First light with my C8 SCT - minitower goto

[cmr (Chris)]

Having always wanted a 'serious' telescope sine being a teenager I finally took the plunge and bought a used C8 - After a weeks extra wait for the ioptron minitower to arrive, the sky tonight was, need I say, cloudy. About 7:45 it cleared a little enough for me to take the minitower outside, level it, point it south and mount the C8 OTA. The GPS lock took maybe 2 minutes, then I selected the moon as a target, slewed to it then did sync to target. My daughter was thrilled with the sliver of moon visible and the detail in the 21 and then 13mm eyepiece had her saying OMG a lot! I then slewed to the Jewel Box and had an OK view through wispy clouds until soon after the cloud forced me back inside. A short but enjoyable first hour with my new setup.

A snap or two of the setup earlier in the evening
http://www.chrisrowney.com/astro/minitower1.jpg
http://www.chrisrowney.com/astro/minitowerc8_2.jpg

[cmr (Chris)]

By the way - am I missing something about how ti include images? I click the add image icon and it just makes a link? Thanks

[jjjnettie (Jeanette)]

Nice looking set up.
It's a great mount isn't it.

[renormalised (Carl)]

Nice setup

Wait till your daughter gets a look at Jupiter and a few other objects. Omega Centauri should suitably impress

[Liz]

Very exciting Chris, may the clouds part for you.

Re images - scroll down below to 'manage attachments' ... browse for you pic and upload.