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Several days ago I rescued my 80mm f/6 Triplet ED APO Explore Scientific refractor that I had stashed in the back of a closet about two years ago and thought I'd piggyback it on my Quattro 8 to see what kind of AP performance I could squeeze out of it. Overall, I was a bit disappointed with the excessive amount of coma this particular triplet glass had to offer. Chromatic aberration was low to non-existent, the central image was good and crisp, but when I post on the DSO forum a sampling of DSO images I grabbed last night and this early morning you'll see what I mean about the excessive coma. However, and it's a big however, my Baader coma corrector for my Quattro 8 f/4 astrograph and my Guan Sheng 8 f/5 might be able to come to the rescue. In a few days I'll attempt another sky safari to see if the coma corrector does the trick.
That said, I did stumble into actually capturing my first images of Comet NEOWISE which wasn't on my to-do list for the evening. I really didn't know exactly where it was in the evening sky and how viewable it would be from my somewhat tree-line horizon location at the Penfield/Middlefork dark site. I had just finished putting my equipment together when a young couple drove up into the parking lot. It was getting pretty dusky and I asked if they were there to to see the comet. Yep. So I pointed them toward the general direction I thought it might be (at the time I had thought it had already set behind some trees) where a line of trees stood about half-a-mile away. After a minute the young man, Ryan, thought he saw it naked eye to the northwest where I had generally pointed. I retrieved a pair of Nikon 7x50 binocularas and let him borrow it. Yep, that was it. When he pointed where it was, I could see it myself. Though I hadn't performed a polar alignment, I knew I was roughly within a couple of degrees of Polaris given the fact I generally set up in the exact same area of the rock parking lot.
So I hurriedly manually slewed the telescope, which originally refused to move (yikes!) and finally got it pointed in the vicinity of NEOWISE. Unfortunately, I didn't shift from BULB mode to AE mode on my Canon 77D so I was shooting blind (though aided by my finderscope which wasn't exactly aligned with the piggybacked ES 80mm refractor). This image is the very first image I grabbed of NEOWISE but the comet was dropping fast behind the trees due to sidereal motion. Unfortunately I lost my 50-50 chance of hitting the right slew button and my next shot had more foreground tree silhouettes and less comet! By the time I was able to roughly frame the comet it's head was already in the tree line. The second image is the last frame I took, all within a span of three minutes.
Despite the troubles, it was still a kick in the pants because I actually captured an image of NEOWISE which I wasn't planning on doing for the next three or four days until it climbed higher into the sky. Now I'm committed to finding a weather/cloud window at sunset somewhere within a two hour drive of my home in order to capture more NEOWISE images. Until I get the coma issue figured out for the ES 80mm, I'll remount my Meade 70mm f/5 astropgraph which yields a wider field of view anyway and try to follow the progression of this comet as it tracks through the sky.
Sorry for the novel-length treatment, but the event was so extraordinary and serendipitous I thought it was worth mentioning in some detail.
Explore Scientific 80mm f/6 APO triplet refractor
Canon EOS 77D unmodified
15.3 seconds, ISO 1600 (I was in such a rush, I didn't think to reset the Canon from it's deep sky Bulb mode at ISO 1600)
No filters, Sidereal rate only
Attachments
Gotcya, sucker! First shot shooting blind in Bulb mode!
Bye-bye for the evening Comet NEOWISE
My Evening's Set-Up ... ten minutes before imaging NEOWISE
Telescopes: Meade LX90 10-inch f/10 UHC Coma-free SCT; Explore Scientific 127mm f/7.5 APO ED triplet refractor; Explore Scientific 102mm f/7 APO ED triplet refractor; Explore Scientific 80mm f/6 APO ED triplet refractor; Skywatcher 72mm f/6 ED Schott doublet refractor; Meade 70mm f/5 APO quadruplet astrograph refractor; Skywatcher Quattro 8-inch f/4 Newtonian astrograph; Orion 6-inch f/4 Newtonian astrograph; Skywatcher SkyMax 180mm f/15 Maksutov; iOptron 150mm f/12 Maksutov; Orion f/9 Ritchey-Chretien RC astrograph Eyepieces: Set of 7 Baader Hyperion eyepieces, 3 Meade 5000 glass handgrenades; 1970s era Japanese manufactured Meade 12.5mm Orthoscopic, and too many other eclectic eyepieces to list Mounts: Skywatcher EQ6-R Pro mount; Orion Atlas EQ-G mount Post-production Software: Not good enough … oh, okay ... Canon's proprietary CanoScan ArcSoft 9000F photoshop suite
I own that particular refractor and I would highly recommend the use of an FF with it. I own both the Hotech SCA2 and the Astro-Tech AT2FF. Both of these work well but I prefer the AT2FF.
I would love to have a ED80 APO. I really like the fov. Looks like it is your guide scope!
Great image! Still haven't been able to spot this bugger. Thanks for the photo and nice write.
Jim
Scopes: Explore Scientific ED102 APO, Sharpstar 61 EDPH II APO, Samyang 135 F2 (still on the Nikon).
Mount: Skywatcher HEQ5 Pro with Rowan Belt Mod
Stuff: ASI EAF Focus Motor (x2), ZWO OAG, ZWO 30 mm Guide Scope, ASI 220mm min, ASI 120mm mini, Stellarview 0.8 FR/FF, Sharpstar 0.8 FR/FF, Mele Overloock 3C.
Camera/Filters/Software: ASI 533 mc pro, ASI 120mm mini, ASI 220mm mini , IDAS LPS D-1, Optolong L-Enhance, ZWO UV/IR Cut, N.I.N.A., Green Swamp Server, PHD2, Adobe Photoshop CC, Pixinsight.
Dog and best bud: Jack
Sky: Bortle 6-7
My Astrobin: https://www.astrobin.com/users/Juno16/
Here are three images that are in my gallery page.
The Eta Carina Nebula
Omega Centauri Globular
M8 and M20. This is not a composite, the FOV is that wide! Believe it or not, the entire Eta Carina Nebula is larger than the distance between M8 and M20
All three images were taken through the ES 80mm f/6 APO using a Canon T3i and the Astro-Tech AT2FF FF.
Thanks, JT! It's almost hard to believe that a little ol' 80mm refractor can deliver such wonderful astro-photos like those you posted. I remember back forty years ago when everyone was aperture crazy ... including myself with my 10-inch f/5.5 Meade mirrored Newtonian! Little 70mm, 3-inch and 80mm glass were scoffed at as being "toys". Of course the vast majority of consumer-grade refractors were two-element achromats and not triplet apochromatics, mostly cemented and not air-spaced with Schott glass for one optical element. I don't know if "Schott glass" was even around that long ago for amateur astronomical use, at least not here in the States. I guess it wasn't until after the Berlin Wall fell in 1991/92 that Schott glass optics became more popular throughout the world. Just my limited read on things. I'll stand corrected on this.
Telescopes: Meade LX90 10-inch f/10 UHC Coma-free SCT; Explore Scientific 127mm f/7.5 APO ED triplet refractor; Explore Scientific 102mm f/7 APO ED triplet refractor; Explore Scientific 80mm f/6 APO ED triplet refractor; Skywatcher 72mm f/6 ED Schott doublet refractor; Meade 70mm f/5 APO quadruplet astrograph refractor; Skywatcher Quattro 8-inch f/4 Newtonian astrograph; Orion 6-inch f/4 Newtonian astrograph; Skywatcher SkyMax 180mm f/15 Maksutov; iOptron 150mm f/12 Maksutov; Orion f/9 Ritchey-Chretien RC astrograph Eyepieces: Set of 7 Baader Hyperion eyepieces, 3 Meade 5000 glass handgrenades; 1970s era Japanese manufactured Meade 12.5mm Orthoscopic, and too many other eclectic eyepieces to list Mounts: Skywatcher EQ6-R Pro mount; Orion Atlas EQ-G mount Post-production Software: Not good enough … oh, okay ... Canon's proprietary CanoScan ArcSoft 9000F photoshop suite