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Old 06-05-2020, 04:17 PM
weathermon (Mike)
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weathermon is offline
 
Join Date: Jun 2014
Location: Mackay, Australia
Posts: 74
Quote:
Originally Posted by glend View Post
I would bet your collimation shift in your GSO Newt is simply due to weak primary support springs. Have you upgraded your primary springs? For a few dollars at Bunnings you might solve your problem.
GSO newts and Dobs are notorious for having less than adequate primary spring strength.

I haven't done upgrades on the primary springs with it no, but the focuser was flexing quite badly on the tube itself, so I re-enforced it with 1.6mm thick aluminium. That made it a bit better, but the temperature shift plus the thin aluminium is still a bit of an issue unfortunately. I might invest in some upgraded springs though as it'll be Sep till there's stock anyway, so if there's anything I can do to help improve the issues I'm having, then I'll do that.

Quote:
Originally Posted by Startrek View Post
I bought an 8” f5 GSO newt from Bintel 18 months ago for imaging and have no issues at all
Primary springs were excellent , and I fitted a 16” DUP losmandy dovetail bar which spread the tube rings another 100mm apart compared to the crappy GSO bar
I agree with Glen , the GSO newts before 2018 had poor quality primary springs
I had to upgrade them on my 4 year old 6” f6 GSO newt with custom made springs from a company called Better Springs in Sydney ( couldn’t find anything in Bunnings that would do the job ) I paid $13 a spring but they were machined with the exact coil size , length and perfect tension. I hardly ever need to collimate this Scope

Try upgrading your primary springs if your newt was purchased before 2018 and also spread your tube rings wider with a big solid losmandy bar

Good luck !!
Interesting! Yeah I also upgraded to the 16" Losmandy dovetail too, plus put the old GSO dovetail on top to stiffen it up a bit more. I might have to check out getting springs for sure - I always thought that the locking levers once they were done up helped to lock the mirror cell in place. One thing I did note though on the last clean was that the cork either side of the primary mirror had shrunk causing mirror flop. Should I look at replacing this too or nothing to worry about?

Cheers
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