Great seeing in Melbourne right now! Time for Mars!

[janoskiss (Steve H)]

I've been outside with my ED80 for the past hour, and the seeing is terrific here in Melbourne. Transparency not so but who cares! It's plenty good enough for Mars. At 300x the little refractor is still producing steady images. But I need more aperture to see more. I just put the Dob out for cooling (wish I'd done so earlier but didn't think the clouds were going to clear).

If you're can stay up a bit longer, it'd be definitely worth it.

[RAJAH235]

Full cloud with lots of rain here......... again! L.

[rmcpb (Rob)]

Don't want to hear about it, 100% cloud cloud cover here for days



Anyway its good to hear someone is having a look at Mars

[Starkler (Geoff)]

Steve, do you still say the ed80 beats the 8 on planets?

[Striker (Tony)]

300x on an ED80.....wow

what are you using...a 2x barlow with 4mm eyepiece.

[janoskiss (Steve H)]

Geoff, well yes it does for quite a while after I take them outside. I stayed out till 3am last night and the Dob was just beginning to sharpen up at around 2:30. Until then the "seeing" through the Dob was lousy. The back of the mirror was still not very cool to the touch when I brought it in. I am thinking that I should fit a simplified version of Bird's cooling system, or at least a fan.

But the ED80 is instant gratification; plonk and observe; I like that v much. I was thinking last night that maybe I'll sell it and get an ED100 once I start earning some decent $. Speaking of which, I have a job interview in a couple of hours...

[janoskiss (Steve H)]

Originally Posted by Striker

300x on an ED80.....wow

what are you using...a 2x barlow with 4mm eyepiece.

Yes Tony, crummy series 500 4mm in a Shorty Plus. Now, as you might imagine, the 300x image is not exactly sharp and crisp. It's a uniform yellow disc with a blurred outline. But it was a steady blurred disc. We tried a Radian 3mm in this scope at Star Camp during the day and the images were still sharp, so it can go over 200x no probs, but 300x is probably just a tad too ambitious.

[Starkler (Geoff)]

My dob lives in the garage sitting on a trolley, so I guess that helps in keeping it closer to ambient.

P.S. good luck with the job interview.