Urk!!!!!! Dew!!!!!!!!!

[Astroman]

Had a heart attack today, went out into the observatory, after not being in there for a while (over three weeks) and took the cover off the scope and ARGHHHH!!!!!!!!!!!!! DEW all over the Primary, my heart dropped, not knowing how long it had been on there for I fired up the fan and ran inside to get the hair dryer, after about 5 minutes of blowing, the mirror was back to normal, although there is a huge amount of dirt left over from the water droplets, still deciding whether to leave it or take the primary out and give it a clean. Might test it out next clear night.

BTW anyone got a 40mm secondary they don't want and want to swap it for one that has lost alot of it's covering :P

[asimov]

:confuse3: My 12.5" primary Has a layer of dust too. I'm not keen on the idea of cleaning it. I did that with my 4.5"....It had a pretty good coat of crap, so I noted the view I was getting, took it out & cleaned it, then compared the views. No appreciative difference at all to my eye. But it's very hard to ignore the fact that it's got dust on it....It wants you to take it out & clean it straight away! I say resist the urge Astroman IMHO ;)

[ving]

myns clean as a whistle! :)

have a look thru it and see what its like first.

[slice of heaven]

I clean my primary regularly, no problems.
Every 5 or 6 years without fail, whether it needs it or not :)

[ballaratdragons]

Or observatory 26" mirror is absolutely filthy and yet still gives great views!

[voyager2]

hehe i get the hair dyer out at 3am just to keep my nayboughs happy

[voyager2]

have you heard the story of the new astronomy club member who thought the club scope mirror was a little dirty so he took to it with the windex and a flannelette towel? he was not so popular after that :scared:

[ballaratdragons]

Didn't hear that one Braddo,

but heard from a member at our society who left his mirror sitting on the table so he could clean it and his little daughter walked past and saw the dust on it and proceded to scrub it off with the tea towel!!! Yep, it had to be re-aluminised.

But the Clubs Mirror, oooooo, that's dangerous.

He was only being a concientous member :rofl:

[asimov]

I've heard all sorts of stories concerning the cleaning of optics. Stories that makes one shudder!

[ballaratdragons]

The average Joe that buys a Dork Smith, Camera Shop, Super market scope or Cash Converters scope have no idea of the delicacy of the coatings! I can imagine how many Tandy's, Wing-Dongs etc have gone to the tip with the optical coatings scratched & scrubbed off. :scared2:

[Astroman]

I don't intend on cleaning the mirror, since it has a bit of the coating chipped already, not happy. I doubt it would make too much of a difference, the eyepieces I have probably give off a worse view that it wont make a difference..

[ballaratdragons]

Andrew, If it's a small chip it would be OK. Some brand new mirrors have tiny chips all the way around the edge of the mirror!

I suppose that's why some EP's have seagulls!! They are looking for the chips LOL!!!

[Astroman]

HAHAHA!!!! there is actually two of them one near the middle the other about 50% out from the middle. Not worried about them because I hide them behind the secondary vanes.