Due to the damaged threads, the stock AZ bolts have developed flat spots in the threads and are still a bit coarse when adjusting, despite lubrication. I will be replacing these with same size bolts with adjustable ratchet heads shortly.

The whole process took a little over an hour and was fairly straight forward. Testing the mount now I can see a major improvement in the AZ motion. Soon I will be testing it under the stars to form a complete opinion.

The forecasts for this night seemed nearly ideal. Meteoblue as well as Unisys & Wundermap data all pointed to a night of very good conditions. Naked eye examinations of stars at zenith showed little or no twinkling and stars at 30-ish elevations showed a slight calm wobble. Early in the night collimation tests of the telescope showed average to good conditions but the true shocker came in the early morning hours. This must be amongst the worst conditions I have ever imaged! A washed out, soft and nearly feature-less Jupiter! Mars, a bright orange wobbling mess that was so bad it was almost impossible to tune the ADC correctly. Never the less, here are the images. 

P.S. I am extremely baffled as to why this has happened..
P.S. 2 I got the C9,25 fairly well collimated regardless of the bad seeing!

It has been two whole months. After battling poor weather and saharan dust attackes, the skies cleared a bit yesterday to allow the possibility of imaging. After spending the first part o the night attempting to fine tune collimation on the telescope, the early morning hours were spent on observing Jupiter. Now a healthy 42" across, the giant offers a wealth of detail to be observed. The seeing was fair to poor for these captures however and the transparency was also poor as I did notice I was imaging through a veil of thin cirrus clouds, illuminated by the nearly full Moon. I also had a chance to test out the ADC/Barlow combo I put together and happy to report it seems to be doing it's job very well indeed. 

Amazing that I haven't used the blog in nearly four years. Anyway...

Last night seemed like the first chance for decent conditions since the new year. The (new) C9,25 was set up on the AVX at 23:00 and half an hour later it was polar aligned and ready. Attempted to fine tune my collimation using Metaguide and got a fairly even pattern. Occuppied myself with some lunar viewing (amazing!) and covered up the scope by 00:30 in anticipation of dawn. Got up at 04:00 and headed outside. Upon aiming at Jupiter I immediately could see that conditions were far from expected. A very high frequency blurring was prevailing but some fleeting moments of good seeing could be glipmsed. Initiated FC's autoguider and autorun features and awaited patiently for that good window to press "start". I gathered a total of 47 captures of mostly mediocre results apart from two short sessions, one early and one near the end. 

The GRS is seen rotating into view here with the streak of activity in the SEB preceding it. The new prominent red barge is also evident. The NEB's wavy appearance is  also very noticable.

Just before the end of the session here, the GRS is prominent with the "hook" feature trailing behind it. Europa is also seenof the edge.

 After a long absence, I finally returned at the scope with an early morning wake up call to see if Jupiter had climbed high enough for imaging. Having recently upgraded the observatory with a concrete slab and cast iron pier I had yet to see them in action so I decided to venture out early in the morning to see what's going on. Started off with a check up on collimation which I was not able to fine tune completely as the mediocre seeing did not allow precise evaluation. Never the less I did attempt some lunar shots with the ASI120MM and I must say the results look very promising!
I urgently need to clean up the sensor as it has accumulated A TON of dust, something which made imaging a challenge as there are virtually no clear spots on the chip left! Shortly before dawn and with the sky turning blue, I switched to the Giant. The seeing remained a mediocre levels but in any case this was a trial run to see that everything works and prepare to throttle up as the days progress and Jupiter climbs higher and higher in the morning skies.

Here's a first quick processing of last night's attempt. The night began extremely hazy and moist, cleared and dried up a bit after midnight but come dawn the humidity rose to 90%+ according to the observatory meter!


C9,25 SCT @ f/6.3 & EOS 550D
Guided with ST80  & ASI120MM
Lights: 25x 300sec ISO800
Darks: 8x 300sec ISO800
Processing: DSS & Photoshop

The Dumbbell Nebula (also known as Apple Core Nebula, Messier 27, M 27, or NGC 6853) is a planetary nebula in the constellation Vulpecula, at a distance of about 1,360 light years.

This object was the first planetary nebula to be discovered; by Charles Messier in 1764. At its brightness of visual magnitude 7.5 and its diameter of about 8 arcminutes, it is easily visible in binoculars, and a popular observing target in amateur telescopes.

source: Wikipedia

So what's new? I swapped the 50mm guider with the ST80 which now rides piggyback on the main scope, added a much heftier ADM/Losmandy D size bottom plate and gave the ASI120MM the task of guiding. The problem is (as if there wasn't gonna be one!) that the whole setup is now a lot heavier and a lot more sensitive to vibration. I had to use the counterweight shaft extension to balance the load with the 2x 5kg weights I have but it seems that the extension makes the whole thing a lot more wobbly. Also did some tuning to the DEC and RA motors to eliminate play but I fear I may have gone too far cause I was simply unable to guide properly no matter what I did. The ASI works beautifully as a guider and what really caught my attention is the fact that I can see the target through the guide window something that was simply impossible with the DBK. So here is a small test-drive at M3 using the new setup (C9,25/ST80/ASI120MM/EOS550D). Only 2x180sec at ISO800 no darks as I had a LOT of guiding issues that I need to solve!

We headed up to Xyliatos with the car full of eager eyes, cameras and telescopes. Arriving at the site we were greeted by a few of our fellow astronomers already set up and waiting for darkness. The familiar smell of the pine trees coupled with the majestic views of the water welcomed us once again. After setting up our scopes, Kyriacos and I went up the trail to the first bench and set up the cameras for some timelapse-ing. As darkness fell more scopes and eyes arrived and pretty soon the ramp was full of astronomers young and old, new and experienced alike. The night started somewhat humid and with partial clouds drifting by, but up until 22:00 the skies cleared leaving behind a dry, crystal clear sky with the milky way arching overhead with remarkable detail. The views through the scopes were simply astonishing. The galactic star fields through the small refractors (80&120mm) were nothing short of spectacular. I found myself constantly returning to Nicos's 120mm to simply sweep the milkyway and stumble upon nebula after nebula, cluster after cluster and pause to marvel at the eerie blackness of those immense dark nebulae. Of special note, the view of M8 with its gas glouds glowing as if made of neon gas, M17 sporting a highly distinct Swan figure, M11 lost in a starry background, the Veil complex (although the pizza slice was nowhere to be seen in the unfiltered view) but especially those dark nebulae....fantastic views. The bigger scopes put on a show of their own too...M27 and M13 through the 11"'s were 3D like. A neat trick we tried was connecting a 2" filter wheel loaded with OIII, UHC-S and HBeta filters. My views with this combo on the Trifid nebula through one of the C11's were remarkable. At the flick of a finger you could switch from unfiltered view to high-contrast, enhanced nebulosity or specifically hydrogen visibility and back again. Quite convenient for dedicated deep sky-ers. All in all the night was very enjoyable and the timelapse I was able to put together isn't so bad either (if you take into account the rookie mistakes I made...)

I went up to the chapel of Panayia Tsampika near our home to capture this eclipse. I only took my trusty 55-250mm IS lens and tripod. I had to hand-hold the filter the whole time as its made for an 80mm scope but never the less managed to capture some decent frames. I was joined by long time friend and fellow Mr. Doros who had his brand new Solarmax 60 with him...needless to say the views were amazing! 

I walked up to the observatory around sundown. Walked in, opened the roofs and made a cup of coffee. Dusted off my sky atlas and took a look at the area around Triangulum. Spotted NGC 925 and though "Huh, there's a nice galaxy fitting for my C9,25"! I had a lot of time though until that little guy was overhead so I took to the Moon! I started with my C9,25 in Solar System mode (that is with the SCT crayford and 2x barlow installed) and shot a few avi's with the DBK21 thinking "wow I haven't done this in years!" and "hmmm, this is FUN!". Before I knew it it was getting darker and the Moon was getting lower. My wife suggested taking a full frame shot of the Moon and so I did. I think it turned out spectacular!

As the darkness fell, I switched to deep sky mode, fitted the f/6.3 corrector with the new (proper) SCT T-adapter and proper T-Ring from Baader and headed out to NGC925...this little guy deserves more attention! It's a magnificent barred spiral approx 30 million LY away in the constellation Triangulum. I picked up 11 4 minute frames, added the appropriate darks and this is what came out of processing. I have to say, it was the first time that PHD guided perfectly from the start with no hiccups and my miniguider seemed to be spot on focus. I like!

As dawn approached, Jupiter peaked up from the neighbours roof and so back to Solar System mode it was! Reducer off - SCT Focuser back on and Ultima 2X for this shot of Jupo which unfortunately was under average to poor seeing conditions. Never the less, I love the fact that I have an instrument that can offer such great variety. It feels like my nearly 5 year old SCT just got a whole new lease of life.