Well finally, when spring has arrived and when the weather is warming, I finally get my remote desktop going (only took me 2 months
and could have been useful on those 0 deg nights!!)
Anyway, just combining ideas at the moment to see how far I can push my gear with the limited budget - so here it is.
Meade LXD55 setup outside with a Meade 5000 series refractor on top. Then I stuck a small webcam into the 5000 and actually got Jupiter!
The LXD55 8"SN then received the Canon 40D but I thought I would give eyepiece projection a go so I used the 40D coupled to a 10mm eyepiece to see how that went. A fair bit of weight on the scope now and a noticeably slight bend on the whole eyepiece gear.
Then next I managed to get the autostar 497 connected via serial to the PC so now I could drive it from the PC. The first pic is that of the setup which was captured via RDP when the gear was pointing to Jupiter.
Finally, then RDP to the whole thing from inside the house to see how it would go and it worked!! Admittedly I was actually quite suprised for such a cheap setup. The LXD55/75 is a very basic model but it worked. So finally I then used the liveview and intercepted the video feed via the USB to record to AVI. I swung over to the moon as it was a safe first go and the second pic here is the moon stack of 155 images in Registax. I haven't done much at all to the image as I just wanted to see how far I could go with the gear.
Anyway, for those on a supa cheap budget, it's possible but don't expect mind blowing shots.
Question though - Would a barlow be better than eyepiece projection? My OTA is a 8" SN (F4 - ie 812mm FL for the OTA) so with a 10mm eyepiece, what is the focal length that I would have been operating at?? I think I understand correctly that a 2 x barlow for eg would mean the scope is now operating at 812mm x 2 ie 1624mm. Hence it would be now 1624/203mm = F8. I don;t know how to translate eyepiece projection into a FL so I could work out what barlow to use to replicate the same magnification.
Cheers,
Darrin...
