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In the past week I have been getting set up to start running a meteor detector. I built my Ariel as per the instructions on the Sky@Night's information pdf. Father Christmas was kind enough to bring me a Funcube dongle 😃 Last night I finally managed to get it all working. The result was loads of 'hits' over night. I still have to fine tune the set up but the initial results are very encouraging. Sitting watching the screen scrolling past waiting for the ping is strangely addictive. Anyway here are a couple of the 'Hits' I got from my first foray into this new world.

Merry Christmas and happy new year from me also, I may even get out and look at stuff next year

I still cannot believe that EMS has been around since July 2010, where has the time gone. It has proved a wonderful club full of dedicated members, and I have made some great friends. So raise a glass to EMS - MERRY XMAS EVERYONE.

Hi everyone - managed to make the best of a clear spell on Christmas Eve to grab this image of IC1871, the inside of the Soul Nebula. Taken with my C8+Hyperstar and 178 MC Cool for 3 hrs of integration and first light onn the STC Duo Narrowband filter (Ha+OIII)

MERRY CHRISTMAS & A HAPPY NEW YEAR TO ALL OUR READERS. A massive Thank You to everyone who has contributed to the forum, despite the weather, folks have got out there and enjoyed the hobby, however frustrating various things have been during the year. There has been some amazing projects, Graham, Mick and Phil to name just three and a massive thanks to the imagerers for posting their hard won results for us all to see. Wishing you all a peaceful and Merry Christmas and a Happy and cloud free New Year. From All Of The Staff. XXX

Merry Christmas and a Happy New Year

Merry Crimbo everyone. Hope the fat bloke in red brings you everything you wanted.

Unfortunately, the links above have not worked, so here are the images.

Hi everyone - I have just over an hour on M78 and thought I'd share it. By no means finished and with the weather at the moment can't honestly see when I'll get my next RGB opportunity. Taken with teh C8+Hyperstar+178MC Cool combo, mostly on 15th December while I was shooting 46p! Happy Christmas everyone 🙂

Merry xmas everyone 👍🎅🏻

Merry Christmas to you all (Inc Staff!) hope you all have a great, relaxing time and get time to look up into a clear sky !!

Seasons greetings to all staff and members, and thanks to everyone for making EMS a great place to hang out full of interesting, fun and inspirational reading and awesome pictures. Looking forward to another great year now. 👍👍😊

Merry Xmas and a Happy New Year to all from me too - and a big thanks to all the staff who have kept EMS ticking along nicely over the year. 🙂

Went to Holme Pierrepont Country Park today hoping to do a bit of birding but it turned out to be very quiet, but there were a few canoeists on the white water course so photographed them instead. Below is a selection but there is many more if you click on the link. https://www.flickr.com/photos/154534235@N07/albums/72157677172833428

Here's wishing you all a very happy Christmas and a prosperous 2019 filled with clear skies.

Managed to get over 2h on the heart nebula in RGB with my DSLR. It came out ok for the short exposure time 🙂 I have also launched a new website for my astrophotos! https://joesastrophoto.myportfolio.com/ Any comments and criticism welcome.

As the title suggests Grabbed this tonight in what can only be described as appalling conditions. With high clouds the seeing could only be described as non existent 😁 Still it was the first clearish night I have had in ages so it just had to be done. Usual kit of the GT81 and the Atik 414 EX 6 subs in HA at 600 seconds 6 subs in OIII at 600 seconds 5 subs in SII at 600 seconds. Captured and stacked in Maxim Compiled in PS 6

Santa was held up in traffic for me, too. But I finally got the Dioptrix astigmatism correctors for my bino eyepieces. Daylight trials indicate they have a beneficial effect - much greater 3D effect than without them. Just add stars ...

I have to admit, I'm rather pleased with this one. Usual DSLR method but DSS did not work and I used Microsoft ICE instead. I'll post the capture and processing details if anyone needs to know.

I spent a couple of hours last evening fine tuning the settings on my set up and have now arrived at a point where I think it is pretty much there. Had 42 'hits' from midnight up to now including the largest and most spectacular one to date. Here are but a few of them.

That's quite a lot of observing nights Ron. I've counted 14 nights out, including the 2 at WW and 2 at Belper. Built a RocketMount and sold all my Delos eyepieces. Then bought a few Clave's to replace them.

After I re-aligned the ariel yesterday the 'hits' are coming in thick and fast. With the ever closeness of the Quadrantids shower things are looking good. These three hit in close succession at 07 06 am this morning. A couple more from last night.

Not a pressie as such but I was aiming to finish the binoscope for Christmas and I did. All assembled and painted now. Its sitting in the cupboard waiting for a clear sky like all good astro kit now

Progress update on my new encoder project. I've been in regular touch with Serge Antonov, who runs 'Astro Devices' out of Sydney, Australia and have even spoken with him on a couple of occasions, when after placing my initial order, he actually rang me up to discuss a few things. Hows that for customer service ?? My DM6 encoders are still in Australia, while Serge custom builds me another set for my 12" OO Dobsonian, and sooner than have two separate orders, and two lots of shipping etc, he's putting everything together into a single order. I think its pretty amazing that he's gone to the trouble to alter the Dobsonian encoder kits they already produce for other scopes like the Meade Lightbridge / Starfinders and the GSO Dobsonian range to then work with the Orion Optics dobsonian mount which is quite a bit different. Heres some pictures below of the modified altitude encoder that Serge has made for my scope. The other encoder for the azimuth axis is pretty much the same as for the other scopes. The installation of these Dob encoders will be a challenge for me, but i have a good friend who is an aero engine fitter at Rolls Royce, so help is there if i need it. I will continue the DM6 upgrade thread when the kit arrives (probably early in the new year) and start a new one for the Dob, as i have a few other mods in mind as well for that scope.

A brief update. The past week or so has been spent sorting toolless alignment adjustment of the tubes on the bracket and beefing up certain areas. The alignment of the tubes is one tube shifts sideways and the other vertically so in the mk1 bracket I just used allen screws to prove that the alignment works, the next step was to make it easy to align, almost one touch. So a bit of head scratching and some compression spring and here is the finalised designs. The lateral adjuster is straightforward, the screw pushes the bar that the OTA is mounted on against a spring plunger. A lock nob under the bracket locks everything up when aligned. The vertical adjustment was a bit more of a challenge. My mk1 bracket showed that the tube just had to be tilted from the back just a few thou' so it didnt need much in the way of adjustment so I plumped for a thumb wheel which pushes or pulls the back of the tube. It seems to work. Ive also found a use for my vintage Gitso tripod pan and tilt handle which means you can move the scope without touching the eyepiece and risking collimation shift. Its all ready for a clean up now and shaving a bit of ali off to reduce weight a touch plus a paint job.