All of the bits came in today, I ended up ordering the laser collimator, 2x barlow, a moon filter and a red LED torch incase I ever needed it.
I tried to manually collimate previously but had no idea what I was doing, laser made the job relatively painless, though I had a bit of trouble aligning up the laser into the dohnut. Tonight's weather in Brisbane is very very cloudy but there was the occasional gap where I managed to sneak a peak at a few things.
Sirius (said Starry Night) was the brightest object I could find, and after a while of searching I switched to the Barlow with the 10mm EP, the difference with focus was quite large compared to pre-collimation, though it still appeared fuzzy and couldn't focus 100% on it - I'll have to play with collimating every time I move the telescope outside methinks.
No moon tonight until really late and by that time I won't have anyone in the house to help me move the canon
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I think i'll try to make a moving platform for it before the chair, I can put up with the backbreakage for now but the transportation is just painful. I'm still having a bit of trouble aligning the finderscope, it's a bit off to one direction and I can't turn the 2 adjustable knobs any further to make it lean that way, but at least it's consistant so objects are easy to find.
Thanks again for all the help and advice, I'll have to walk into a bookstore sometime and look for a 'tourists guide to the sky' so I have some idea of nice things to point the scope at
