Solstice Approaches

 

Sunrise behind our house

        Full moon came and went on 6/3. Normally I would be working on my Lunar 100 list but our son's flight was arriving in Mesa and we didn't get back until after midnight. By then all I wanted was sleep. It's kind of a thing because this time of year, about the only celestial item viewable outside of overnight IS the moon.  

        So this seemed like a good time to show off the inventory as it stands today. I'm still saving up band money towards the new dob. It's simply a question of an 8" or a 10". 

        Below is my collection of eyepieces and the planet cam. The red item is the ZWO ASI120MC-S camera. It fits into the focus tube without any eyepieces. There's a considerable learning curve on this so far. Middle row L-R: Orion 7-21mm zoom lens, Meade 32mm and a Celestron 9mm. Bottom row L-R: Celestron 2x Barlow and an Orion Shorty 2x Barlow. 

    

        I also have a 25mm and a 10mm Plossl eyepiece which were stock with my scope. The FOV on those are small, though. I still have them in an equipment archive. 

        Next is the filters collected so far top to bottom: Spectrum full aperture glass solar filter, Gosky LP Filter and an Orion 13% Lunar Filter. 

    

     

            This is a Bahtinov Mask I had someone make with his 3D printer. It's very helpful whenever sharp focus is in question. 

            This is Orion's Telescope Drive. In theory it is supposed to keep my EQ mount in sync with Earth's rotation. But either the device is imperfect, my mount is imperfect, my alignment is imperfect or all of the above because I get about a 50% reliability rate. If you want good tracking it's probably better if you get a go-to setup right out of the box. I'd rather spend my cash on aperture and enjoy the thrill of the hunt. 

            Finally the miscellaneous, the mobile phone adapter mentioned in an earlier post and the headband mount used for not losing my red night light. Having this strapped to my head with my black-rimmed reading glasses makes for a nerd overload! 😎

            Finally the foundation is my Orion 130mm EQ enjoying it's 3rd summer: 

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            I figure on about a month before daylight starts to slowly diminish, and maybe two months before it's really helpful. Evening hours by then will have Saturn and M31 just rising in the east, Sagittarius and Scorpio (or is it "Scorpius"?) will be due south and Cygnus will be high in the NE for good viewing. Early morning (but not TOO early) see the return of Orion, Taurus and Gemini, along with Jupiter and Uranus in the east. I hope by then to have my new dob. 

            No logs this time around. The last several sessions have been trial runs for the planet cam and differing software titles. So no cool pix...yet.