The skies were clear for twilight and a couple of stars and a planet or two were out, so I took the new SW truss dob out on the patio for a test run. I suspect the main problem is my incompetence at collimation, although I should mention that I took the store's display model as they said they didn't have any boxed ones out back. As such I don't know if anything is wrong with it except that the mirrors have a bit of dust etc on them - though not a great deal.
When I collimated using the GSO laser collimator from York, I first centred the laser beam in the centre of the primary. Then I tried to get the laser dot in the sausage on the collimator by turning the 3 adjustment screws on the primary. I should mention that the 3 locking screws were reasonably firm throughout. I was annoyed because two of the adjusting screws were tight as a tiger, and when I moved the third screw so that the dot would centre, the third screw was so loose that it just stopped being effective. So I recollimated the secondary and tried again with the primary. Bingo - I got the dot in the sausage and took the scope out shortly after.
Now the finder scope didn't blow my socks off, it wouldn't completely focus for me but it was sufficient to find an object. I centred on Sirius, looked through the 10mm eyepiece... I get better views out of my 8x40 binoculars. I let the celestial sphere spin by for a minute or so and watched through the eyepiece: dim, dim, dim. I figured it must have been out of collimation so I checked it, and the primary was out, a little bit. By this time the Sydney summer evening clouds were blocking the stars and I thought it was time to come in here and complain on IIS.
A few questions:
1. Can a slightly uncollimated scope cause an awful dim view?
2. Are the people who say laser collimation is useless right?
3. Am I going to burn my darn retinas off if I stare at the alignment dot on my laser collimator (the one on the side)? It so bright!
4. Am I collimating correctly, by the sound of it?
5. Is it possible that I got sold a dud scope? What else could be wrong with it?
6:
Cheers, disappointment, here's hoping -
- DSB
