On first glance that close-up ground level photo of your eyepieces made them look 6 feet tall! I think a HILARIOUS picture would be that same pic, but positioning someone in the background such that they appear to be equivalent size to the eyepieces...maybe gazing up to the eyecup with awe. A little Photoshop magic, and it can be the Great Big Down Under Eyepiece Collection. Latest attraction.
Nothing beats seeing the dob up close. I second the most excellent suggestion to road trip to nearest store to eyeball the 12" before you buy. Make sure it'll fit in your vehicle with room to spare for other gear you'll gather soon. The Bintel guys in MEl let me take the tube out to my car to confirm it'd fit in my X-Trail back, with the you-break-it-you-bought-it qualification. With the tube and base, it's a fairly bulky combination, so pay close attention to that factor.
You'd find an equal number of helpful folks on the U.S. forums, BUT, they haven't the dominant clearing-house site that Oz has with IIS. So it's much more hit or miss depending on where you land on the U.S. forums.
You could join the Yahoo group skyquest-telescopes, which ephasizes the Orion line but has many Synta, Hardin, and GSO owners. There are several very dominant posters who regularly pitch in with suggestions. THe more or less Harding and GSO-dominant Yahoo group chineseReflectors has essentially died.
For collimation, because there are several methods to "get there," it's easy to become confused. It also depends on what - if any - collimation tools you have or plan to buy. If you have a laser collimator, the discussions have a bit different feel than if you use stricly "passive" tools. You'll hear folks disparage the laser, or embrace it like it's the messiah of collimation. Bottom line, your hardest job will be to find a simple and accurate technique to learn and do - preferably with a veteran helping you the first time or two - and suppress the other additional and sometimes confusing info from the other excellent sources. Until you start to want to open up and learn more nuances, then you can re-open the floodgates. Do I full off-set or partial offset? Do I mark the center of the secondary or no? Do I buy an autocollimator or not? We all have (usually very strong) opinions on all such issues, but you'll find authoritative-sounding folks chime in with different views on all these subjects. It can be very distressing. As with telescope selection, there is no one dominant "right" answer. Read Don Pensacks article here on IIS, it's great.
Scott
Quote:
Originally Posted by duncan
Hi all,
Yep the 12"Dob is the way to go. Mine fits in a Ford Laser 5 door Hatch with the front seat forward and back seat laid down. And the views are awesome.
I've included a few snapshots from a crap camera,LOL. Eyepieces are 9,15,32mm(2"),2XBarlow and Cheshire Collimator.
Cheers
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