After an eternity of clouds and snow I finally got two clearish nights. What is amazing about this is that they were two nights in a row and around a new moon.
I spent the first night calibrating FocusMax (in between runs into the hospital for emergencies -- crazy week this week, the ICU's are packed full). Last night I did G2V calibration and then imaged M13.
The RHA rides flawlessly on the AP1200. It guides perfectly with the ST-402 e-finder setup. Focusing was wonderful using a Microtouch motor (I use Robofocus on all my other scopes, but Roland suggested the Microtouch for this scope, and I must say I think he was right. The Microtouch attached to the 1:10 reducing knob of the Feathertouch focuser gives perfect V-curves every time. Also, it is
so quite I had to look at it a few times to make sure it was actually moving the drawtube!)
I imaged using only RGB filters with each sub of 150 seconds. The stars came out perfectly round across the entire KAI-11000M chip. I also started another image in Cepheus with my usual 600 seconds subs; still the stars were perfectly round.
Here it is:
http://www.tvdavisastropics.com/astr...s-1_0000d4.htm
It may not be the best M13 out there, but for first light test image I am pretty pleased. I will be putting the scope through its paces as the sky permits. After I get used to the scope then I will trade out the STL for my PL-16803 and give it a go.
-Tom
Superb field. As you said it is corrected to perfection. Looking forward to further images. 
), not having an observatory doesn't help either 
...but at least my ASA experiece just feels like a bad dream now 
