I've taken the solid unwavering Brissy cloud as an omen to spend some time (and more $) kitting out the new c9.25... good an excuse as anything
. Some pics of the new bits and pieces below.
I've wanted an electric micro-focusser for a long time to get over mirror flop and the jiggles when imaging the planets - I'd have loved a moonlite or similar quality, but have opted for the cheaper Meade micro-focusser which I've found fits - see image - and works great on the celestron, with about half an in of travel. As a bonus it has a SCT thread to 2in barrel adaptor so I'll be able to use it on the Mewlon as well
Next were the Bob's knobs that were fitted easily (ensuring only one collimation screw exchanged at a time) and with a few tweaks alignment looks pretty good already - I get the feeling this scope will be easier to collimate than the Mewlon, the knobs are larger and easier on the fingers that's for sure.
Finally I knocked up a dewshield using a sheet of black iron-on mellamime from bunnings and some adhesive velcro. I cut off and ironed a piece at the ends to provide a smooth inner surface for the Velcro and then painted the inside surface black - this was already roughened with heat-activated contact adhesive so makes for pretty good light trapping capabilites when blackened. Only problem is the Mellamime is pretty brittle and is aready starting to crack in a few places, but a bit of black PVC tape to reinforce seems to fix
.
Final image shows everything in place perched proudly on the LXD75 - had some fun training the drives and go-toing under cloud; it's quite easy to align and tour the sky when you can't see any stars to know how far off you actually are
cheers,
