[g__day (Matthew)]

It arrived today and I attached it to my C9.25. I noticed immediately when focusing and changing directions - stars jumped a tenth of what they used to.

But the real pleasure was tracking and pointing - both really improved. I would say my tracking error that has bugged me for a while now is at least two to three times better. So it was the mirror flopping that caused the majority of my tracking errors.

Meaning it might have thrown my polar alignment out too. (yep 36 star model shows Az 3' 22" sec and Alt 1' 24" - so knowing this I can switch compensation off and use PEMPro to tune alignment far better)

So of course its cloud central now - but I feel like I have had a breakthrough in my search for better tuned gear! Raw pointing MaxPoint tells me is +/1 134 arc second vs +/1 40 arc seconds with correction enabled. Guiding with MaximDL I see stars move in RA about +/- 1 pixel before corrections and PEMPro thinks PEC is +/- 2.1 arc seconds. So if I can just finalise alignment then collimate the mirrors - I'll be as ready to image as I can ever be!

Thanks very much to the folk who suggested these microfocusers to improve mirror flop (I already use a basic Meade focuser to electronically focus - but it didn't do a thing for flop). That advice was really a big step forward for me!

Yippee!