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hairbundle See other photos by this photographer? 10/30/2004 4:48:12 PM M31 Average of 2 20 min exposures (Kodak high definition 400 film). LPI autoguided LXD55 SN10 on LXD75 mount; Taurus tech minitacker, Moonlite crawford focuser, Taurus tech hypercamera. A work in progress..too much light polution will try again with LPS filter. This photo has been viewed 1174 times. Comments about this picture from visitors: This is about the definition you would visually see using a 12" Dob. Nice effort though. How did you Autoguide with the LPI? Want to explain your connections to us dummies a little? Thanks, and nice shot! I used the Taurus-tech minitracker. This is an off-axis guider so a pick off mirror grabs the guide star off frame from the camera. I had to get a crawford focuser to achieve focus. The Taurus hypercamera allows one to swap out the camera for an eyepiece so getting a crisp focus is not difficult. The LXD75 mount is smooth and I tracked for 30 min w/o error. The LPI performed flawlessly, 1.4 to 2 sec exposures under autoguide. Background sky glow was bad so I had to clip off the dim gray levels to get the image posted. Hopefully the lumicon deep sky filter will let me pick up the dimmer parts of the galaxy. Thanks for the interest. What do you think of the Taurus miniT? And the HyperCamera? Its nice overall. The pieces are attracted to each other by magnets so changing out the focusing eyepiece for the camera is easy to do in the dark. Everything is lightweight so the added bulk to the mount is negligible. The only thing is that the stock focuser will not reach focus with the mini-T attached at least with a SN10. Taurus-tech now has a cheap solution for this as a low profile focuser, but I know nothing about it as I bought a low profile crawford focuser from moonlite to solve the problem. I like the moonlite focuser alot but had to enlarge the hole in the OTA a little to get the focuser tube to extend into the OTA (necessary to accomodate the backfocus required by the Taurus mini-T). All in all it was not difficult and the scope easily collimated afterwards. I have been try ing to reach taurus-tech,to purchase their tracker3 they don't return any emails or phone messages, just curious how did your dealing with taurus go. Thanks Mark Mazzarell Wingasorus53@netscape.net |