I have been involved with astronomy for a number of years and building my own artificial star came naturally. As in so many hobbies, there are countless gadgets and doodads that can make your astronomy setup, alignment, and viewing much more enjoyable. Unfortunately for most of us, without the benefit […]
By Dr. James R. Dire In 2017, I picked up two new William Optics telescopes: a Twentieth Anniversary Edition Fluorostar 132 (132-mm f/7 triplet Apo) and a William Optics Zenithstar 61. In a previous article, I reviewed the Fluorostar 132. Here, I will review the William Optics Zenithstar 61. The […]
By William E. Rison I needed an easily-removable focus motor for my Stellarvue SV80S and came up with the following design that uses a 12-volt DC motor, a wheel for building robots, a 3/4-inch x 3/8-inch x 7-inch section of aluminum bar, and a Vixen/Orion-style dovetail finder shoe. The basic […]
Astro Imaging Processing – I Want to Image the Skies, But Do I have to Process My Images? I used to think to myself, “Everything we see in the magazines and online (that isn’t sketched) shows processed images, but what is the big deal with all of this processing?” What […]
In understanding my approach towards creating SkyTools 4 Imaging, its worth considering how major professional observatories, such as ESO, use mathematical models of their telescope and instruments to plan their observations. It is useful to know the image scale, what exposure times to use, whether a star will bloom or […]
10Micron AZ-HPS Mounts offer a line of premium altazimuth mounts based on the company’s popular GM-HPS line of super-accurate, absolute encoder German equatorial mounts. The 10Micron AZ-HPS series of mounts use the same absolute encoder technology as the GM-HPS mounts with instrument capacities from 55 to 330 pounds. The capability […]
“By Matt Harmston” I Want to Image the Skies, But Do I have to Process My Images? I used to think to myself, “Everything we see in the magazines and online (that isn’t sketched) shows processed images, but what is the big deal with all of this processing?” What did […]
Most beginner telescope packages come with a single eyepiece. Thinking that most beginners would want something more in the way of power than the lowest possible power (which yields the largest true field of view), the manufacturers provide an eyepiece that, charitably, is a “jack of all trades and master […]
DSLR Astro Photography with Astronomik Clip-Filter System I decided that I would dive into astrophotography long before I’d purchased my first telescope. In fact, my first foray into this dark art involved a DSLR, a 50-mm lens and a secondhand Orion EQ-1 mount with a motor drive. It was a […]
Repair Your Telescope Equipment: I used J-B Weld for years to repair minor cracks and breaks in metal components when I couldn’t justify the cost of a proper brazing-machining repair. It’s great stuff, but it sets quickly – within four minutes – and requires mixing the epoxy filler with […]
By Austin Grant Lunt Calcium K Filter Review: I remember from an early age being told not to look directly at the sun, and I’m also quite sure that my first pair of binoculars had a sticker on them instructing me to absolutely not point them at the sun. So, […]
Celestron CGEM II Mount: The Celestron CGEM, CGEM II and CGEM DX mounts are a midsized class of German Equatorial Mounts (GEM) generically called EQ6 mounts. They are similar to the Orion Atlas mount and the Sky-Watcher EQ6. These mounts are higher capacity mounts than the Celestron Advanced VX but […]