TheSkySearchers

This Celestron "Celestrar 8" is fork mounted. It is equiped with an RA tracking motor and very large setting circles and nice fine adjustment knobs for manual RA and Dec control.

It took a while to figure out how to set it up and discover its operation. I have not been out under a dark sky yet, but I think I am going to like this rig.
I will be able to do my hand navigation and star hopping with maybe a bit of assist from the setting circles. When I find my target I can turn on the tracker and enjoy the view eithout constant adjustment.

This is a 1996 Celestron SCT with "Starbright" coatings. This is not as good as the XLT coatings but it is supposed to be pretty good. This is the non computerized fork mount.
It will be fun to give this a go.

That's a beauty Mark; I quite like that! Supposedly they were very well made, this might be of interest to you.

My C80-HD was made in the same time frame (96/97) and I have nothing but praise for it. Hopefully your C8 is of the same quality which I'm sure it will be!

Looking forward to a first light report,

Nice ring Mark! Should be fun to operate. I love the oversized RA and Dec circles. You should be able to place a target within finder FOV no problem.

Great scope, I love mine

It's got some weight to it though, I defork it, but I plan to refork since I also have an 8SE at this point.

Enjoy!

Thefatkitty wrote: ↑Sun Nov 14, 2021 4:12 pm That's a beauty Mark; I quite like that! Supposedly they were very well made, this might be of interest to you.

My C80-HD was made in the same time frame (96/97) and I have nothing but praise for it. Hopefully your C8 is of the same quality which I'm sure it will be!

Looking forward to a first light report,

Great info Mark.
This is another "Henkmeister" that I had not unboxed untill yesterday.
I LIKE it !

I think it will nake a grest star hopping machine. I am keen on using these big RA and Dec circles.
I am going to try to find doubkes lisyed in my Sussie Hasse book.

I have been driving it around in my living room today...through the windows but what the heck.

It is very easy to manipulate this fork set up and the slow mo controls are as smooth as the article said.

It will be a least a week before I have clear skies...
Regards to you Mark.

Bigzmey wrote: ↑Sun Nov 14, 2021 5:06 pm Nice ring Mark! Should be fun to operate. I love the oversized RA and Dec circles. You should be able to place a target within finder FOV no problem.

I am thinking these ra and dec circles should actually do as you have suggested Andrey. When I get a night and get this kit set up I am going to see if I can locate some of the doubles in my Sissy Hass book by this method.



Clear skies to you Andrey.

Ylem wrote: ↑Sun Nov 14, 2021 6:19 pm Great scope, I love mine

It's got some weight to it though, I defork it, but I plan to refork since I also have an 8SE at this point.

Enjoy!

When I unpacked this scope I thought maybe I would defork it as you did, but after playing with it and seeing how it works I think I will have a lot if fun with it as it is.

Thank you Ylem.
Ckear skies to you.

Quite a nice SCT and a real "classic" Mark - hope you really enjoy it!

very nice setup , clear sky .

I do miss the fork mount and circles on my old C8. I don't miss the weight of the pod, wedge, and fork though. Ah well, trade-offs...

I had a short sky opening last night...not enough for a real outing, but I set up and looked at the moon...

DANG !
The moon is so much fun !
But when I got done I was blind in my left eye for ten minutes.

I turned on the drive and it hummed along and stayed right on the moon. I was only out for about 10 minutes because all I had on my feet were my night slippers. The feet got cold pretty quick but I am excited about this old monster.

It has no vibration to recover from when driving the slo-mo controls. I have read that the dec balance or lack thereof is a problem. I did not notice any big issue. I have some soft wrights I can strap on of I find issues with this. I made sure all the connecting fasteners that hold the folk to the wedge were tight. One was not quite, but a quick turn with my allen wrench took care of that.

There is no way to adjust the tripod legs but to shim them. I was on the level last night so it did not matter. I will figure some convenuent shimming proceedure when I take it out for real.

Well thats it for now. All smiles so far !!!

By 0100 this morning Orion had emerged into my viewing slot in the trees.
I took in a great view of the nebula and stars. The Trapezium stars were bloated, seeing being quite poor, but I was able to enjoy this outing.
I have experienced some tiny settling vibration at higher magnification. It was difficult to judge this because of the scintilating stars
The lunar view was stunning and I look forward to that view in a more stable sky.

One may ask why I would fool with this old kit when I have nice goto mounts that find and track the targets with little effort.
It's fun...

It sure is fun, having this equipment. I had an orange one on a fork mount once and I used the setting circles years on end; and it worked!
Great find, have a lot of fun with it!

John Donne wrote: ↑Tue Nov 16, 2021 4:33 pm By 0100 this morning Orion had emerged into my viewing slot in the trees.
I took in a great view of the nebula and stars. The Trapezium stars were bloated, seeing being quite poor, but I was able to enjoy this outing.
I have experienced some tiny settling vibration at higher magnification. It was difficult to judge this because of the scintilating stars
The lunar view was stunning and I look forward to that view in a more stable sky.

One may ask why I would fool with this old kit when I have nice goto mounts that find and track the targets with little effort.
It's fun...

There is no wrong way to enjoy the heavens and I do use GoTo under light polluted skies when not enough stars visible for manual navigation. But, I REALLY enjoy finding targets with manual mounts under darker skies. It is like sailing vs driving motor boat, both enjoyable but completely different experience.

Hi Mark. Wow this is a great classic vintage unit to add to your telescope arsenal. And I am glad that you have already enjoyed using this new instrument and it is great fun for lunar/planetary viewing and star hopping. Thanks for your report Mark and the best of wishes for many clear night skies.

What a neat scope Mark! Have fun!

Man, Henry sure did have some kit!