Had some friends round for dinner Sat night and the weather has turned into summer so the 10" has been sitting up on the concrete wrapped in plastic for about 3 days now.
After dinner sky was reasonably clear ( I thought ) and Jupiter had popped up in the east so I got the little 4.5" out on the deck for a quick look and show. 20 mm wideview and then 2 x Barlow impressed very technically minded male friend who had already had a full mecahnical/optical rundown in the afternoon of the 10". Four moons and some banding visible.
So I got ambitious and carried the 10 " down to the deck Jupiter being not visible at that angle from the concrete pad. NOW male friend got very excited with the view. It was quite awesome although I'd noticed that although seeing was good, transparency was not great at all, about a 3 maybe. Still air but thin high mist. I moved the scope back to the pad and had a hunt round and managed to find and impress him with M7 after finding it with binocs. But transparency was down to about 1 by then so any further viewing was really pointless. Friend went away about 11pm very impessed and talking about maybe getting/building a scope. I shall cultivate this desire carefully.
After they had left my better half commented that she had yet to see Jupiter through the new beast so we went outside. Jupiter by now was almost at zenith and although transparency was not great it had improved so we found Jupiter and she was impresed with that. I must say that the 10" over the 4.5" is a massive optical improvement. It was also a full moon ( which wasn't helping viewing of course) and she suggested a quick look at the moon. I knew it would be bright and I haven't made a mask yet to fit but to put it bluntly I was blown away by the view. Yes it was bright but the clarity of the features was just outstanding !!! Far outranking what I now perceive to be quite a cheap 4.5" scope.
Definitely will make a mask and the moon will become a bit more of an object of interest especially as it will lend itself to photography better for now with the DSLR.
So killed several birds with one stone. Maybe converted a friend, got tacit approval from my wife to continue and found a new subject to try and capture better. Not the best observing night but certainly an excellent night for astronomy all round. Now just waiting for 2" crayford and some more EPs to arrive and I'll be into upgrade mode.
