Its the end of the year...time for....astro resolutions!

Well folks its that time of the year again. Time for renewal, time for change, time to dust off whatever you had good intentions at the start of the year to do, or finish and never got round to doing. Its funny how time flies past after making a to do list and discovering you have not even accomplished a single thing to check off that list. Its time to make good. What better time right?

I must admit that I did accomplish some of the things I set out to do, maybe not to my best ability, but I tried very hard. Last year I made a pact to myself to observe more (which I did since I discovered Solstice Canyon in Malibu, almost every new moon when the weather cooperated...and I did 4 runs out of the 6 to Pinos...good record), to get my 10" dob out to dark sky sites (which I did on two occasions to Mount Pinos thanks to our new Mazda5!), to sketch new objects (which I also did, although not as many as I would have liked, but still I did), to try to spread the joys of stargazing (which I did through friends and via selling beginner scopes on the internet), to try out more scopes (which I also did), to write more on my blog (which I tried to at every opportunity I got) and to dabble in astrophotography (which I did through afocal methods, wide field and also CCD camming).

So what's in it for me this coming new year. Lets see the list looks pretty similar to last years list, but I want to do MORE MORE and still MORE. I am going to break it down into points so I can really check off this list of TO DO's:

• Get my 10" out at every available opportunity, not just for runs to Pinos. That means using it at the mouth of Solstice Canyon Park.
• Plan my observing runs better. That means reading more and making list of objects to look at. No more random hopping around .
• Sketch at least 5 new objects at every session I get at Solstice Canyon (and Pinos in season). No excuses now since I have a tracking GOTO mount.
• Do more scope review articles and shootouts if time and money allows.
• Try out a SCT or Mak....if the opportunity arises and does not overstretch my budget.
• Look out for more good scope deals (got some excellent deals this year from Costco, Orion and Walmart!).
• Blog more (which I have been diligently doing anyways...its fun to be able to share my experiences with other like minded people).
• Use all my scopes equally....also hard when you have faves. And my current fave scope is my Celestron 102GT for the ease of finding stuff, plus it helps me sketch as it tracks..I need to use my C6 more frequently!
• Get my Meade DSI I color to work properly. No excuses anymore as I can use my Celestron 102GT for short exposures for stacking and I now have a Orion 0.5x focal reducer...have to get cracking on that one. I am still pretty much a visual observer by nature and it is really hard for me to get into the imaging mode when all I want to do is look and drink in views.
• Most importantly NOT avoid the moon but observe it, and the planets as well and not just DSO's!

Seems like that is it for the time being. I will probably be adding on to this list as time goes and when some crazy cockamamie scheme comes up in my delusional mind. Till then have fun, have a great holiday and clear dark skies......if I don't blog again before the year ends that is ;)

Small beginners scope shoot-out 8th of December 2012

Its funny how things sometimes don't turn out the way you want it to. My plan for tonight was to just take it easy and do some nice semi dark sky observing from my usual site at Solstice Canyon in Malibu. I had with me my Celestron NexStar 102GT and my new old stock Orion 76mm 3 SpaceProbe. I had plans to do a small scope shootout between the latter and the Celestron Powerseeker 70mm refractor, seeing how both have very similar apertures. However I deemed tonight to not be that night. Weather reports had the skies down as clear all night. But seeing how the weather has been so iffy the last couple of nights, especially with the marine layer and all, I was not holding out for a long observing session. But I did not intend for it to end the way it did either. I got to my site at about 10pm and hiked into the park, only to find that Terry was not there. No biggie. I will just set up and get some observing done myself. As it turns out I only managed 1 hour before the fog rolled in. The air was very moist and the OTA's were all drenched in dew. Geeze only managed to look at M42 and M31and its companion galaxies. So much for semi dark sky observing. After beating a hasty retreat and getting back on the road, I noticed the fog lifting as I drove away from Malibu. Turns out I should have just stayed at home!

It was 11.30pm by the time I got home. Seeing how the skies were clear, I decided to do what I had planned to do in the first place anyway, have a small scope shootout. I had recently acquired four small scopes (two Orion FunScopes) on my trip to NorCal over Thanksgiving. The two I was going to put head to head was the Orion SpaceProbe 3 and the Celestron Powerseeker 70mm. Its amazing what you can get for so little money these days. I remember back in the day I could not even afford a 60mm alt-az refractor with its pathetic 0.965" accessories. For less that a hundred greenbacks, one can get a fully functional telescope these days. All one has to do is be careful where you buy them from. Most scopes in these price range have fairly decent optics capable of opening up newbies to the wonders of stargazing. The bugbear of these scopes has always been their substandard accessories and totally inadequate mounts. Both these scopes had most things in the right place, decent optics, a okay if not fantastic alt az mount (which is easier to master and makes more sense on small scopes such as these...I do NOT recommend EQ mounts for beginners since it takes a while to get used to its motions) and some serviceable accessories.

The SpaceProbe 3 came with 25mm and 10mm Orion Explorer II 3 element eyepieces which looked to be fully coated and a pathetic 5x24 stoppered down finder (I got this scope on clearance as they were cleaning out their warehouse......for a crazy price so who can refuse?), a collimation cap, a short screwdriver for collimation and the primary mirror was center spotted (nice touch Orion!). The 70mm Powerseeker I purchased brand new. Also a fantastic Black Friday price. Scope came with an alt az mount not unlike the one on the Orion, but I noticed the legs were of a much thinner stamped aluminum. Unlike the Orion, this scope came with the preferred red dot finder (similar to the Orion EzFinder II), a plus point, an erect image diagonal, plastic Ramsden and HM eyepieces (20mm, 10mm and 6mm from memory) and a dinky plastic tubed 3x barlow. Other than the finder, everything else was a setback from the accessories that came with the Orion. Also the optics on these only seemed coated. I guess with a rather long focal length, this scope should perform okay.

As they say, the scope is only as good as the mount that holds it. This rings true, whether it be for advanced scopes costing thousands of dollars, or beginner scopes. The main problem with "departmental store" junk scopes has always decent to great optics mounted on junky tripods that quiver like jello when rapped. Both these scopes had similar looking mounts. But this is where the similarity ends. The Orion SpaceProbe had a really nice alt az mount that was a joy to use. The slow mo knob for altazimuth worked very well and I found myself thinking I was using a dob mount at times. The Sky and Telescope reviews for this scope had the same conclusion. The Powerseeker alt az mount looked similar to the SpaceProbe, on the surface. However the tripod legs and metal tripod head were of a lighter variety and not as stable. Vibrations took a hell longer to dampen down as opposed to the SpaceProbe 3.

With both the scopes setup, I was ready to roll. Its nice how light these scopes are. I managed to carry both of them downstairs easily. They also have adjustable tripods so they should accomodate kids (and kidults ;) of all heights. Plonking them down was easy enough. After getting the Powerseeker's finderscope aligned using Sirius, I set out to compare and contrast the scopes. Getting the right magnification to match both scopes was easy too as both had the same 700mm focal length. It was also fortuitious that the Spaceprobe 3 came with a 25mm Explorer II eyepiece to match my lowest power eyepiece, my Meade 24.5mm SWA. From the get go, I decided to use my Orion Dielectric diagonal on the Powerseeker to allow it to reach its maximum potential. I had four objects in mind for testing, Sirius A for star testing; M45, the Pleiades for star testing and flatness of field and coma, M42, the Orion Nebula to measure light throughput and finally the king of planets Jupiter and its four moons for clarity, sharpness and contrast. Summarised below are my findings:

Sirius A: Nice airy rings from the Spaceprobe 3. Star focused down to a nice point, with difrraction spikes visible. Powerseeker showed astigmatism and pinched optics. Would not focus down to a point. Pattern's on both sides of focus not symmetrical.
M45, the Pleiades: Same case as the above. Powerseeker had a flatter field of view and next to no coma. Field was not as flat in the SpaceProbe 3, but nevertheless views were outstanding. Probably due to its long focal length, coma was almost absent. I though I could detect some blurring towards the edges but that could be just me.
M42, The Orion Nebula: SpaceProbe 3 threw up brighter views, despite having a central obstruction. Contrast was also a tad higher on the Spaceprobe 3. This is funny as I expected the refractor to beat it hands down in this respect. Orion's wings were made even more apparent when I used the NPB filter in both the scopes.
Jupiter: No contest here. SpaceProbe wins hands down. This is surprising too as I expected the refractor to do well in this respect. Must have been the pinched optics or something (see below for details). The planetary disk was super sharp in my 6mm Radian, giving a magnification of 117x. Since Jupiter's opposition was just last weekend, the planet exhibited a huge disc with abundant detail. In addition to the two main equatorial bands, I detected at least two other thinner bands, as well as ruffling in the bands. The views were reminiscent of the 102GT and C6, although with slightly less resolution. I don't remember my firstscope, the navy blue 76mm Explorer alt az giving such good planetary views. Must have been the collimation.

Due to the substandard performance of the Powerseeker, I decided to tinker with it in the daytime to see what could be causing its poor performance. Every refractor I have encountered so far has been good off the bat, with the exception of a crazily stoppered down 60mm Japanese scope (JUNK) and the 90mm ST plastic piece of junk I got from Hong Kong. Looking down the business end of the scope , I could see that there was indeed a plastic retaining ring holding down the air spaced achromatic lens. I loosened this, held the OTA upright and gave it a few raps to make sure the objective sat properly in place. I also checked it collimation and found it a little off. The main problem is the plastic focuser drawtube. There is too much play in it when one racks in and out. This is indeed a problem. I wonder if one could wrap some sort of tape around the drawtube to reduce the "play"(Addentum: There are two small set screws at the top of the focuser that can be used to shim the drawtube to remove the slop. Will give that a go and give you guys an update). That is a real bummer as I was all ready to embrace the 70mm Powerseeker as the new entry level 60mm scopes of the past. Celestron will have to work out the kinks and probably have better QC if this scope is to be a contender. Maybe I am being too harsh, but at that price point, there are better alternatives to this scope.

In conclusion, the Orion SpaceProbe 3 came out tops and I can heartily recommend it as a beginner scope. As it has a long focal length, it will give brilliant sharp views of solar system objects, something that beginners usually gravitate to when starting. The accessories that come with it is sufficient that one does not feel the need to get additional accessories. Also it has a rather sturdy mount and is height adjustable to it can appeal to kids of all ages, putting the eyepiece at just the right height to avoid bending and kneeling. 76mm gathers more light than the defacto beginners scope, the 60mm refractor, so one can start to hunt down some of the brighter DSO. While the FunScope is a great bargain and can be an introduction to the hobby, I personally feel that this scope will be used longer since it provides a good range of magnification. The FunScope is only good for low powered views, and from experience, anything above 50x magnification becomes blurry, no matter how well you collimate the optics. Its just the nature of the beast when you have such a short focal length spherical mirror. It is a good introduction, spur of the moment scope you want to break out when seeing is not optimal. By contrast, the SpaceProbe 3, with its almost diffraction limited optics can be brought out and used as a serious observing scope. I disagree with many that small scopes cannot be used as a serious deep sky scope. With dark enough skies and persistence, I don't think you can exhaust all there is to see with such a scope.

Small scope shootout from Solstice Canyon, Malibu, 10th of Nov 2012

This has probably been in the works for a while now. I have not done a side by side shootout between two similar aperture scopes for some time. Seeing how my small'ish scopes have continued to "breed", I felt this was as good a time as any. These two scopes also compliment each other very well as I can use one of them to take quick peeks, whilst the other goes on it merry electronic way, whirling and clicking as it searches out its quarry. The two scopes I am referring to are my Orion SkyScanner 100mm and Celestron NexStar 102GT. One is a newtonian refractor, and the other a long focal length doublet achromat. Its funny how one equates to a 100mm reflector as being a small beginner scope, while a 102mm refractor is regarded as a serious intermediate scope. I have also not had such a "big" refractor in my arsenal, since selling both my short tube scopes back in oz (Orion 80ST and Synta 102mm f/5). I also briefly owned a really dodgy chinese made "plastic" tubed 90mm ST, which I obtained from Hong Kong some years ago that was great for terrestrial views but terrible for night sky views.

 

Anyways I have had the Celestron NexStar 102GT for more than a month now and have had time to work out all its idiosyncracies and  kinks. There were issues with getting the GOTO to work properly, optimizing the visual views, etc etc. See my last blog post about this. The GOTO now works really nicely and battery life seems to be very good despite what a lot of people have mentioned, so much so I don't feel the need to get a Celestron Power Tank (well I did consider getting a cigarette lighter power cable). I also noted that it was pretty cold that night, maybe not as cold as Pinos on my previous trip. The batteries and the GOTO did not fail me this time. Thank goodness.

I arrived at my semi rural Solstice Canyon site at a little past 10.30pm and set up my scopes side by side (literally). My Orion SkyScanner found itself perched on its usual mount, the Orion Paragon photo tripod. Setting up the 102GT was much easier. Just slide the dovetail of the OTA into the groove of the fork mount, plug in the hand controller and the power source and there ya go. I tried to replicate similar FOV and magnification's for both scopes since the the SkyScanner has about half the focal length of the 102GT (400mm versus 1000mm) by using my lowest powered ep, the 13mm Orion Stratus in the SkyScanner for 31x magnification and the 24.5mm Meade SWA for 41x. I then proceeded to hit several DSO's over the course of three hours. Familliar objects were easy, whilst with harder ones, I tried to copy the starhop the GOTO used.

Started off with showcase objects such as M42, the Orion Nebula, M45, the Pleiades, M31, the Andromeda Galaxy, M33, the Triangulum pinwheel galaxy, M76, the Little Dumbbell Nebula, NGC 2392, the Eskimo Nebula, NGC 7662, the Blue Snowball Nebula, M1, the Crab Nebula, M78, Orion reflection nebula, M79, Lepus Globular as well as some open clusters such as M35 (Gemini), M36/37/38 (Auriga), NGC 869/884 (Perseus) Double Cluster. Later in the night I decided to trawl the galaxy rich Fornax/Eridanus region for southern galaxies. It was fun to once again visit NGC 1365, 1300, 1316 among others. Here are my eyepiece impressions of all objects:

M42 (Orion Nebula) Nice looking. Outer tendrils more obvious without the NPB filter in place when looking through the refractor. Wider FOV in SkyScanner made for a more asthetically pleasing views, but with NPB in place.
M45 (Pleiades) Cleaner looking stars in the refractor but once again the SkyScanner threw up a nicer wide FOV view
M31 (Andromeda Galaxy) More contrasty views of the galaxy's dust lane in the refractor, but I liked the wide FOV views given by the SkyScanner as it showed the full expanse of the galaxy
M33 (Triangulum Galaxy) The wider FOV tended to concentrate the galaxy better, but the refractor threw up very contrasty views at its lowest magnification
M76 (Little Dumbbell Nebula) Both scopes gave better views of this smaller object, although the refractor again wins out with its more contrasty views
NGC2392 (Eskimo Nebula) Its a running trend here. Small objects requiring magnification do better in the refractor. Its amazing how little if any false color there is on these objects. I can start to make out the dual ring nature, which is way more obvious in my 10".
NGC7662 (Blue Snowball) Again views in refractor wins here. Little internal detail is visible though. Small planetaries are best viewed at ridiculous magnifications in big scopes, such as my 10"
M1 (Crab Nebula) Again the refractor wins out. The nebula just seemed more defined with "harder" edges
M78 Much like the crab nebula, the edges just seem more defined in the refractor. Maybe I have to flock my SkyScanner.
All galaxies appeared better in the refractor, probably due to its superior contrast. The background was just darker in the refractor. I am wondering if flocking the SkyScanner OTA would level the playing field.
Larger open clusters looked prettier in the SkyScanner, if one ignores the seagulls cause by coma closer to the edges of the FOV. Smaller open clusters looked very pretty in the refractor, again due to its superior contrast.

So in conclusion, planetary views are heaps better in the refractor. I also found that the refractor can be pushed to higher magnifications with minimal image breakdown, in comparison to the SkyScanner. I generally found the images optimal at about 100x magnification for the SkyScanner. In that aspect, the refractor threw up nice and more contrasty images of small planetary nebulae and planets. Brightness between both scopes was on par, and detail in objects was just a tad better in the refractor. I am not sure if this is due to the unobstructed aperture of the refractor, or its superior contrast, since viewing DSO's is all about the contrast between the sky and the object in question. The other thing that was annoying in the reflector that was absent in the refractor was the size of the sweet spot where the field remained aberration free. With the short focal length reflector, the off axis coma was annoying as anything that was not in the center of the FOV was distorted (i.e. hard if you were trying to sweep up some planetary nebula as you could not distinguish the stars from the planetary nebula). So which scope would I choose. This is a hard one as both scopes compliment each other so well. Both fill a roll, even when used in tandem. The big plus is both scopes are light and can be carried in one sitting when using my Orion carry bag. I rather carry these two scopes than the C6 by itself on the Vixen Porta, my previously most used scope. That says a lot. The Orion SkyScanner is a great waiting for the GOTO, super duper quick wide field scope. And speaking of wide field, the SkyScanner is an excellent panning scope. This is something I cannot do with the longer focal length 102GT refractor. Also using the dob mount is pure joy when panning. The GOTO mount cannot be used for panning as it can only move manually in altazimuth.

So what's up next? I think I am getting shootout fever. I recently purchased some small scopes over the Thanksgiving/Black Friday period and I am hoping to pan some of these scopes off to newbies with the hopes of igniting their passions for stargazing. The two interesting scopes that will go head to head include a Orion 3 inch SpaceProbe which I got for a good price on clearance from the Cupertino Orion store, and also a 70mm Celestron Powerseeker I got off Walmart. And when the dust finally settles, I will pit my most used scope to date, my Celestron/Vixen C6 on Vixen PortaMount against my Celestron 102GT. I am sure the GT will hold its own in terms of planetary and lunar views. DSO's might be more of a stretch...stay tuned!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!

i.e. photos taken by Terry Nakazono on a different observing run. We were only there from 11pm to about 2am.

My first GOTO scope....a Celestron/Costco NexStar 102GT

 The accidental discovery

This was totally unanticipated and was never in the works, well sort of, but not this way. One Friday evening, like we always do after having dinner, we would just go to our nearby Costco warehouse to window shop and get the usual stuff, such as groceries, clothes, etc. I usually walk my lil girl around, either in the trolley basket, or by foot. To keep the lil one entertained, I would usually bring her to the toy section. In that same alley, Costco also stocks electronics such as synthesizers, keyboards, electronic drums, you know the usual budget fare (well not everything is cheap though). This time round, whilst perusing the aisles, I chanced upon a gleaming grey scope on a GOTO mount. From its one arm fork mount visage, I immediately recognized it as Celestron's beginner NexStar series scope. From its rather fat OTA, I made it out to be at least a 4" scope. I was right! But from experience, I knew they were selling NexStar's in this size that were short tubes (i.e. 500mm or f/5 scopes). I have had in the past "briefly" owned such a beast of an OTA, after having such a blast with my Orion 80ST. While an achromat, the f/5 80mm scope was a pretty decent performer at high magnifications. There was of course the warm hues from the glass being achromatic, but the color was well controlled. There was no purple haze, or multi-colored neon lights hiding behind the moon. The planets look really nice and sharp, after using similar sized newtonians. It was not so much the sharpness, but more the contrast. Refractors just have superior contrast. Objects are usually framed by nice dark background. Its bigger brother, the 102mm f/5 was totally different animal though. For one the OTA was heaps heavier, making its use on a photo tripod unbearable. Color was also very apparent on every bright object, washing out minute detail. Needless to say I did not hold on to the OTA very long.

So I was really happy to find that this particular NexStar came with a longer focal length, two times the focal length of its short tube brethren. Clocking in at a nice 1000mm, this scope had a f/10 focal length. That translates to better color correction, sharper images and less edge of field distortion. Looking down the working end of the scope, I noted the nice green, purple coatings on the achromatic objective lens. There was minimal reflections coming off the objective indicating good multi-coatings for less light loss. Also I did not see a baffle directly behind the objective. Lesser quality scopes tend to have their full aperture stoppered down to minimize aberrations. Other accessories that came with the scope include a nice red dot finder, not so different from those Orion Ezy Finder's found on most of their beginner scopes. I used to scorn at these zero magnification pointers, but ever since using one that came on my Orion StarBlast, I have grown to appreciate them. While the glass is tinted and you cannot see anything but the brightest stuff through them, they are very intuitive to use, especially if your instrument is a wide field one. Getting the object of study in the ballpark, you can then pan around to find it. I guess by itself, the red dot pointer would be a poor  choice for a scope of this focal length. However since this was a GOTO scope, this finder made more sense. It also cuts down on the weight of the OTA, so the already inadequate mount would have better damping characteristics. The OTA also has a very nice focuser with metal focuser knobs (which is lined with rubber for a better grip).

This package comes with a nice foam lined plastic container with a five eyepieces set, a 20mm, 12.5mm, 10mm, 6mm and 4mm eyepiece. Unfortunately, the quality of the eyepieces leaves a lot to be desired. While they are the preferred 1.25" barrel size eyepieces, the optical design of these eyepieces are not in sync with times. They are of the Huygens and Symmetrical Ramsden designs that used to come with scopes of the 60's and 70's. These designs employ two lens elements to give very narrow field of views, very poor color correction and ridiculously tight eye relieve. While these eyepieces are okay for longer focal length scopes, they are very poor performers in faster scopes. I guess they would be okay for this OTA, but I could not use them as I need my glasses on when observing. Well this set would make a great upgrade set for a small long focal length refractor using a hybrid 0.965" to 1.25" diagonal. The other accessory this package came with was a correct image 45 degree prism telescope diagonal. While fine for terrestrial views, I found that its performance was less than starry (pun intended) under the night sky. This diagonal was firstly a prism diagonal. Testing it under the stars showed that it was letting less light through. Also the star images were not as sharp or as contrasty. I ended up replacing this with a Orion 1.25" dielectric star diagonal, and this greatly improved the views of night time celestial bodies. Jupiter looked surprisingly crisp, with abundant detail. More on this later.

The mount itself was very intuitive to setup. I like it how Celestron scopes now come with a very well written instruction manuals, as well as a pictorial quick setup guide (for dummies lol!). All one needs to do is look through the quick setup guide quickly, and one is ready to start assembling the scope. This was the same for the 127mm Celestron Powerseeker I obtained a couple of years ago in oz. Seeing how this was my first motorized/computerized mount, I was keen to get it setup so I could play around with it. The mount came in two pieces (not counting the accessory tray which is very easy to put on, the battery holder and the NexStar hand controller). All one needs to do is to unfold the three tripod legs, align the fork arm assembly base to the top of the tripod in the tripod mounting platform, and then attach  the assembly onto the tripod by threading the coupling screw into the hole at the bottom of the fork arm assembly. And wala the mount it ready. All one needs to do now put the accessory tray in place by aligning the tabs and then turning it till it clicks in place, plugging in the NexStar hand controller and then putting 8AA batteries into the battery pack and plugging that in. My gripe with the mount was firstly it was not adequate to handle a OTA this long. Celestron did try to remedy this by adding tubular legs to the tripod. However this was still not enough. They probably should have provided the mount with 2" tubular legs! To get the mount to dampen down quicker, one could possibly hang weights off the middle of the mount to weight it down, or use specialized vibration damping pads. Also this mount lacks an on/off switch. To turn off the mount, one would have to physically unplug the "external" battery pack (yup unlike its more expensive cousins, this NexStar does not have an enclosed battery holder) from the fork arm. Not so cool in my opinion!!!!

Under the Stars

Here comes the litmus test. I was keen to get the scope under the stars to firstly test out NexStar's three star alignment I have read so much about (sic) and how well the scope tracks.  Was also keen to check out how good the scope optics were and if the longer focal length made a difference in terms of chromatic aberration and contrast. First night out was under indifferent Los Angeles skies. Tried the three star alignment. Big FAIL. Did not try any of the other alignment procedures so spent the night checking out the optics. Looks at a couple of bright open clusters and Jupiter. My thoughts were meh...okay views...not great. Color correction was surprisingly good. It was on par with the Orion 80ST if not better. Okay views turned to great views when I replaced the correct image diagonal with a Orion Dielectric star diagonal. Images were wayyy sharper and brighter. Jupiter revealed a level of belt detail that rivaled my 6" Celestron/Vixen f/5 newtonian. All that you have read about the crummy correct image diagonal is true. This is one of the field things that needs replacing if all you want to do is look at stars. Open clusters looked gorgeous with the pitch black background thrown up by the refractor's superior contrast (and this from light polluted skies no less) . I spent quite a bit of time on M45, the Pleiades and the double cluster in Perseus.

Did not get the GOTO working till Terry stumbled on the two star align and got it to work. It seems that the three star align only works from pitch black skies (personal communication from Terry while testing his Costco scope out from the All Arizona Star party). Two star align works just fine from light polluted skies. The trick to get the GOTO to work properly is to make sure you get the location, date, and time as close to perfect as possible. Also make sure your mount is level (check the bubble level). Most important thing however is the batteries. they have to be fresh and not affected by the cold (as I found out when I was at Mount Pinos....GOTO refused to work!). Also when centering the alignment stars, always use high mag and defocus the stars to get them as dead center as you can. Trust me when it comes down to centering DSO's in the ep's, it really helps to get the alignment stars as close to the center as possible for accurate GOTO. I also found from personal experience that the NexStar align favour some stars over others. Not sure if it is just the placement of the alignment stars or something else. Once aligned, NexStar can place the object pretty close to the center, if not the center of the FOV. Have not tested to see how long the tracking motors can keep the object centered, but from my short forays, it seems to do a pretty nifty job.

The Verdict?

This has got to be one of the hottest deals in the telescope world right now. For the price, one could do far worse than purchasing this scope. In the price range, other good buys for beginners include Orion's battery of beginner scopes (70mm Explorer, Orion SkyScanner table top scope, Orion StarBlast 4.5 on either mini dob or EQ mount). This scope is, however a full fledged GOTO scope with tracking. Although I usually scorn at the idea of recommending a GOTO scope to a beginner (I myself am a "dyed in the wool hardcore" starhopper), this would make a great first telescope, when presented together with a good beginners book such as "Turn Left at Orion". Although the accessories are not the best, they are enough to allow newbies to gain access into the observing world of visual astronomy. If one is resourceful enough, one could also do some basic astrophotography with this setup, seeing how the GOTO works pretty spot on, and tracking seems to be pretty good. But more on this in a later post. Till then do yourself a favour and go out and buy one, if you have not already done so. remember that you can only get this special price at Costco. This scope sells for more than $200 on e Bay!

Last Pinos run for the year...and a solo adventure too.....kewl 13th October 2012

I had to get out. I just had to. This would be the last trip to my fully dark-dark sky site, before winter sets in and it gets too cold, with snow, blah blah blah. Anyways I also had another reason to get out there.....to test out my new Celestron/Costco 102GT scope. I have had issues with the GOTO (which will be covered in detail in an upcoming review of this very same scope!) so I was hoping that would stay away. Anyways had the car packed and I was ready to bolt at about 7pm! I had with me my trusty 10" f/5 GS dob (its second dark sky run way up here in the northern hemisphere) and my Celestron/Costco NexStar 102GT. Its amazing how light the whole GOTO setup is, way lighter than my Celestron/Vixen C6 and Vixen Porta Mount. This scope also fit in my Orion carry case really well and I had no problems zipping the whole case up. Got to love good, light and portable setups. I was also hoping to shoot (no pun intended!) for some DSO shots with my Meade DSI, which up until now has not logged any imaging time due to backfocus issues with all my short focal length newts. Hopefully this longer focal length refractor would solve my focusing issues.

The drive there was pretty uneventful. Traffic was nice and light at this hour and I had just added new movie soundtracks to my iTouch. Blasting the music while driving is definately recommended as I got pumped just listening to my playlist. My new fave new tracks include Transformer Prime and the new Batman Rises theme song. Got to love Brian Tyler and Hans Zimmer!!! Music really makes for a good companion whilst driving on the road and flying solo. I was in pretty high spirits, right up to when I got closer to my exit. Where did all this fog come from!!!!!! OMG I was freaking out. I had to get gas and a drink so I stopped at my usual gas station. But man oh man was the fog was thick. As I filled my car up, thoughts were racing through my head...should I turn back, should I head to Malibu, should I just give up and go home? Thankfully I decided to press on. As I drove towards the summit, the fog lifted. Whew. I ended up pulling over at the very same spot Terry and I found the last time we were there. I did not feel like driving all the way up to the summit. This was a much shorter drive, plus I get a un-obscured views of the southern sky. No pine trees to block my view!!!!! The only drawback to this site is the frequent passing cars and their pesky headlights. Well I was just glad to be out there ;)

First order of the night for me was testing out the new GOTO scope and to see if I can get the DSI to work with it. After unpacking the car (in a hurry too as I was keen to get stuff underway). Got the dob out first and checked its collimation. Then turned on my wifey's PC laptop, unpacked and set up the NexStar, connected the handset and the battery pack. This is when the frustration started to kick in. Did the two star alignment, as usual. NexStar read alignment success. Used the GOTO....big FAIL. It was slewing to the wrong spot every time. I realigned the GOTO, selecting different alignment stars this time.....NexStar read alignment fail. Tried auto two star alignment...FAIL, 3 star alignment FAIL. Dammit. At this point I was getting really pissed off. I have read that the batteries had to be fresh to get he GOTO to work properly. Since I had done about 2 1/2 hours on the 8 Duracell AA batteries, I figure it would still have some way to go (some sites on the internet state that 8 AA batteries can last up to 10 hours...I was being more conservative and cut that time in a half). Well that was not the case. Looking back I was wondering if the cold had anything to do with this. It was cold that night. Got down to about 0 degrees Celcius! Will have to test the batteries again when I get home to a warmer climate!

Not wanting to waste anymore time (the center of our milky way was long gone by then, even when I pulled up to the observing site ), I decided to do what I do best, manual star-hopping and visual observing. I was keen to at least sketch one new object tonight, and check out some other DSO's that I have not seen for a while (or not at all). Got good views of the usual suspects. Started off with a tour of the summer planetaries. First stop was M57, the ring nebula. Then turned to M27, the dumbbell nebula. With the 10" extra resolving power, I got excellent views of NGC 6826, the blinking planetary in Cygnus. Internal detail easily visible at 208x with the 6mm Radian. Also looked at M76, the little dumbbell in Perseus, a bipolar planetary. It is interesting to note that from a lower elevation, the DGM NPB filter made these nebulae stand out better. This was the same case for the Veil Nebula in Cygnus and the Helix Nebula in Aquarius. Speaking of the Helix Nebula, this is the first time I am seeing it from northern skies, and with my 10" no less. The views were pretty spiffy, with whispy detail visible in the nebula with the NPB filter in place.

Also looked at some pretty open clusters, the most outstanding being the double cluster in Perseus and M45, the Pleiades. Scrutinized some galaxies too, such larger galaxies as M31/32, the Andromeda Galaxy, M33, the great spiral in Triangulum, M76 in Pisces, M77 and its surrounds in Cetus and finally, I looked at NGC 253, the Silver Coin galaxy in Sculptor. This remains my fave southern galaxy after the LMC and SMC. The views were heaps better from dark skies. Mottling was very evident in the 10" and the spiral structure was evident (not as evident as from oz, but heaps better than from say Malibu). Wanted to give NGC 55 in Sculptor a go, but this was hidden behind a hill when I went for it. Oh and yes I sketched NGC 772 in Aries the ram. Not much detail visible.

As the night progressed, it got colder and colder. The wind chill did not help either. I was getting chilled to the bone and the winds keep up its buffeting of my monks hood. I was kinda glad the GOTO did not work. It would have been impossible to keep the images from jumping around. Ended the night....and my Pinos run for 2012 with a gorgeous view of M42, the great nebula in Orion. Never get tired of looking at its green/subtle pastle colored visage at low mag in the 10". I actually prefer the views of M42 from a dark sky site without the NPB filter screwed in. My plans for the next few months would probably be focused on getting some imaging down from my light polluted playground as I attempt to master my GOTO scope and Meade DSI CCD camera. I might take an occasional trip out to Malibu but we will see what happens. The call of dark skies can be pretty hard to ignore......

Mini Reports: Dark sky getaway 8th (Mount Pinos) and 15th of September (Solstice Canyon, Malibu)2012

I am going to lump two reports into one post so bear with me. It has been about a month since my last dark sky visit due to my recent trip home to Malaysia/Singapore. I did do some stargazing while I was back there with my trusty Celestron Cometron CO40 and my nephews Celestron Powerseeker 127mm OTA on photo tripod. Seeing how we just collected our new Mazda5 minivan, I decided it was time to give my 10" some dark sky time. It has been more than 2 years since this scope has seen ancient DSO starlight. In fact in the 2 years or so I have been in LA, the scope has only been out twice under indifferent light polluted skies. Needless to say I was itching to let my 10" stretch its DSO chops once again. So after taking three trips down two flights of stairs, the 10" was ready to make its pilgrimage to Mount Pinos. The targets.......the centre of our milky way, as well as some northern skies goodies it has never had the opportunity to catch. Terry my observing buddy came with me on this trip. He had with him a new set of observing gear. Gone is the SkyScanner and Manfrotto tripod. In its place a spanking new Orion StarBlast 4.5" on Vixen MiniPorta. He purchased a Orion StarBlast 4.5 EQ. We left pretty late as I went factory outlet shopping that very day. Since it was late, we decided to just find a spot somewhere along the way up to Pinos (closer to Lockwood Valley). One advantage of this site was the unobscured southern sky, allowing up full view of the southern sky goodies. We arrived at that site just after 10pm. The centre of our home galaxy was still visible, so after unloading the scopes (I had with me my trusty 10" GS dob, and my cute blue tubed 60mm 80's Meade refractor (Its second Pinos run).

First up nebulae M8, M20, M17, M16. All were awesome in the 10" with my 24.5mm Meade SWA with DGM NPB filter despite their lower elevation. I could not frame both M8, the lagoon and M20, the trifid in the same filed of view. Using my lowest mag ep, a 24.5mm SWA Meade, I could only manage 51x, the downside of a larger scope with a longer focal length. M8 appeared mottled, with its nebulosity punctuated by dark nebulae and the lagoon lane stood out boldly. M20, the trifid showed its dark lanes easily. I then perused globular alley, starting with the grand daddy of the Sagittarius clusters, M22, then moved onto M28, M55 and M54, M70, M69. After scrutinizing what Sagittarius had to offer, both at low mag and at higher mag, I moved onto Scutum and its riches, focusing particularly on M11, the wild duck cluster. I then turned my attention on some of the other summer wonders such as M57, the ring nebula, M27, the dumbbell nebula, North American Nebula and Veil Nebula. Then it hit me....I really really miss my 10". The Veil was as intricate as a photograph, showing braided structure with the 24.5mm eyepiece and the DGM NPB filter. The North American and Pelican were viewed in portions due to the longer focal length of the dob, but was nevertheless detailed. I also looked at some other objects that I had not looked at in recent times such as M2 and NGC 7009 (Saturn Nebula) in Aquarius and NGC 7662 in Andromeda. Now this is where aperture starts to make its presence felt. I could push the magnification wayyyy up to between 200 and 400x (my max magnification in this scope with the 6mm Radian and Orion Shorty Plus 2x barlow) without light loss. Internal detail was abundantly obvious in these smaller planetary nebulae. I also looked at the little dumbbell (M76) for the first time with so much aperture. Even M57 showed more (variation in intensity in the ring) and M27 too on a football appearance with the "hollow" areas filling out with nebulosity. I love planetary nebulae!!!! They are just so fun to look at if you have sufficient aperture to make them look different.....

Other objects viewed that night include M31 and its companions (also could not fit this in the FOV so I had to pan around), M33, the double cluster in Perseus and two new objects Terry pointed out in Cepheus, NGC 6946 (galaxy) and NGC 6939 (open cluster). Did my first sketch in ages! Now I am raring to sketch even more objects! Final objects of the night include M45 (the Pleiades), M42 (the Orion Nebula) and good old Jupiter. It was a great night all in all. My only gripe was that they closed the 405 freeway on my home stretch and we had to take a detour...sheesh!!!!!

Malibu run

Okie this is going to be ultra short since I basically looked at similar stuff, just with less aperture. I had with me my C6 6" f/5 newt on Vixen Porta Mount. I just had to get out there, and seeing how it was the new moon weekend (yup I jumped the gun with Pinos and went there during the last quarter moon that rose pretty late at about 1.30am). Also Malibu has not had the best weather for stargazing in months (last trip there was in May!!!!!!!!!), thanks to the marine layer. The only new DSO's I looked at included Sculptor galaxies NGC 55 and NGC 253. These two were my staple galaxy diet from down under. Both appeared a pale reflection of their former glories. With their lower elevation this was expected. Still its nice to know that I still have access to some of my fave southern sky friends. Not much detail in these. Will have to check them out when I go to Pinos this weekend with my 10", weather permitting of course. So yes here is my report...up next Pinos take four for this year.....and a scope review of my all new Celestron/ Costco 102 NexStar GT....an amazing scope for the price!!! Stay tuned!!!!!

Mini Report: Equator dreaming.....my recent trip back to my homeland...

To me Malaysia will always be home. I might not spend as much time as I used to when I was a kid growing up there, but everything just seems so familliar. Now the place itself has changed in the past decade or so since I left (I have been overseas for about 11 years now...living both in Brisbane, Australia and our current home in Los Angeles, USA). Many new developments, shopping centres, buildings and also highways have cropped up. Its much easier to get around now that it was many years ago. However one would still need a car to get around Johor Bahru. The drawback to this is the loss of the night sky of course. Due to the ever expanding commercial buildings, reaching skywards, the once semi dark skies at my parents place is no longer a suitable spot for serious stargazing. One would have to observe after a stormfront has passed to get the clearest and most transparent skies. Battling mozzies is another thing us astronomers at the equator have to deal with. I for one though still brave the mozzies as I get to see southern hemisphere objects that is beyond my reach from my current northerly observing spot in Los Angeles. The calling of the night sky is too strong. I succumbed to its siren song everytime I am at home and the skies are clear at night. I have been lucky the past two years I have been back. There have been some pretty clear skies. Hardly dark but observable. Again I used my nephews future scope, the Celestron Powerseeker 127mm on photo tripod. Still trying to adapt the scope better for visual observation. Even with such a short and stubby lightweight OTA, the photo tripod is still overwhelmed when viewing anything more than 45 degrees above the horizon. My best guess for a suitable easy to use mount would be a Vixen MiniPorta or a one of them tabletop one arm dob mounts.

This time of the year, the very heart of our milky way rides overhead. I visited the usual suspects such as globulars M80 and M4 in Scorpius, M6 and M7, also in Scorpius, and then perused the rich star spangled regions of Sagittarius. Visited old friends such as the Trifid (M20), Lagoon (M8), the Eagle (M16) and the Swan (M17). Also looked at some old globulars such as M22, the crackerjack cluster and the close by M28. Nebulae, with the NPB filter in place, looked like pale imitations of themselves from these light drenched skies. Its amazing how light pollution can wipe out even bright objects such at M4. Even the globulars suffered, with M4 barely visible and M13 and M22 only slightly resolved . Objects that was not affected as much were planetary nebulae, M57, the Ring Nebula and M27, the Dumbbell Nebula. Of course  both of this objects benefited from the use of the NPB filter. Again I found the OIII views to be very close if not similar to the views through the NPB. I ended up selling the OIII when I returned from my trip. Highlights from the observing sessions was scrutinizing Saturn and its ring system with the 6mm TV Radian eyepiece at 167X.

Anyway that concludes my mini observing report from the equator..till we meet again a year later!!!!!

Dark sky weekend getaway....Mount Pinos it is!!!!

I am trying to be more consistent with my dark sky observing runs. SoCal residents living near the coast get hit hard during the summer months as the marine layer pretty much comes in every other night, and this is not just restricted to the June Gloom month! My observing buddy and fellow Los Angeleno Terry Nakazono has been observing from SoCal since he came back to the hobby in 2010. His experiences with observing in the summer months has been bad. So bad that he has to resort to making trips to the desert and basically anywhere away from the coastline to get clearer skies. Since I have been observing a lot more lately from Malibu, I started to feel the need to get to a place where I could escape the marine layer. Mount Pinos is one of these places that is high enough to escape the marine layer. Another added advantage is that it is only about 1 1/2 hours from where I live, making it a doable single night trip. Plus this summer has been rather warm (well warmer to me than last year at least!). If my last trip there was pleasant, the session on Saturday night was even better! The temps were a balmy 20 degrees celcius (about 60 degrees farenheigh). To make it better, transparency was pretty good and the skies were steady too!

Got the car packed up pretty early at shortly after lunch. This time I had planned to not do any comparison observation. It was going to be a strictly observing trip. I even had a short list of objects, which I culled from a larger list I made way back when I was still making observing list in Brisbane for my sessions at Leyburn. I had some northern sky DSO's that I had noted that would have been impossible from my southerly declination back in oz. Alas good intentions do not always bear fruit. This time of the year Virgo sets pretty early, slightly after astronomical twilight. Also the galaxy zoo in the direction of Coma Berenices-Canes Venatici also sank fast after twilight. Oh well there is always the brighter stuff I can revisit, plus some of the fall constellations to look out for later in the night.

After a shower and a light dinner, I called Terry up and we were on our way by about 10 past 6 pm. Surprisingly the drive up there went pretty quick. I guess that's what happens when you are all fired up to observe and there is someone who is equally as enthusiastic as you in the car. When we pulled up into the parking lot up on Pinos, we were greeted by a throng of cars and people. Geeze we had to park practically at the mouth of the entrance into the parking lot. I have never seen Pinos this crowded before. Must be the good weather conditions! I later also learned that there was a class being conducted that night.

As we had some time to kill, after checking the collimation of our scopes (I was armed with my Celestron/Vixen C6 on Vixen Porta mount and my Orion Skyscanner table top on my Orion Paragon FD2 photo tripod), we decided to wander around and talk to our fellow astronomers. Some of the more hardcore folk have been up there since last night with their RV's. There were some big Obsession and Obsession type scopes up there. The biggest scope was probably the 25" Obsession, followed by a 22" and a 20" monster. There might be another 25 incher but I could not locate the owner. The field also played host to several astrophotographers. My other Pinos buddy Dave, who was supposed to be there unfortunately did not make it.

I started off the night in my usual astrophotography tinkering. I had with me new/old Meade DSI one shot color CCD camera. This cam is definately more light sensitive than the Orion Starshoot Color Solar System Imager IV, which I returned (and there will be a write up on the cams as soon as I get some half decent shots to post!). I had the same problem with not having enough backfocus!!!!! Sheesh looks like the cams are not going to work with my short focal length newtonians. Will have to see if I can get it to work with my 10" dob. If not I might need to get a short focal length  refractor to image. What I did accomplish though is get some defocussed stars in the FOV. At least I know the cam is sensitive enough for deeper fair. All I need to work out now is the backfocus issue! There is no easy remedy for this, save moving the whole primary mirror cell forward.

With the tinkering out of the way, it was time to get down to some serious visual observing. I started off my "not so dark adapted" eyes on some easy objects like open clusters and globular clusters. First up was the rich starfields in Sagittarius and Scorpius. Unfortunately due to our position close to the entrance of the parking lot, there wasn't that much room to move around (well until later when the non hardcore astronomers started to leave at about 11pm!). Scorpius was hiding behind a tree so I could only manage M80 at the head of the scorpion. The nebulous puffs that was M8, the Lagoon Nebula, M20, the Trifid Nebula, the small Sagittarius starcloud, M17, the Swan Nebula and M16, the Eagle Nebula were all easy fare so I started with those, this time mostly focused on using the OIII filter to observe the darker features. With these observations, I can confirm that there is definately less nebulosity visible in these objects (well the extent of the nebula anyway) using this filter. I spent a good amount of time scrutinizing each object and then moved onto M22, the crackerjack cluster in Sagittarius. Again I got the impression of this object resembling Omega Centauri at high power as it is just such a loose globular! I also had high power looks with the C6 at M28, two other globulars close to M8 and M10 and M12 in Ophiuchus! Then I panned to M11, the Wild Duck cluster in Scutum. This object actually looks better at low to medium magnification as it keeps the cluster compact, showcasing its flock of wild ducks in arrow formation.

My now better dark adapted eyes were ready for some galaxy action. With the galaxy fields fast sinking, I had to work fast if I wanted to see anything. I started off with Ursa Major's M101 and M51. This time I tried the Orion Skyglow broadband filter to see if it enhanced the view of the galaxies. To my amazement (well I half expected it to work), the galaxies looked much better with the filter in place. The galaxies looked "contrastier" and gave up their details a little easier. I later used this filter to observe the dark lanes in M31, the Andromeda Galaxy and the spiral arms and the star forming region in M33, the Triangulum Galaxy! Other scrutinized galaxies included M106, M63, the Sunflower galaxy and M?? in Canes Venatici.

After oogling the galaxy zoo, I decided to go back to some nebula observing, staring with some stellar graveyards. M57, the Ring Nebula is my fave planetary nebula. With or without the filter, this object is a stunner in even small scopes. My best views of this object have been with my 10" when it really does resemble a celestial smoke ring! But the C6 does a darn good job too. M27, the dumbbell nebula is no slouch either and this curious football shaped (well with the narrowband filter in place. Without the filter, the apple core visage is easier to descern) object was strutting its stuff. With the OIII filter screwed in, all three portions was visible. Again the views were nice in both my smaller scopes. But this view is marred by the wonderful views I got with my 10", with the NPB filter in place . I will never forget that night in Leyburn when the Veil Nebula looked striated and braided, looking much like a black and white photograph! I also hit the North American Nebula with the C6, but the best views of this expansive nebula came with the Skyscanner at very low power. Again the Pelican Nebula was easily visible.

With Andromeda now up and most of Pegasus, I decided to swing over to M31 and its companions, M32 and M110. All three looked very good. This turned to great when I decided to give the Orion Skyglow broadband filter a go. Wow oh wow, the dust lanes jumped out and M31 seemed to stretch on forever. I wonder if this was coupled with the fact that M31 was still not super high in the sky. M33 pulled the same trick with the Skyglow filter in place . I though I could just make out its spiral arms with the filter in place!

It was now getting late and I was starting to tire. I figured I take a quick break from standing up and observing , and shoot some wide field shots with my Kodak Z990. I retired the Skyscanner from its perch on the Paragon photo tripod so I could mount the camera. Pushing the ISO all the way to 6400 and using its maximum exposure of 16 seconds, I look some shots of the southern milky way (M8 and up, as well as the region around M11, M31 the Andromeda Galaxy and the double cluster in Perseus, Lyra the constellation and even the head of Cygnus, around the bright star Deneb).

Now that I was rested, I went back to bright and easy stuff again, My final objects of the night was the double cluster in Perseus, M13 the great Hercules cluster and M30 in Capricorn. Terry also showed me Banard's Galaxy in Capricornus. It was faint but definately there. By then the clouds started moving in from the east. It was the end of yet another perfect night up at the temple of the stars. Next trip up would probably be in September or October.....

My many visits to Orion Telescopes in Cupertino.....one of my dreams growing up in Malaysia

I know this sounds dorky but I have always held a fascination for the stars, ever since I received my Celestron Cometron CO40 as a gift, and since I discovered Astronomy Magazine (and later Sky and Telescope). It was through reading these magazines (and I still read them today!), that my fascination for Orion Telescopes and Binoculars began. I would peruse over their then black and white ad's in the magazines, and even wrote to them for some of their information packed catalogs (back then they used to mail internationally...ah the good old days). While I acquired catalogs from Celestron, Edmund Scientific and Orion, the one I always read over and over again was Orion's. In fact it became sort of like a collectors item for me and I would try to acquire "back issues" over the years through Astromart (and I acquired quite a few thanks to a fellow astronomer from Canada!)! As I flipped through its hallowed pages, I would drool over the ad's of Celestron/Vixen's C6 (which I now own...well the OTA anyway), Edmund's Astroscan and some of the smaller scope fare (I recently purchased a used Celestron Cometron CO60...but then sold it off!). Remember that Orion is a importer/exporter. However it would not be till years later that I would acquire my first Orion scope, and a used one too, a Orion 80ST OTA. More on this later.....

In 2007, after completion of my PhD, me and my significant half made plans to visit California to check out the many UC's for postdoctoral opportunities. This meant that I would have an opportunity to finally visit some of the telescope stores in CA. I immediately though of Orion. Now I know they have two stores in NorCal, one in Cupertino, and one in Watsonville. I made it to both stores and have not been disappointed!!!!! It was like a dream come true as I walked through the doors of the Cupertino store. I even got to experience their legendary customer service firsthand when I wanted to purchase a Orion StarBlast 4.5" minidob and was told that it was out of stock. Now I only had 2 weeks in CA so there was no way I could have waited for their stock to arrive. Buying the scope through a dealer back in oz was not an option as their prices were through the roof! Fortunately they had a floor model which was in immaculate condition. After explaining my situation to the store salesperson, he made a call to the manager and they agreed to sell me that model! They even threw in a free eyepiece for a lower price!

Fast forward to 2012. Yet another brilliant example of Orion's legendary after sales service. I now live in SoCal so getting to an Orion is way easier than having to fly thousands of miles and then driving to the Orion store. In fact I visit their store every time I drive up to NorCal to visit close friends. We hope to eventually move up to NorCal for jobs and such so we can be close to our childhood friends. Anyways back to the story. The following are two instances where Orion's staff members went out of their way to make sure things were right! You know the story where the StarBlast was out of stock...well it happened to me again when I decided to get their SkyScanner mini dob. I got the floor model again for a lower price (booyah!) as they were once again out of stock for this model (what is wrong with my timing ;).

The other more recent incident on my last trip up north I purchased a Orion StarShoot Color Solar System Imager, during a web sale. Due to the awful June/July marine layer weather here in SoCal, I only got to try the camera out about a month after receiving it. The cam worked fine for terrestrial objects, but stubbornly refused to come to focus in all my newtonian telescopes. And this was with the bright moon as a test subject! It seems the imaged was formed inside the focuser tube. Therefore there was no easy way to solve this problem, save moving the primary mirror forward (which would necessitate moving the whole mirror cell forward!). I wish the problem was the other way around. That way all I needed to do was to add an extension tube, or a barlow lens (I did try the barlow in the focuser trick but it did not work!). Now Orion now has a superb website and has several options for contacting them. One was the traditional method of calling their hot line. the other was a live chat over the internet (and it is sooo convenient!). I chose the latter. Talking to tech support, we ran through the problem I faced with the cam. Not being able to come up with a simple solution, I decided to return the item for a full refund. I asked if it was possible to return the item seeing how I was a few days off the 30 day return window. The person on the other side said that that was not an issue, and told me to send it in. That's what I call customer satisfaction!

Technology has come a long way and there are now many different avenues for purchasing items from brick and mortar stores, as well as online stores. While in many countries, buying online is still at its infancy, the avenue of shopping is very much alive and heavily utilized in the US. In fact most good deals can be had by purchasing online, more so than buying from a store!!! Seeing how Orion specialized in mail order, their brilliant online store is just another feather in their cap. They pride themselves on educating the masses, and have done so through their print catalog for many years (and they still do!). They now have a different avenue, via their online store. I find their articles, their monthly sky write ups and their educational videos on how to setup and use astronomical equipment very helpful. Making their product instruction manual's available as pdf's for download is definitely a plus plus. Many of the larger companies are now following in Orion's footsteps and adding articles and how to video's for their scopes. Also although they are an importer/exporter, Orion continues to innovate and work closely with their manufacturer's to produce original designs that set them apart from their competition (i.e. everyone loves their mini dobs and they are currently the first company to offer camera holders for smart phones!!!!!!). Also quality control is pretty tight and QC on their scopes seems to be very good. All Orion scopes I have owned have been pretty close to perfect, starting with the Orion 80ST, the Orion StarBlast and now the Orion SkyScanner! Kudos to Orion for servicing the amateur astronomy community for so many years.....happy 37th anniversary!!!!!!!!!!!!!

Its summertime...lets all go to Pinos!!!!

What a blast last weekend was. The weather finally cooperated and we could go up to Pinos (first trip of the year!) for a great night of summer stargazing. Nothing gets better than this. While Malibu is nice, observing in Pinos is a whole different animal. Its like observing from Perrin Park, Toowong versus Leyburn back in good old oz. There is just no comparison, no substitute. Not to knock my current fave observing site at Solstice Canyon, Malibu as it is just so convenient, but sometimes you just need to get out under truly dark skies. Only Pinos, with its high elevation can provide this. And what better time to visit than the start of summer! Last year my maiden voyage to SoCal's temple of the stars was in May when it was still cold and snowy. This year it was much warmer and there was no snow. Hurrah. The place was packed when we got there and it really did feel like a star party. Both previous trips up there have been rather quiet.

Anyways I did not have any real plans to hunt new quarry. My objective this time round was to just get out under dark velvety skies and drink in the views of some of my fave DSO's. I also wanted to compare and contrast the views through my DGM NPB and my newly acquired OIII filter, try out my $30 retro 80's "Made in Japan" Meade 60mm 700mm focal length refractor and to give the SkyScanner its first dark sky sprint as this also happened its maiden dark sky trip! So much to see and do!

The night started off rather frustratingly, much like my last trip to Pinos. Me and my lofty ideas of doing afocal photography using my Kodak Z990 and the Orion SteadyPix Camera holder. Its funny how the SteadyPix never wants to cooperate everytime I am at some dark sky site. Its either the SteadyPix eyepiece clamp coming loose or the old EQ3-2 not wanting to cooperate (and there I was thinking that the Vixen Porta would solve this problem...well the Porta did perform rather exceptionally.......it was the fault of the SteadyPix this time). After farting around with the setup and my C6 on Vixen Porta for what seemed like eternity, I threw in the towel and just decided to do what I do best, observe visually. I had my starcharts with me, as well as my iTouch, but decided to rely solely on my memory this time to revisit some of old friends and acquaintances.

I decided right there and then to ease myself into the observing session by looking at some of the brighter solar system fare on offer earlier in the night, namely Mars, Saturn and the moon. Some curious folk came over and asked what everyone was up to. Not wanting to be unfriendly, I decided to show them the rings of Saturn at 250x through the C6. The SkyScanner was aimed at moon so they got some quick peeks at old luna. Terry Nakazono, my Malibu observing buddy who came along with me to hunt down some faint fuzzies also took a quick peek at Saturn. The skies were transparent and steady! Plus the temperatures were pretty mild and there was no wind!!! It was the perfect start to the night!

Continuing with the trend of looking at bright and easy stuff, at least till my eyes dark adapt better, I then moseyed over to Lyra to look at M57, the ring nebula. Spent some time gazing at the ring through all my scopes, comparing the views. I was surprised by the views of the ring in the 60mm Meade. It gave quite a nice view for such a small scope! It goes to show what can be accomplished with minimal aperture if you have good enough skies, although I could not really see the hole in the celestial donut. Its looked pretty much like the bloated out of focus star I spied in my CO40 all those years ago. It was kind of silly of me to forget to pack the 9mm MA eyepiece. Wonder if the hole would have been visible at a higher mag. Bummer.

Seeing how Ursa Major was slowly starting to dip below the tree line, I next turned my scopes towards M81 and M82. All three scopes gave a nice image, with the best of course coming from the C6. Extended "arms" were visible radiating from the intense core of M81. M82 showed nice mottling, indicating its star forming regions. The galaxies were visible, abeilt dimly in the 60mm scope. What I really liked though were the views the SkyScanner threw up. They were not as bright as in the 6 incher, but they were bright enough to show detail. The same went for M101, the large low surface brightness galaxy in the great bear. Again I though the SkyScanner gave a better view of this galaxy. Maybe the light was more concentrated in a smaller space due to its extremely wide FOV (400mm vs 750mm focal length). One other object that appeared very nice in the C6 was M97, the owl nebula. With the OIII in place, me and Terry though we could make out the "eyes" of the owl. This feature was not visible in the SkyScanner. I did not even bother trying for it in the 60mm scope, although I am sure it would have been visible.

Since I was in the "realm of galaxies", I thought I should look at the usual suspects and compare them in my different scopes. Next up M51, the whirlpool galaxy. Again aperture reigned supreme. The C6 won hands down, with the SkyScanner coming in a close second, throwing up a lovely image of a lop sided, pear shaped fuzzy. For some strange reason I could not for the life of me get it in the FOV of the 60mm Meade. The 5x25 stopped down finder was a bear to use!!!!!! I think I might have to replace this with a red dot finder since they are more suited to scopes of this aperture. For the remainder of the galaxies, I stopped using the 60mm altogether and just focused on comparing the images between the C6 and SkyScanner. Galaxies observed included NGC 4565, the edge on galaxy with a nice dark lane running through it, M64, the black eye galaxy (the dark region visible in the C6), M104, the sombrero galaxy (best views again at high mag where the dust lane is clearly visible), M106 (extent of the spiral arms were much wider in the C6), the M94, M63, the sunflower galaxy.

After viewing the galaxy fields, I decided to do some summer stargazing, i.e bright nebulae and globular clusters. With the glorious northern and southern milky way stretching from one horizon to the next, who could resist. Started out at the head of the scorpion. The "star-bar (or cats eye whichever way you want to see this) was clearly resolved in the C6, as it was in the SkyScanner. The 60mm also showed this feature, although it was not as obvious. M80 was nice too. I must have been in some weird compartmentalization mode (carry on from my work with brain clones in the lab probably lol) as I decided to look at all the globulars whose locations I had imprinted at the back of my mind. Hit M53 in Coma, then the big and bright globs, M13 in Hercules (very nice propellor effect easily visible), M22, the crackerjack cluster in Sagittarius (M22 always reminds me of Omega Centauri at high power, appearing more like a open cluster than a concentrated globular!), M10 and M12 in Ophiuchus (both very nicely resolved in the C6 too at high mag). The odd one out in this list was M11, the wild duck cluster in Scutum. The is not a globular but a open cluster, but since it is so packed, it appears like a weird shaped glob in small scopes. Again this cluster appeared its best when viewed at in high mag.

As I was perusing, or rather surfing close to the heart of our home galaxy, the milky way, I decided it was finally time for the glorious nebulae filled part of my night, probably the most exciting segment ;) It was also a good time to compare and contrast the effects of the DGM NPB and OIII filters on these nebulae. I manually slewed my scope over to the puff of smoke at the apex of the teapot sprout. Peering into the eyepiece, lo and behold there was M8, the lagoon nebula, and M20, the trifid nebula, just narrowly squeezing into the FOV in the 24.5mm Meade SWA in the C6. Screwing in the NPB filter first and then swapping it for the OIII filter, I had the impression that there was more extended nebulosity with the NPB. The OIII's views did look more contrasty though, but with less overall nebulosity. I think I liked the look with the NPB a whole lot better. The dark lanes in the lagoon and in the trifid did stand out better with the OIII though. Using M20 as a jumping off point, its easy to starhop over to the small Sagittarius starcloud and then move onto one of my fave objects in the sky, M17, the swan nebula and M16, the eagle (or lil ghost nebula as Stephen O'Meara calls it). Did the same thing as with M8 and M20. This time I preferred the views of both objects with the OIII filter. Both the swan and the eagle just looked better with the OIII, especially the swan...the nebulosity looks distinctly more "feathery". After admiring those southern sky gems, it was time to go over and scrutinize some northern sky nebulae in Cygnus.

The north american nebula was nicely framed by the C6, but a more expansive view was required to fully drink in and appreciate the object in its entirety. For this the SkyScanner came up tops. Again the NPB showed more nebulosity. On this extremely transparent night, the pelican nebula was easily visible too. For the veil nebula, however, the OIII views were markedly better than the NPB. The nebula displayed its intricate beaded look with the OIII in place. This was not so obvious with the NPB.

So yeah a great night overall. We finally packed up and drove down the mountain at about 3.30am. By the time we arrived in LA, the sun had started to rise. Geeze. Must remember to leave slightly earlier the next time...or stay overnight if the weather is not too cold. When we left, most people had packed up and either went home or had gone to bed.

Till the next time we meet again, I will look back with fond memories of my 3rd trip to SoCal's temple of the stars.....