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StringScope Complete
Well after 12 months of planning and construction my string scope Dob is finally in a useable form. Still a couple of jobs to do:
1. Padded canvas cary bag.
2. Some form of lid, I am still thinking about this.
3. New shroud and dew shield once I have used the temporary ones for a little while.
My observing buddy (17 yo son) and I had both scopes out for a decent observing session last night. Seeing was quite good although transparency was down a little on the previous night.
I am quite pleased with the stringscope.
The good news:
Jupiter @ 280X quite spectacular showing cloud swirls in the large equatorial bands and quite a number of additional bands during moments of steady seeing. Split Antares at 100X, very clear at 200X. The homunculus in Eta Carina showed signs of structure at 100X and up.
I was able to do some star testing. There is no sign of turned edge.
The not so good news:
While star testing I noticed what appears to be a minor zone within the inner third of the mirror radius. I guess this is probably OK as the images look OK to me and the intra and extra focus patterns look fairly closely matched.
There is some noticeable glare around bright stars which is less noticabe in the other scope with the same EP. I suspect this might be the degraded mirror coating. I need to look at this further.
Attached photo's show the completed scope side on plus equipment drawer and electrical panel.
Cheers,
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