My First Scope arrived Today!!

Calibos

Not a mark on the 3 packing boxes thanks to a concientious UPS delivery man who just bought a telescope himself last week and thus knew he had to be gentle.

All parts were present and accounted for and I took my time assembling to make sure I got everything right. Took about 2 hours taking it very slow. Could probably put another one together in about 30 minutes. It was very easy, but like I said I was taking it very slow this time.

When I opened the OTA box....OMG! Its huge!! It actually doesn't look as big once assembled. Going to collimate this evening and then tomorrow I'll align the finderscope. Obviously the New Telescope curse has hit big time and the weather forecast for the next week to 10 days is dreadful

I can't wait to get this behemoth outside for 'First Light' though

I feel like a kid on Christmas Day opening his presents

We never grow up, do we?!!

hamster

Very nice indeed! Let us know how you get on.

slade_x

Nice, just remember a telescope is not just for christmas.

Care to mention where you ordered it from, and delivery time?

Calibos

slade_x wrote: »

Nice, just remember a telescope is not just for christmas.

Care to mention where you ordered it from, and delivery time?

Forgot to mention, its an 12inch Orion SkyQuest 12XTi (Intelliscope). I was going to order it from Telescope-Service in Germany who come highly recommended over on Irishastronomy.org and Grayarea also recommended them to me in my thread here from a few weeks ago.

They weren't wrong and Patrick over at Telescope-Service was very helpful and could do me a great deal. Unfortunately they did not have the 12in in stock and wouldn't have it back till February. They did have the 10in version however but it seems apature fever got its claws into me even before my first scope. I had my heart set on the 12in.

So off I went and looked up all the European dealers on the Orion Telescopes website. Emailed them all and finally got the answer I was looking for when Optiek Van Grootven in Belgium emailed me back confirming that they had the 12in in stock. Dutch speaking Belgians but both people I communicated with via email from Optiek Van Grootven, the owner Wim and Staff Member Gunther wrote perfect English. Lucky for us that English is the Lingua Franca!!

I ordered and paid via Paypal on Thursday night and the scope shipped on Friday lunch time. It was in the UK by 3 am on Friday night/Sat Morning. I probably would have recieved the scope sooner only for the cancelled ferries over the weekend. It arrived in Dublin at 6.30pm Monday evening and was delivered this morning at 10am.

Not bad going for such a big bulky shipment. (3 big boxes)

Got a follow up email from Gunther within a couple of hours of recieving the telescope checking to see if I had recieved my order and if it had arrived undamaged etc and also to give me a few tips on assembly. The scope was a little dearer than Telescope-Service at €1350 as opposed to €1295 and shipping was €85. I know know why the were a little dearer. There was an object Locator holster and Orion Laser Collimator included in the shipment which I didn't know about. I ordered both items from Telescope-Service too!! So if anyone wants to buy a spare TS laser collimator off me.........

I also ordered a full set of Baader Hyperion EP's from Telescope-Service as well as Broadband and Narrowband Filters, Variable Polorising Moon Filter, Telerad and Telegizmos Telescope Cover and a few other bits and bobs. Telescope-Service may have lost the scope sale but they still got over €1200 off me. Patrick at TS knocked off 10%. Should be getting that delivery tomorrow.

I believe the Hyperion Widefield EP's are on the large side and couldn't find any EP case that would take all of them so I picked up a nice toolcase from Woodies. With a bit of customisation and once I source some dense foam I should be able to make myself a sweet EP case.

Took me a while to suss the colimation tonight though. Turns out I had the colimation locking nuts fully tightened and thus couldn't tighten the colimation screws tight enough. I would colimate both visually and with the laser colimator. Neither would agree and then when I'd sweep the scope around a bit the collimation would be out again straight away. Once I copped what was wrong totally disengaged the locking screws. Tightened up the collimation screws a lot more putting a lot more compression on the collimation springs, collimated and then engaged the locking screws again. This time both the visual method and the laser collimator agreed and collimation held firm with me swinging and sweeping the scope all over the place. Got a great sense of achievement from that!

Luckily my brother paid his share of the costs and we were able to push the boat out for our first scope and accessories. Such a monster certainly isn't the average first scope I'll admit!

I think you can assertain from me having the time to write such a long post that there was no 'first Light' tonight. Lashing and blowing a gale here atm though looking at the satellite imagery there is an Ireland size clear patch tracking towards us!! I might set my alarm for 5 or 6 am and pop my head out the window later!!

Calibos

Stop The Press!!

Looked out before turning in for the night and see stars over the back garden!! Checked the west where the clouds were coming from and saw that we had about 15 minutes max of a clear patch. Heaved the scope out the back garden and popped in the 25mm Sirius Plossl. Zeroed in on Mars and saw the a beautiful little white disc. Popped in the 10mm Sirius and it was a bigger 'little white disc'. The wind was gusting, the scope was vibrating, there was haze, the seeing was crap, the clouds were quickly aproaching, mars so high meant my scope was perilously close to dobsons hole and thus tracking was hard especially since this being my first scope means moving the scope in the opposite direction is not natural yet.

It was all a rush job, Lowish mag meant mars was too bright to show anything other than a white disc.....but you know what??

I am still stoked!!:D My bino's were so crap I never did know whether I was seeing a disc or glare or coma or chromatic aberation etc on any planet.

This was unmistakeable.

It actually makes the waiting for good observing weather even more unbearable. Clear Crisp skies with no worry about clouds. All my new Ep's, taking my time and just sweeping the sky.

One thing I learnt even in those 10 short minutes though. I'll be getting a Motorised EQ platform!! Jaysus does an object move fast through the FOV even at 120x with the 10mm

Redshift

Hey Well done on your new scope, it's a beauty.:)
Of course you do reaslise you have damned us all to three months of solid cloud;)

Trev M

Hehh just noticed how big that thing is , at first look I thought it was sitteing on a coffee table hahahh ha I know nothing about telescopes but that things massive for a first scope.:D