Exploring A Beautiful Universe…. No matter your physical limitations…
We will be building the new observatory in 2022. The new building will be a 10 x 12 foot structure with a small sitting area and a desk with a door to allow for remaining warm on cold nights. I will add a conduit to allow for battery powered operation of the telescope and laptop(s) Read More ...
This observatory has been a life-long desire I have had to be able to revisit the skies and enjoy the beauty of the universe we live in. Two distinct missions are envisioned: Return to visual observing as I experienced in my youth. Explore modern-day astrophotography and allow myself to remotely control my systems from the Read More ...
May 2021:We have been doing systems integration work on the following telescopes to get them up and running to begin observing in late May as follows: A High Point 6″ f/5 Newtonian OTA on a Skywatcher EQ6-R Pro for both visual and astrophotography imaging work. A Celestron 130 GT Alt-Az telescope for primarily visual work. Read More ...
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Events in 2022 to enjoy From SeaSky.Org: January 2, 3 – Quadrantids Meteor Shower. The Quadrantids is an above average shower, with up to 40 meteors per hour at its peak. It is thought to be produced by dust grains left behind by an extinct comet known as 2003 EH1, which was discovered in 2003. Read More ...
We will be building the new observatory in 2022. The new building will be a 10 x 12 foot structure with a small sitting area and a desk with a door to allow for remaining warm on cold nights. I will add a conduit to allow for battery powered operation of the telescope and laptop(s) Read More ...
May 2021:We have been doing systems integration work on the following telescopes to get them up and running to begin observing in late May as follows: A High Point 6″ f/5 Newtonian OTA on a Skywatcher EQ6-R Pro for both visual and astrophotography imaging work. A Celestron 130 GT Alt-Az telescope for primarily visual work. Read More ...
Due to family circumstances and the economy, I’m having to push out the observatory construction. I am, however, going to begin testing my new equatorial mount, cameras and scopes to get them exercised and fully understood. I have dedicated an older laptop to the work and have worked out a plan to use a temporary Read More …
I recently purchased a Raspberry PI 4 and installed the Astroberry operating system with a collection of astrophotography imaging tools installed that make it possible to use a low-power Raspberry Pi computer at a properly configured telescope, either in the field or in a observatory. The software provides a ready platform for controlling your telescope Read More …
I found this free software for generating your own custom Bahtinov masks. It installs on Windows with no issues and is a very quick install. https://astrojargon.net/ You can also download pre-made PDF masks at a different site at: http://www.deepskywatch.com/Articles/make-bahtinov-mask.html
This video shows how being selective with using only the BEST data gives the best astrophotographs.
Newtonian reflectors require regular collimation. Thus, they need to have their collimation regularly adjusted. The caveat is that the laser device that collimates the reflector itself requires collimation to insure it is accurate and this video provides the process for doing so.
This is a useful tips video for doing a meridian flip.
The following videos are useful guides for autoguiding and getting started with PHD2. Setup, Troubleshooting and Basics Astrobackyard Guiding with multiple ZWO camera in PHD2 This video references a setting for ZWO camera choice in PHD2 in the event you have TWO ZWO cameras in operation. Jump to 6:58 in the video to see how Read More …
This is meant to be an evolving list, mainly for my own use in the field from my phone. If it is useful for you then by all means use it! Polar Alignment Skywatcher PDF link – https://inter-static.skywatcher.com/downloads/neq6-r.pdf Videos detailing polar alignment with the EQ6-R Pro Set the mount to Home Position after polar alignment Read More …
If you are getting this error when connecting your EQ6-R Pro to EQMOD: “Connect Error: Port not available“, then this article is for you. Likely you’ve reached the end of your tether, trying to get your mount to work with ASCOM and EQMOD HE5/6. I hope this procedure helps you get your mount working! The Read More …
We bought the Skywatcher EQ6 Pro in 2019 and were not able to progress further due to the issues with a sick parent. We’re now at a point we can proceed to begin testing the mount. We were able to get the mount to run using Stellarium with direct USB to serial conversion cables. The Read More …