Apertura AD10 Dobsonian Reflector Telescope

      10/20/2012

      My buddy Doug from Cincinnati came up this weekend with his new 10" Dobsonian "in hand".  This type of scope was new to both of us and I was excited to check it out.  Here is a pic...

Here are the specs for it copied off Apetura's website:

Technical Specifications and Dimensions

Primary Mirror Diameter:	10"
Primary Mirror Details:	34.2mm, Parabolic, 1/12 wave
Primary Mirror Coating:	Aluminum and silicone dioxide (SiO2); reflectivity=93 %
Optical Design:	Newtonian Reflector
Mount Design:	Dobsonian, clutch mounting with tension knobs
Focal Length:	1250mm
Focal Ratio:	f/4.92
Focuser:	2 inch, dual speed Micro 10:1 Crayford style
Eyepiece 1:	2", Superview 30mm, 68 degree FOV, Eye-relief=22mm
Eyepiece 2:	1.25", Super-Plossl 9mm, 52 degree FOV, Eye-relief=6mm
Finderscope:	Right-Angle, Correct-Image 8 x 50 viewer
Star Diagonal:	1.25 inch
Limiting Stellar Magnitude:	14.5
Optical Tube Length:	48.5"
Fully Assembled Height:	54"
Optical Tube Assembly Weight:	34.8 lbs
Base Height:	25.625"
Base Diameter:	22"
Base Weight:	31.4 lbs
Fully Assembled Weight:	66.2 lbs
WARRANTY	1 year for materials and workmanship

    

I was not involved in setting it up out of the box but Doug said it was not too difficult.  I was surprised by how long the tube was:  4' .5".  A little difficult for one person to load and unload from a vehicle.  Another issue was moving it around the yard once it was setup.  It took both of us to pick it up(fully assembled) to move it.  My backyard has a few trees in it so moving the scope is necessary to gain access to different parts of the sky.

It wasn't the best night for stargazing.  Clouds rolled in and out and the atmosphere was very turbulent.  We did view many objects though, but I can't give a good report on the optical quality of the scope because of the conditions.  Also, Doug found out that his eyepiece tube is out of square so every time we switched from a 1.25" eyepiece to a 2" eyepiece, the collimation would be off.  This seemed to effect the quality of the image through the scope.

I will post more about this scope in time when it gets a proper break-in.

Ring Nebula Photo

Ring Nebula - Taken on 09-08-2012 with Doug Elick.

This is a pic of the Ring Nebula (M57) taken at Hueston Woods in Ohio.  It was taken using my friends DSLR camera.

It was color enhanced just a bit in Photoshop.  I think we got lucky with the tracking because the scope was never polar aligned properly.  We basically just pointed the north leg on the tripod north and leveled the mount.  The tracking held up nicely for upto about 15 secs or so.

Little Update

I did some stargazing on this crisp night in Vandalia.  Lot's of stars and a few planets were out.

The first object I looked at was Jupiter and it's moons.  Three of the 4 moons were clearly visible while the fourth was hiding on the backside of Jupe.  Jupiter in my scope shows a fair amount of detail.  On the clearest nights the different atmospheric bands show up pretty distinctly.  I have also seen one of the moons cast it's shadow upon Jupiter.  At first I thought it a piece of dirt on the eyepiece, but then realized it was a shadow.  I've only seen this happen once and it was truely kickass.
The 4 easily seen moons of Jupiter are called the Galilean moons, named after their discoverer Galileo Galilei.  They are:  IO, Europa, Ganymede, and Callisto.

The next object I searched out was Orion.  More specifically the Orion Nebula, located in the constellation Orion The Hunter.  Anyone can find the constellation Orion with ease, and the nebula itself is pretty easy also.  It can be located with the naked eye most of the time.  I would like to snap a pic of the nebula, but I need to hookup with my friend Doug, the DSLR owner.

I tried once again to find M1, the Crab Nebula.  Epic fail.  Kind of got too cold and tired.  I suck.  Plus it's sort of hard to find with my 8" scope.

I found a good amount of the Messier objects this past summer, but not all of them.  I need to make a list of which ones I've seen now.  Maybe later.

Till next time...