. God knows what Meade were thinking when they designed the base of the mirror box! Anyway, second trip to get the rocker box, then pick the OTA up again and drop it on the rocker box. Easy peasy and a 2 minute setup.
A note about the fan, I’ve recently installed a set of bobs knobs for the Lightbridge and replaced the primary mirror springs with sturdier versions to prevent mirror flop. A slight problem with the fan is that the new bob’s knobs knurled nut cover the power connector so it’s impossible to plug the fan in with bobs knobs installed. [update] Actually if you turn the knob just so, you can get the connector between the knurls! Not ideal but it works. Although this doesn’t affect me as I keep my Lightbridge in my shed so don’t need cooling as it’s always at ambient but for people storing their ‘scope in the house this could be a pain.
This is the secondary with Bob’s Knobs installed
And the rear of the primary
Next was removing the primary mirror cover. This flimsy piece of plastic is all that protects the primary mirror and to be honest it’s a load of rubbish. The plastic is a cheap vacuum formed pile of crud and I wouldn’t trust it to protect my shaving mirror let alone my 12” precision instrument. I rapidly need to sort out a plywood cover for the top of the mirror box. Whilst I’m at it I also need to think about a secondary cover, but that might just be an old sock and an elastic band!
I’ve purchased a Meade laser collimator as being a truss dob it needs collimation more often than a solid tube. This didn’t take long and is much more accurate than eyeballing down the focuser. For those who haven’t used a laser before (I hadn’t) it’s quite simple. Just stick the laser in the focuser and centre the red dot on the primary centre donut by adjusting the secondary mirror tilt. Then when the red dot is centred adjust the primary mirror so the return beam is aligned with the first beam. There’s a silvered 45 degree plane on the collimator to make it easier and the system works very well. It still needs a final tweak with a star test but for me its close enough, at least for now. I’ll see how well it keeps collimation when I come to use the ‘scope again (maybe in about 6 months going by the current weather!) [update] I need to make sure that my laser is collimated as whilst I was using the ‘scope I wasn’t getting perfect focus. Easily collimated but something I missed.
The laser collimator in place
And if you look closely you can see the red dot on my primary out of collimation
A note about the red dot finder, the finder itself is quite good, and you can choose 10 levels of brightness and 4 different reticule shapes. However the supplied stalk that attaches the metal finder to the metal shoe is PLASTIC! I mean ffs, how on earth can you align the finder when it moves as you tighten the Allen keys!? I did manage to align the finder during the day but only by compensating for the flexure of the plastic stalk. For the sake of an extra 50p in the manufacturing costs I would have happily paid a few £’s more.
Anyway, once I was all setup I was ready to do some observing! I screwed in my 2” Baader moon and skyglow filter into the 1.25” to 2” adapter and my 24mm Pan was my eyepiece of choice. Turned on the red dot finder and turned to M45 first. Well a little disappointed as I couldn’t fit M45 into my FOV with the 24 Pan! Given the Lightbridge’s 1600mm focal length the FOV is greatly reduced from my 600mm ED80! I knew this was the case but didn’t realize quite how small the FOV is. I can see some expensive 2” Naglers in my future and my 3-6 Nagler zoom going on UK astro buy/sell!
Anyway not to be disheartened I changed to my 45m Plossl and there was M45 in all its glory. The 45mm Plossl isn’t ideal for this scope as it gives a 9mm exit pupil but I was quite pleased with the view despite a half moon. I changed to an 11mm T6 Nagler and centred the view on Alycone for a star test. Defocused out and was quite pleased with the results despite the rough collimation. Defocused in and got similar results. The secondary was quite prominent and I could clearly see the 3 mirror clips. I’m sure there’s a better way of attaching the mirror but it doesn’t bother me too much.
Back in with the 24 Pan and over to the half moon that was causing me such light pollution. I decided that the moon was a target and not a source of light pollution! The moon fitted nicely in the 24 Pan’s FOV and I was very pleased at the detail the Lightbridge showed. Upped the magnification to the 11mm T6 Nagler and there was no image degradation at all. Upped again to 6mm and still perfect. No “mushyness” at all even with less than perfect seeing. There was some turbulence in the atmosphere “heat haze” so didn’t push the magnification any more, but on a good night I feel I could go all the way to 3mm if I could track at that high magnification.
All in all I’m very pleased with the performance of the Lightbridge. I’m just waiting now for M42 to rise to a viewable position and if I’m not too tired perhaps Saturn too. I’m not sure how easy I will be able to track the ringed one as the stability of the dob base at high powers leaves something to be desired. With the 6mm eyepiece focusing produced significant wobble and I need to work out a way to strengthen the base without adding too much weight. I also noticed that the tolerances of the base were a little too tight and the aluminium alt bearings were catching slightly on the base sides. This meant that the friction in the alt axis was a little high but once the bearings had worn their own groove in the MDF it sorted itself out. Not ideal but I can live with that. I may help things along with a touch of grease or see about replacing the felt used with Teflon blocks, but that’s a project for another day.
One thing I did test was that my magnetic inclinometer attaches happily to the UTA! No aluminium here, just good old steel. I’m quite pleased as this is one half of my setting circles and now all I need is a 24” diameter disc for the Az circle and a chunk cut out of my top board. Easy enough to sort. Also needed is a shroud, especially in my light polluted skies. You can buy one for £60 but I think I’ll have a bash at making one for 50p instead. Can’t be that hard!
[update]
Well couldn’t see the horse or flame but then I didn’t think I would with magnitude 4 skies but to say I was pleased with M42 would be an understatement. The trapezium stood out fantastically clear although I think my collimation is off as I couldn’t quite get tack sharp focus. Couldn’t see any colour in M42 but again, didn’t really expect to, but I was impressed with the amount of nebulosity given my skies.
Once again mistook Procyon for Saturn (got to stop doing that!) and gave up before the ringed one peeked above the houses to my east. I’ll catch him another night. Off to bed now, but very happy with this first night out with the 12”, I’m looking forward to many more great nights! I might even take the time to lug it to a dark site to really test it out, but need more brownie points with the missus before then!
Originally posted 21 November 2006
Well after much soul searching (and wallet checking) I finally made a decision on purchasing a new telescope. I was dead set on the HEQ5 Pro with a C8 OTA, but finally decided against this due to portability issues (and lack of funds!).
That left a fork mount. The CPC800 seemed favourite but I just can’t justify the near £2000 price tag. The alternative was the 8SE however I had some concerns about the mount stability and portability so in the end I am the proud owner of a brand new Celestron 6SE.
My thinking is that this can be my main ‘scope at the moment and will make a nice grab and go ‘scope to compliment something larger later on. Anyway, it’s not ideal but it’s pretty close to what I wanted and over all I’m pretty happy.
I ordered the ‘scope on Sunday from Steve at First Light Optics and I got my grubby hands on the goods on Tuesday. Fantastic service, especially when I got the ‘scope at such a good price! Thanks Steve! I can’t recommend FLO enough for great service and excellent prices.
The ‘scope came in a single large box weighing 10kg. Straight away this gives you some idea how portable this ‘scope is.
Unpacking took no time at all and setup took about 2 minutes. The OTA came already attached to the fork arm and the only assembly needed was to attach the fork arm to the tripod.
After assembling the ‘scope the first thing that I noticed was that there was a problem with the hand controller. The rubber/plastic sheet the buttons are formed from wasn’t properly seated in the plastic case:
Something like this should have been spotted in Celestron quality control but it wasn’t much of a problem to snap the hand controller open and reseat the button “sheet”.
Lifting the whole setup is a breeze and I don’t think there is a need to separate the fork/OTA/tripod for transport, at least not from my shed to observing location in my garden.
The back of the OTA is very similar to the C8 although I’m not too impressed with the focus knob being positioned directly beneath the visual back (due to the positioning of the dovetail rail). I think this would have been better placed 45 degrees to the lower right, but it’s only a small thing. I may even look at moving the dovetail rail if it gets on my nerves too much.
The lens cap as can be seen is a single piece of plastic and fits well. It’s a pain though not having a central handle like on the older SCT models. Not having this central handle means theres much more chance of touching the corrector plate. I may attach a handle at some point in the future, perhaps just drill a hole in the middle of the cover and attach a kitchen draw knob.
Another niggle is that on the tripod there isn’t QUITE enough thread on the spreader plate bolt to loosen the spreader without the knob coming completely off the thread if that makes sense. This means that in order to collapse the tripod you have to remove the knob completely drop the spreader, rotate it and then reattach the knob. It would have been MUCH easier if they had made the bolt half an inch longer, this would have meant the bolt didn’t need to be removed, just loosened. Hey ho, it’s a small thing and another niggle I can live with.
The SE series has the ability to be ran from AA batteries however this isn’t really recommended as the motors REALLY suck these things dry. I use a 240v mains supply adapter when at home and a power tank when away from home. This means that there is no chance of the batteries running out in the middle of a session. (another!) niggle though is that I had forgotten to “split the pin” on the power socket. It seems that ALL ‘scopes that use the same power socket need the central pin to be split slightly to stop the power plug from falling out mid-slew. Irritating, but easily fixed.
Next to the battery compartment is the 2 ports available on the SE. One is an AUX port for a GPS module and the other is a standard ST4 autoguide port. Although the SE isn’t really designed for imaging i’ll be attempting some widefield DSLR shots when I get the chance.
One of the main draws to me for the SE series is the ability to remove the OTA from the fork arm. The SE uses a (nearly) standard vixen dovetail system and this means that it’s easy to attach a small APO refractor to the mount for a wider field of view. This is something i’ll look into as it’s nice to have the best of both worlds.
Removed the OTA looks very small! I guess it’s a similar size to the Synta 150 Mak. Weight wise it’s not that much lighter than a C8, but the added stability the lighter OTA gives does seem to count. When attached to the fork arm at 300x a sharp rap to the OTA settled in less than a second. A rap to the tripod settled in less than half a second. I’m very pleased as the stability was one of my main concerns with this single fork arm setup.
I actually managed to get a first light on the same day I recieved the ‘scope, a first i think! I put the ‘scope out to cool at about 8:30pm and came back at 9:30pm to see if I could get it aligned. The hand controller is familiar to me having owned Celestron GT/SLT/CG5 telescopes before. I hit SkyAlign and entered my location and time. I then slewed the ‘scope to Venus (nice and bright low in the west), Capella directly above Venus and Saturn (I was keen to see the performance on Saturn). Skyalign sat thinking for a while and then unceremoniously said “Alignment Failed”. Hmmmmm odd. I tried again with Procyon, Capella and Regulus…… waited…… Alignment failed. Grrrrrrrrr, iritating! 3rd time lucky? Nope. Tried Capella, Regulus, Mizar……… Alignment failed. Well I’m sure it’s most likely operator error, so I gave up on the alignment and just slewed manually back to Saturn. There he was nice and bright in the 25mm supplied e-lux eyepiece. Rings very crisp and despite the near 40% central obstruction the view was actually very pleasing and contrasty. I defocused to check collimation and saw that it was off a little (I have a set of Bob’s knobs on order). It was close enough to not bother messing around though. I swapped to a nagler 3-6 zoom and at 6mm (250x)Saturn was glorious. Still bright and clear, although seeing wasn’t good enough to see Cassini (and collimation didn’t help). Just for fun I pushed to 4mm (375x) and Saturn was obviously mushy but still nice and bright. Even at 500x (3mm) Saturn was still clear and bright and overall i’m very pleased with the optics. I can imagine with a perfect collimation and a night of good seeing the images will be as good as anything I saw in my ED100. Which is suprising and probably says more about my eyes then about the quality of my equipment!
Anyway I spent about 30 mins viewing Saturn (manually slewing to keep up as tracking wasn’t enabled without a GOTO alignment) and then gave up for one night. The best bit? Pick the whole kit and kaboodle up in one piece and carry it to the shed. Total time to pack up: less than 30 seconds.
I can see that once i’ve got the alignment sorted out the little 6SE will give me many nights of great viewing, and I highly recommend this ‘scope to anyone who is a visual only observer and wants a lightweight portable GOTO ‘scope with 6” or 8” of aperture.
I’ll add more as I get to use the ‘scope more.
Originally posted 18 April 2007
Well I received my skywatcher ED100 today. I brought it second hand (3rd? 4th?) from astro buy/sell for £500. This seems expensive but it’s the full kit with metal case, eyepieces, finder, diagonal and rings. Initial inspection was good with build quality about average. No real niggles although the dew shield squeeked something terrible when I removed it to inspect the lens cell! The crayford focuser is tight and there was no slop that i could tell. The finder is a half decent 9x50 with a single set of 3 pins for adjustment. Im not sure i like the SW (synta) method of using a collar and just 3 pins to adjust the finder. I think the 6 pin method gives better adjustment but thats just personal preference. I think i will be changing the finder for a right angle finder after getting into some strange positions lying on the ground trying to aim at the moon tonight!
This is the skywatcher setup on my Vixen GP. Please excuse the bare room, we were in mid-decorate!
Tonight was one of the clearest nights i’ve seen all year. Apart from the odd bit of cloud an a bit of wind the conditions were excellent. I first took a look at the moon. The cresent was bright in the sky and fitted my 18mm celestron x-cel eyepiece for a wide view of the surface. I was stunned. The best views i’ve seen so far. Bearing in mind my only comparisons have been through binoculars, a little 80mm f5 achro and a C8 that i never got to use in good conditions. I closely examined the terminator and was amazed at the detail I could see. Craters clearly had central peaks and the mares had pock marks that I’ve never seen before. I took a photo using my Nikon D70 at prime focus.
D70 at prime focus of ED100, 100th/s exposure. Straight from the camera other than a crop and resize for the web.
I was quite impressed with the quality of the image, but I think I need to find a 2” Barlow to increase the magnification to get detail at prime focus. At this point the clouds started to become denser and I swapped to my neximage ccd camera to try and get some stacked images of the moon.
Neximage CCD at prime focus. 500 frames stacked with Registax. Wavelet tweaked.
These images don’t really do justice to the scope as my imaging skills are limited. But I was quite impressed with the quality. I moved over to Saturn to get a shot of the rings but as Saturn was quite high in the sky (in cancer) I found it difficult to align the scope. By sheer chance I ended up looking at M44, the beehive cluster. It looked fantastic, with a myriad of pinpoint stars set in black velvet. One of the sights that we all wait for and love to get. I was amazed, mostly because of the clarity of the night, and how well the scope was performing compared to my other experiences. The longish focal length of 900mm meant that M44 wasn’t framed very well and I had to “scroll” around to see it all. I may invest in a focal reducer at some point to get wide field shots.
The cloud was coming in thicker and I moved to look at Saturn. After lying on my back virtually to align the scope I know I defiantly need a right angle finder! Saturn in my 5mm x-cel eyepiece was very nice. Quite low magnification compared to the C8 but this is as I expected as the focal length of 900mm is less than half that of the C8’s 2032mm. Even so I could easily see the Cassini division. I went to get my Barlow which I had left indoors to see if I could get some banding but after returning (minus night vision) the clouds had rolled in and obscured my view. Looking up I saw that a large dark cloud had completely filled the sky whilst I had been inside. A few patches were clear and I decided to wait it out. Something of a mistake as big black clouds in the sky usually only mean one thing: RAIN! Packed up in something of a panic as the last thing I wanted was water all over my laptop, new scope, and DSLR! I’ve been processing what little images I’ve gotten and wrote this report whilst waiting for the rain to blow over. Seems to have done so, so I’m back out to try and get Saturn again. Wish me luck!
ED100 on Vixen GP with Nikon D70 at prime focus and 70mm cheapo guide scope
Originally posted 3rd April 2006
I have been one of the lucky first owners of the new Ambermile Aztech mount my version of which arrived by courier first thing this morning. I’ve spent the last hour putting the mount together and gaining first impressions of the thing. The mount is very similar in design to others, including the Williams Optics EZ-Touch, the Teleoptic Giro II and the Bray Tablet. However the load capacity of the Aztech and the price makes it a cut above the others. The Aztech is priced at £350 Inc VAT and delivery.
I need to apologise for the graininess of the images as I have accidently left my D70 set to ISO1600 from the last long exposures I was taking….
First impressions of the Aztech were very good. The thing is a nice size and looks very very solid. It comes with a modified synta EQ5 SS tripod and looks very good. I had a choice of colours for the anodizing and chose black to match the rest of my gear. Arthur thinks that mounts shouldn’t be black and I think that the other colour choices of gold/red or blue would look equally nice. I just prefer black……. Sorry Arthur.
I didn’t have a can of lager to hand for scale so my lunch will have to do! The flat top does make a useful little platform for eyepieces though and there’s hints that it might be used in the future to house a motor in the next version…..
I weighed the whole thing and it comes to a hefty 9kg. This isn’t massive but does put a little dent in the grab and go aspect of the mount. However the solid engineering means that the mount can support dual C8’s and not break a sweat. The Alt axis is made from 25mm thick stainless steel and this is the “weak” point in the mounts load capacity. In fact looking at it I would guess that the tripod would probably go before the mount head does.
Without the spreader plate the whole mount is very compact, and as I’m using the mount just for my little ED80 I doubt I will need the tripod spreader plate and will likely put it into storage and use the setup without. 
The machining is first rate as with all Ambermile products as is the anodizing. There were a few little scuffs on the mount head but they were so small as to be unnoticeable unless looked for. I’m expecting this mount to gain a lot more scratches in its expected long life. This thing is built to last and would probably survive a tank running over it.
Without a scope the Azimuth bearing is very very smooth. The large internal shaft makes for great smooth movement. The Altitude bearing at first confused me as when adjusting the tension i found that the shaft was either locked or not locked with very little control. The Alt tension screw uses a brass bush to provide pressure against the shaft whilst the Az tension screw uses a (Teflon?) plastic bush. The plastic bush seems to provide a lot more control than the brass bush but i discovered that when there is a scope mounted and there is some weight on the arms this stops being a problem. Also you NEED a lock on the alt axis to stop things moving when you are in position so actually this is a design feature not a fault.
I mounted my modified ED80 onto the aztech using the very nice Ambermile dovetail saddle. This is much more secure than the standard drop forged saddles found in synta mounts as it has 5 points of contact with the dovetail rail all of which can be tightened for safety. 
I discovered that balance is MUCH more important in this type of mount and it takes a little bit longer to find the right balance point for my scope than it did on an EQ mount. This is the nature of the beast though and not something at fault. If the scope is slightly out of balance then it tends to flip objective down or focuser down depending on your out of balance situation. Whilst you can lock the alt axis to stop this, obviously when in exact balance the scope is much nicer to use. I did discover that when changing from a heavy eyepiece to a light eyepiece that the scope needed a little bit of re-balancing to keep things working nicely. This could be a pain but I’m already thinking of using the second dovetail saddle for a sliding counterbalance that I can move forward or backwards to counter the eyepiece I’m using at the time. If it works it could be a useful accessory.
I have yet to use the mount in anger under dark skies but when I get first light I’ll add to this review and let people know my experiences of using the mount for both wide field scanning (my intended purpose) and high-power tracking of stars (I can’t try planets just yet as there are none in my sky this time of year!)
I also hope to add to this review after I’ve used the mount for a good few months to give a longer term opinion.
All in all my first impressions are good and I would recommend this mount over similar designs due to its capacity, looks and ease of use.
