For the battery, using the inverter side of things will drain it very fast compared to using the DC side. I'm not sure what the requirements of your scope are, but if it'll take 12V DC, that's the way to go. For example, my Losmandy G-11 runs at least several days on my battery pack when plugged into the DC cigarette lighter, but only a few hours when plugged into the inverter. It's possible the battery has already sulfated, but try using the 12V side (assuming it has one). For the finder, I'd suggest using a target reticule like a Rigel Quickfinder or a Telrad. It doesn't magnify, which helps me when star hopping--I don't have to recalculate anything in my brain. Collimation is still a topic I'm working through, but I use a chesire on my newt, and it works pretty well, although it can be a little more difficult to use sometimes. Finding stuff...best book I've found is Nightwatch, and another one I recommend is Turn Left at Orion. I still struggle with it myself, I can find the half a dozen favorites of mine each season, but otherwise I have to rely on my goto. Each season I add a few more objects to my star hopping abilities though. Come to a SPOC star party and setup next to someone, that's helped me a lot in the past as well... Dan On May 17, 2013, at 10:36 AM, Dion Davidson <diondavidson@yahoo.com> wrote:
I need help with a few things that are causing frustration for me at the scope this year:
Battery: I bought a Ryobi battery/light/tire pump to use as an power source for my scope. But it is always dead! Useless. Even if I charge it for 2 days prior to an event, it will be dead within minutes of using it. Suggestions for a better battery? My old Meade 2120 10 SCT uses AC power, so I use an inverter between the battery and the scope. Know of anything better for sale?
Viewfinder: I have the straight-through 8x50 viewfinder that came with my scope. It works fine but I have a hard time finding stuff, especially when looking up. I'd like to get a right angle correct image viewfinder. Suggestions? Know any for sale? If I bought a non-Meade one, could someone show me how to connect it to my tube? Would I have to drill holes?
Collimation: I think my scope is ok (I had it collimated at Scope City when I bought it), but I've heard other opinions from SLAS members. Could I get help from someone who knows what they are doing on a) determining if my scope needs collimation, and b) how to do it. I have read a bunch online and watched youtube videos but I'm none the wiser.
Finding stuff: I would love to have a class/lesson/tutorial on how to find cool stuff in the sky. I struggle to find anything but the most basic things in the sky. Having the image inverted/upside down in my viewfinder doesn't help, and it seems I can always see more stars in the eyepiece than I can on a star chart, which makes it difficult to know if I'm in the right area. I probably need some basic instruction on star hopping and recognizing star magnitudes, fields of view, map orientation, etc. (FYI: I can usually find the moon, planets, and some familiar deep sky stuff: M8 (Lagoon), M31 (Andromeda), M13, Orion Nebula, and even M57 (ring nebula)).
I spent a beautiful weekend in Montana this weekend under dark skies and spent a few hours one night looking for stuff and finding none of it! (I looked for M51, M81, M82, M101, M108. I even looked for PANSTARRS). I went back out early in the morning on another day and did see M31, M57, and got M81 and M82 in the same field of view. So, some redemption.
Thanks for listening. Dion _______________________________________________ Utah-Astronomy mailing list http://mailman.xmission.com/cgi-bin/mailman/listinfo/utah-astronomy
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