A New Toy Arrives!
A new toy has arrived at TANO!
Yes, a nice little William Optics Zenithstar 61mm telescope has arrived at TANO to join the RC8 and Esprit 100.
Here it is, installed on the HEQ5 ready for testing…
Technical details
- Type: Apochromat Refractor
- Glass: FPL53
- Focal length: 360mm
- Focal ratio: f/5.9
- Flattener: Yes
The dew shield is reatractable, make it very small and compact, and the focuser is full rotatable, ideal for framing targets; The end cap has a built-in bahtinov mask, accessed by simply unscrewing the front cover. The focuser also has a temperatur guage on one of the focus wheels - I think the idea is that you mark the focus position at a given temperature to give the ability to easily get back to a known focus point… I think! I will, no doubt, end up with another EAF at some point in the future…
Field of views
This focal length gives me another set of options now, especially with some bigger targets, or larger groupings. This is M45 - Pleiades, Seven Sisters - in the ASI 533 camera.
As can be seen, that fits in quite nicely. Searches on the internet show this field to capture all of the nebulosity around the stars. Compare that with the view in the ASI2600MM, and you can see that any extended nebulosity would be captured.
Another great target for this scope will be M31 - The Great Andromeda Galaxy. If I frame the galaxy on the diagonal, I should just about get the extended disc in…
Next steps
Tonight (10th May), I’m hopeful to get first light - I managed to get the camera focused on Friday night, but the prism in the OAG needed adjusting. Did that today, so now just need to focus the guide camera, and then get the guiding trained. I also need to confirm my spacing is correct to the flattener.
I also want to document the swap and set up from the RC platform to this one - it just makes the whole process easier when you don’t have to think about it too much…
I’ll follow up, once I have everything set up properly.