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Thanks all for the responses.
David the total setup cost will be near $7000.00. This includes mount, scope, bobs knobs, moonlite electric focusor, lymax cooler, and battery illuminated reticle.
Louie bad seeing is very common especially in terms of planetary imaging. Focus is nearly impossible during periods of bad seeing. So they work hand in hand. If you have bad seeing and I mean anything below 7/10 then focus will be very difficult. This year I have seen two night at 7/10 and above. Nots not a lot. However, I find that changing focus after each run will usually achieve one good avi on nights of average seeing. You will know when you have good focus, small details will be evident by popping in and out of focus. When you have good seeing the planet will not move, it almost appears as though the camera software has stalled. I have three Jupiter Avi's that look like this.
Robert electric focus is essential for hi res planetary imaging. Glad you are thinking the same way.
Anthony23..., Damien does use a monochrome camera and this is next on my list of equipment, a difficult choice of which camera to get and much research must occur first. Besides his site has good seeing for much of the year. My site has good seeing on a couple of nights a year. He frequently travels to locations that have excellent seeing. unfortunately, I don't have the resources to fund such adventures, maybe one day. His imaging has long been a source of inspiration for me. I can only dream.
Dennis good link, but it was not a single turn it is a 1/28 of a turn. Very small adjustments. My most common routine after cooling the scope is to check collimation. General rules of collimation are: You must always check on a star near the planet you are imaging or use a day star and spend a lot of time sorting collimation. Collimation will be slightly different from one side of the sky to the other. The mirror will shift ever so slightly, not a lot but enough to cause collimation problems. From what I can gather all the good planetary imagers check collimation frequently in this manner. If you are interested in doing hi res planetary it is often good to follow the great ones.
Paul
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