[xelasnave]

Today's thoughts.
150 Espirit, eq6 8 or maybe the ioptron.

The Ioptron seems to good to be true.

Funny only recently I said mounts should come with built in guiding yet now that is available I wonder if it is a good idea given the benefit of minimising flex with an oag.

And back to thinking zwo for a camera, I just like their colour and service seems really great, although I still need to understand pixel size. But it would seem my two 1600 mono would be ok. until I figer what to get...

I had a crazy moment this morning whilst looking at a 16 inch dob and thinking to add decent structure to the tube and use it..it was f4.5. Doable I am not sure.

The 150 Espirit has the appeal of just working out of the box it would seem and maybe the focuser would be ok.

It's seems all zwo cameras have small pixel size. Mine seems small but it is ok to my untrained eye...plus I have the benefit of rather dark sky if that helps.

Maybe the 150 mm would work without an OAG.

Anyways got out this morning and pulled one winch out of the box and played around to work out where to put it and pulleys etc and think I have a good plan..I won't get bolts etc until Monday so I will think and look at it over the week end but it's looking good. Be good if I could rewire to use only one controller..that should work.

Figured to build an enclosed desk ..a desk with some sort of lid to protect from mice and water etc..but the roll off had heaps of moisture on the ceiling which is a worry. ..must check the size off the gift desks.

The ioptron is very appealing I presume it works with accom.. or does it?

The guide scope is only 120 mm ( I presume they meant FL and not app) ... it seems to have heaps of ports so will look into that. Plus a polar aligment scope...The design is so sensible I would have one in a flash except I like to follow the croud in new tech.

I suppose it's the unknown thing that worries me with it but really the new eq8 is an unknown also it seems.

Put my crystals in the small observatory and ran the little heater fan under the covers at 4 am until day break..I plan a routine of getting up early putting the genny on to make the batteries happy and run a room heater in the van...zero again in the van but although the heater hardly raised the temp the beautiful glow made you feel warm..I have a little one to bring up that has an artificial fire in it that would be nice here.so when that is a habit having a dehumidifier will work for me.

So current idea is to order a mount after the observatory is fit to take it..maybe just use my eight inch for a while before deciding on the next scope and camera.

Thanks again for all the help..after sorting the winch plan I feel that I am making progress at least...good thing the winches appear to have enough cable although I have some rigging left from boat days and more importantly the swagging tool which will be real handy I expect.Also I realised why I am in a rush..if I don't buy astronomy gear something else will come along and, well you all know how it goes, someone will want a car or a horse or a hot water service.
Alex