Pimp My Telescope -- Red Dot finder

I managed to pick up a simple red dot finder, actually it is simpler than I thought and I think I can make one out of a laser pointer and some optical glass etc.

Pimp my Telescope - components list

Parts to make/fabricate

Bearing Box

• The box, 4 sides about 7" long by 3" wide
• Bearing disks, 120 mm diameter, (double thick, apply laminate)

The Fork

• Bottom Disk, 10" Apply Laminate
  
• Fork Arms 8" high (Double Thick, apply teflon)
  

The Base

• Tripod top disk, 10" (Teflon on top)
• Legs, 4 foot, round edges.
  

Building the Dob-like mount

For the Bearing Box:

1. 1 sheet HVHC plywood (3/8 should do it)
2. 1x2's for the legs (3)
   
3. Teflon (On order)
4. Ebony Star (on order)
5. Varnish/wood finish

Tools

1. Jigsaw
2. Router
3. Sander
4. Square
   
5. Clamps (have a few more would help)
6. Circle Jig
   

Modding the telescope (ETX-127)/ AKA PIMP MY SCOPE

OK so I have a meade ETX-127 Optical tube that I picked up used. currently it has a orion 9x50 Finder which Is pretty nice but poorly placed. In addition the scope is currently sitting on a tripod head that was really made for a view camera. and while it works well with a view camera it kind of sucks for a telescope.

SO some changes, I would like to do 1 and 2 and maybe 3 in the next month.

1. Build a dob style alt-az mount, and maybe a new wood tripod
   
2. Move the current finder to the structure of the mount (see #1) (may need new finder bracket)
   
3. Add a Zero Power Finder
4. Add Binoviewers
   
5. Green Laser Pointer?
6. Pair of 13mm Naglers
   

Photography projects

I think with the equipment I have now (save what I just wrote about in the last post) I can do most of the things I want to do. I have some ideas for stuff involving flash that will have to be put off until some future point, but I think I can do the projects I'm working on now at least to some extent with the cameras I have. I think a normal lens (Which is what most of the cameras have) will work for all of these.

• Flowers: Sinar with the "Flower Tripod" Just have to wait for the flowers to bloom, I will probably also have to find a large piece of cardboard to lie down on while working.
• Milky way, Round 1: Pentax or Rollei with Barn Door, next summer mostly
  
• Landscapes, Sinar just need to find the time, and get my car back. I would like to drive down the Allon road over Passover to take these.
  
• Moonscapes, Full moon in the desert, can use any camera, normal lens will work fine.
  

Equipment to aquire in the short term

"Flower Tripod" Will be just two boards screwed together with a screw to attach the camera. I may have to buy the machine screw and a few screws to build it. Should be able to salvage the wood. Total cost less than 50NIS.
Need to buy

• Machine screw to mount camera
• Some wood screws (May have)
  
• Wood glue (may have)
• 1x4 board , about 3', may be able to find
• Loops for tent pegs (Strapping, 12")
  

Barn Door mount/ bent bolt.
Needed to buy (See sky and telescope)

• Wood, (See above)
• Some eletronics (current regulator, Pot, Resistors, LED, breadboard)
  
• gears (2 same tooth count)
• extra finder bracket ($12)
  

New Telescope

I picked up a Meade ETX 127 MCT telescope, well just the OTA. I attached an Orion 9x50 finder and put in some eyepieces that I already had. So far mostly been looking at Luna (as I didn't have that finderscope)

Also recently aquired a Carl Zeiss Jana 300mm F4.5 Tessar lens for the astrograph.

Building a small ball scope

So I have a 114mm F8 Mirror with a secondary and spider, I have been wanting to turn this into a telescope for some time (and will do so if I ever have any money). I would like to build a small ball scope with it.

Needed:

• Sheet of plywood (1/2 inch should be fine)
• 3/4 Al tube (enough for 3 trusses)
• Tube Cutter
• 6-7" Sphere
• Random fasteners
• Some Lead Shot for counter balance
• Wood Varnish
• 8cm fan

• 
  

Large format Astrograph

Plans for a 4x5 astrograph box camera.

Framework of camera 1/2" Plywood inner painted flat black with velvet ribbon light traps.

Front with current 150mm F5.6 Lens on lensboard.

Back Ronchi Screen 100LPI printed on transparency film over glass.

Ensure that film plane and the glass are in the same spot. Focus with Ronchi Screen, then check the focus with B&W film.

Focus travel +/- 1".

Film and Tracking

It looks like a tracking platform (AKA Barn door mount) will be on my to do list for the near future. I want to get a GEM but for now its on hold due to lack of cash. This should at least allow me to do 2-3minutes on the K-1000. This should be good for a few rounds (or at least until I use up the 6 rolls of Provia 400F that I have)

Longer term I want to get a GEM so I can track longer and guide.

For Large format film I'm no deciding between Provia 100F and Kodak E100G.

The Moon and venus at sunset

Milky way project -- Test Image (take 2)

Milky way picture, same as the last one, but a better scan. (Click for larger)

15s Fuji Provia 400F, pushed 1 stop, on a tripod. with a 50mm Normal lens at F2.0.

Milky way project -- Filters

Deap Space objects including the Milky Way in general are pretty low contrast objects. So filters seem to be a good idea if one can be found to pass the correct parts of teh spectrum. It appears that a Kodak 3x3" (75mm) #32 Magenta Special Color Effect Wratten Gel Filter
will do the trick. According to various sources I found it will pass 320-500nm and 600nm plus thus removing much of the green parts of the spectrum. The green range includes a lot of light polution and sky glow from O2 in the high atmosphere. This should bring out milky way nebulosity and structure though it may reduce stars a bit.

I need to figure out what the best way to attach one of these to the camera is, but I expect its not too complex.

Milky way project -- Focus

The critical factor in the milky way photo atlas will be getting the best possible focus out of the camera. At F5.6 the ground glass is not that bright, but 0th magnitude stars can be seen with help from the loupe. The nice thing is a star forms a clean point at proper focus. So assuming that the film plane and the ground glass really are at the same place (Something to check) it should be possible to establish a clean photo.

Film buckling may be a problem, so a vacuum back film holder will be useful. (see link). At least 3 film holders would be a good number to be able to work in the field. Even that will require a changing bag. Quickloads might be better.

http://www.deadbread.com/crumbs/vac.html

Milky way project -- Film Choice

After camera selection for the Milky way project the next more important thing will be film choice.
The "perfect" astro film would combine a few characteristics:

1. No reciprocity failure
2. Fine grain
3. sensitive to H-Alpha at 656.4 nm
4. Sold in 4x5 format
5. Fast
   
6. E-6 positive development
7. Handles push processing
   

However there is as far as I know no such film. Fuji's provia 400F is gets 1,3 and 5, and not bad on #2, but is not sold as sheet film, so that kills that idea. So what is left

• Provia 100F
• Astia 100F
• Velvia 100
• Velvia 100F
  
• A Kodak film
  

It looks like Velvia 100 might do a bit better on the red, Astia has a bit finner grain, and I think Provia will push better. I think they will all be fine on the other points. Kodak's datasheets are not as easy to understand as Fuji's, so I will stick to Fuji.

I may have to buy a few rolls/boxes and take them out to test and see what does best.

Milky way project

In the early 20th century Astronomer EE Barnard composed a photographic atlas of the milky way, this work was done at the Lick observatory in California and was at the time a rather technical venture. However with the advances in film and camera technology it should be possible to take similar pictures today with amature level equipment.

With modern films such as Fuji Provia 400F it is possible to get quite a lot of milky way detail in as little as 15 seconds at F 2.0. With an equatorials mounted telescope and a camera mounted piggy back wide fields can be captured of much of the northern milky way, from Sagatarius up across to Cassiopea and down into the winter sky. This will take many sessions probably over a course of several years.

The first question is what type of camera to use:

The Options:

* 35mm (Pentax K-1000)
Advantages:

* Easy to use
* Easy to get lens for
* F2.0 Lens
* Light weight
* Film is reasonably cheap

Disadvantages:

* Small Negatives
* 50mm Lens leaves a pretty small plate scale

* 120 format, Rolleiflex F2.8 80mm
Advantages:

* Film is larger
* High quality optics, probably can be shot at F2.8 or F4.0
* Film is still not very expensive
* Not too heavy

Disadvantages:

* Camera is flakey and needs repair
* only one lens (but at least is a really good one)

* 120 Format Pentacon 6 or the like with 250 mm lens
Advantages:

* Same size film as the Rollei
* Long lens will bring out more small details,

Disadvantages:

* Unknown mechnical and optical quality
* Would have to buy camera (1200NIS or so)
* Weight?

* 4x5 format, Sinar F1
Advantages:

* High end 150mm APO lens
* 150mm Lens will bring many smaller details above the grain of the film
* 4x5 film is much bigger allowing for a lot of detail

Disadvantages:

* Provia 400F is not made in 4x5 would have to use Provia 100F
* Lens is only F5.6, so exposures would have to be in the 5-10min range
* Camera weight
* Camera flex could be a problem
* Film flatness could be an issue, with luck quickloads would fix this, or if not we can build a vacuum back

For now I plan to start trying with the Sinar, this may get swapped out for a flatbed camera, however if the project can be made to work with a LF camera the result will look amazing.

Milky way project -- test image

This is test shot of the milky way near sagatarius. I think the double stars are due to a bump of the tripod. The shot was taken bya 30 eyar old Pentax K1000 camera with Fuji Provia 400F film pushed one stop, 15s on a fixed tripod from outside Mizpe Ramon Israel.

Orion With labels

Fuji Provia 400F, 15S at F2.0 ( I think)

Best Observing in a long time

Ok so sometimes Insomnia pays off. I took my binoculars out and had a very nice time. I spent most of my time
touring around scorpius and sagatarius. Nice view of Jupiter and a few moons. Spent some time viewing M7, as well as a globular (not sure which one) and a gassious nebula. (M20?) I also saw an amazing fireball. One of the best ones I've seen. It went from Lyra or Aquila all the way to Ursa Major. with a pretty well defined head and a very long tail. I also took the binoculars off the tripod and looked around Lyra and the summer triangle. To bad that that the ring nebula is not within what you can do with my binoculars.

This was all out the back and side of the house with my celestron 15x70 skymasters. If anyone wants an intro astronomy tool these are great. Not the fanciest thing in the world, and not really great for planets. But for under $100 its about the best you can do, assuming you can find a heavy duty tripod.

Mirror in hand

I have my 114mm F8 Mirror. I should be able to start building the scope around it in the next few days. I'm going to find a few feet of sonotube after work. Then to get started working on putting the thing together next week.