Lightbridge First Light

[astronut (John)]

Well, after waiting three weeks I finally gave my 12" LB first light.
Between the weather and me pulling the thing apart it didn't have much of a chance earlier.
A few star starved members of our astroclub went out last night to catch up on observing, and along with the moon ( 3/4 phase ) and the wind, I pointed my baby to the stars. The former and the latter didn't help but my first impressions are WOW!!! All the old favourites just jumped out at me ( I've come from a 4" Refractor ) and the supplied 2" 26mm Meade with the 70D, F.O.V. performed well, some coma in the outer 1/3 of the image, but this didn't detract from the object.
All the other eyepieces widescan 111-16mm, ultima 24mm all with and without the barlow performed well.
I was very happy that the scope has tension adjustments on the alt & az bearings this kept the scope exactly where I wanted it to be, without backlash. The other two scopes on the field were spinning around in the wind.
I didn't go hunting for faint fuzzies due to the moon, I will wait another couple of weeks for that test.
It was a dream to set up ( in the dark for the first time ) and the collimation was only out a fraction to what it had been at home.
Speaking of collimation I now know the fun? that I was missing out on all these years really though, I know that practice will make ( near ) perfect.
It's main feature being a truss scope came to the fore, it's so much easier handling a U.T.A. 3 trusses and a L.T.A. than one big tube, no hernias
The G.S.O. mirror performed well, a more critical test will be carried out in darker and less windy skies.
All in all I'm very happy with Meades new scopes and would recommend them to anyone. Price? $1499 + $69 collimator.

[g__day (Matthew)]

Nice, think you'll ever motorise it or add goto? A motorised DOB might be alot of fun.

[Muddy Diver]

Thanks John, I've been patiently waiting to hear how you get on. Glad you enjoyed your first experience. You stated that the and the collimation was only out a fraction to what it had been at home. did you disassemble then re assemble on site or did you transport the scope made up. I'm concerned that everything needs setting up each time its re assembled.

I have to sell some scuba gear before I raise the necessary funds to purchase my next "real" te;escope so will be some time yet for me. So far, things are looking good for an LB!

[mickoking]

Welcome to the 300mm club glad to hear you enjoy your 'scope.

[astronut (John)]

Thanks, Mick & Muddy, It's great having a large aperture at last. I'm about to start the Jack Bennett catalogue, it's like the Messier catalogue but mainly made up of southern & fainter objects and more of a challenge.
Muddy, the scope was broken down into its components, I made sure that I used the same trusses in the same place, so minimising lose of collimation.

[ving (David)]

so you obviously number your poles or something hey.....
great to hear you had a go at it finally and that its a hit

[vespine]

I thought a little about the simplest way of marking the poles so you'd always assemble them the same way, but I wanted the fewest marks as possible. I think this is it:

There is a seam on where the metal is joined down the side of the OTA, two of the trusses meet there around the seam so I simply put a texta dot right near the bottom of those 2 poles at the seam. The poles are not reversible so if you put those 2 dots at the seams there is only one way to assemble the trusses .

[spacezebra (Petra)]

Hi all

Yes I must admit I was starved of stars over the week and took LB for a run on Friday night.

I number the trusses and check collimation when moving scope. All working well.

My lastest edition to LBD12 is a GSO 8x50 RA Correct Image Finderscope. Which looks pretty cool. Way heavier than the red dot finder and will test on weekend.

Looking into a Moonlite Focuser - but must save a few more $$.

I decided on a 11mm Nag and 15mm Pan (+ the 26mm that comes with the scope) as my first eyepieces.

Otherwise all is well in LB land

Cheers Petra