New World Datsuns...

That is curious. Hope switching that out helps get you back to normal.

Normal used to be when I lay on my stomach I was out like a light, this laying there all night trying to fall asleep just does not work for me.

I know I am not going to have a good night when I cannot get comfortable, I cannot relax, all my muscles are tense just like when they put me on that statin, that was a known side effect of that drug, but I am not taking a new drug, yet this sleep thing happened fast, and the fact is I did not change anything I was putting in my body except the toothpaste, I wish I had figured that out sooner, them 2 nights of sleep were awesome, last night was alright, it was not awesome.

I had my best night of telescope observing last night this year, I could see 5 stars in the Trapezium of M42(Orions Nebula), I have not been able to see 5 stars for a long time as the skies have not been steady this winter, but I do not need steady skies to find things, I just need steady skies to see faint stars and details in things, M42 is known for the 4 bright stars in the Trapezium, but it has 7 stars, you can see the 4 bright stars close together in the middle in the photo below, I did not even know it had 7 stars, I thought it only had 5 stars, now I have 2 more stars to find and you can see all 7 in the photo, they are the small stars, 2 larger ones on the outside of the 4 and a spec in the middle.



By the way I cannot see the red color thru the eyepiece, I can see a slight green tint on a very good night, most the time it all looks like a light grey foggy color, only cameras taking photos see intense color, red is the toughest color to see in an eyepiece and one has to be at a dark site with a large telescope to see even a hint of that color, our eyes do not see red when dark adapted, and you have to be dark adapted to see fine details, Mars looks slightly red/orange in the sky to our eyes, but in the eyepiece it is basically a mixture of dark gray/light grey/white(polar ice cap).

You'd love the stargazing around here. Very little light pollution as you head south of me.

I expect I would, it would not be easy for me to do unless I moved, and that still would not be easy.

That is astonishing wayno. Feel free to post as many pics like that as you wish. In this manner , I’m living through you and others that do the same.

BLUE wrote: ↑Tue Feb 01, 2022 9:24 pm That is astonishing wayno. Feel free to post as many pics like that as you wish. In this manner , I’m living through you and others that do the same.

I did not take that photo, I just copied it and pasted it here because it showed the 4 stars(actually 7 stars) in the photo, they are in the light grey in the center.
Fact is thru the eyepiece where the 4 stars are I see nothing but black sky/background, the 4 stars stand out and that is what makes it a very popular Nebula to observe, the photo below is closer to what I see but without the color on an unsteady night where things do not look that good thru the eyepiece, the cloud is grey and the stars are bloated, sometimes seeing is so bad all I can see is the 4 stars, I cannot see the cloud at all, other times the stars are sharp and I can see a lot more grey cloud and I can see the 5th star I mentioned.



The photo in my last post was what camera sees after sometimes hours of exposure time using different methods and then stacking them on each other to make one photo, they take all sorts of different kinds of photos of the same thing in different ways, then they put them in a computer and process them differently/different ways until they get something they like, then they post the photo to a forum and everyone else tells them how good a job they did or they use the posted photo or the data if the member publishes a link to it and process it themselves and post what they think it should look like.

I have "liked" a lot of posted photos because they look great just to have someone else process the data and post a photo of what it really looks like, my reply is that I like the first photo better and it did not cost me a dime to look at it, they are always talking about noise in the photos whatever that is, I also think how do they know what it really looks like as we cannot see red when dark adapted, I suppose if an astronaut took a telescope up in the shuttle and looked at M42 with his/her eye and then looked at photos they could say what was the closet to what they seen in the eyepiece, but I do not recall if that was ever done.

It costs thousands of dollars, sometimes way over 10 thousand to take photos of things in the sky that our eyes cannot see, the camera and telescope are cheap compared to the mount with the electronics to track the object they are photographing, the telescope may cost $600.00 or more or less, the camera may cost from $500.00 to up to $5000.00 for one that does not need a telescope, but the mount, a cheap one might cost $3000.00, a good one $6000.00, a great one $10,000 or more depending on the telescope, the telescope is cheap compared to the rest of the equipment, and the frustration of getting that equipment to work properly, it is cheaper to just look at others photos and it does not frustrate me at all.

Well, I got the garage door painted yesterday.

Before




After




I bought another 10" dob, it was cheap($170.00), but I had to make a base for it, and I did some upgrades in the process, I made it easy to hand truck around, and I mean EASY, as they are always saying if it is easy to move around you will use it more.









Here it is on the hand truck, the tube(OTA) is locked in the upright position, it has a rubber bumper at the top, and the piece of unsealed plywood at the base keeps it from trying to roll sideways off the hand truck, I need to seal that piece also, but when I sealed the base/mount I had not thought of that yet, work in progress.

Well I have been sleeping fine, a couple days ago I started using Aquafresh, that frist night I slept fine, last night it started all over again, I laid in that bed all night last night, I felt like shit this morning when I left for my job today, I was not expecting that to happen, there is something in toothpaste that my body does not like, I did not change anything else except to start using tooth paste, I have been brushing with my Sonicare and water for around 3 weeks now and have been sleeping fine.

I took me months to figure this out, I have quit eating just about everything the last 5/6 months including getting my drinking water from a well, when I stopped using Crest, I finally started sleeping normal/better than normal, I will go back to water again, I will see what happens tonight but I am exhausted so it will take more than one night of sleep, not sure what to do next.

Have you tried brushing your teeth with just baking soda and water? It won’t taste good but it’ll do the job

I actually bought some baking soda a month ago to make cookies, I thought I could use it to clean my battery terminals as I only needed a 1/2 teaspoon for the cookies, now I can brush my teeth with it, I never thought of using it on my teeth.

I slept well for the first 4 hours as I was exhausted, but about 5am on I started waking up every half hour, but that is better than just lying there trying to get to sleep for 4 hours.

I started my small tractor/lawn mower yesterday, but I bought a small battery for it so I did not have to put a car battery in there, it was very tight and it moved around while this one I made a hold down for it, it started right up after sitting there for months, but I use non-ethanol fuel that does not spoil.

I actually started another telescope build, I bought another 16" mirror when I bought that sandwich mirror in case the sandwich mirror was no good, well it is great so I decided to make another dob with a 16" F/4.5 Meade mirror, I started on the mirror cell a Friday, this is how far I have got so far, I am trying to make this one low profile as the Meade mirror is thicker than the sandwich mirror.

I still don't understand how it all works, but nice job so far.

OK, this is how it works, you can see the half circles connected on the side of the dob/scope in the photo below, they are connected to the frame I made in my last post, them half circles rest in the base, you can also see the frame the mirror rests on in the photo below.



This is how it rests in the base, you can see the black strip, it is connected to the half circle, you can see what the circle is resting in(cradle), it has 2 pieces of Teflon that the black strip rests on, it acts like a bearing but has drag so the scope does not try to move on its own, it has to be pushed/nudged/lifted to where one wants it.



A close up of the Teflon pads.



Here I clamped circles on the frame, they rest in the cradle, the plywood circle is the mirror.







I am trying to make this one as low as I possibly can make it so I can stand flat footed on the ground and still look thru the eyepiece, if this one is better I might use my sandwich mirror in this one and put the thicker Meade mirror in my old scope/dob structure, or I might upgrade that one, I am making this up as I go, in this version I already have the mirror and inch lower, but the frame sits 5" above the base, I am pretty sure I can get it a couple inches lower, maybe more, I am thinking of new ways all the time, just have not committed to anything yet.

I should have bought this container of springs over a decade ago.



I paid just under $9.00 for the 200 springs in this container, right next to this box was a wall of packages of 2 springs that they wanted $4.99 for each package(2 springs, that is crazy) and it did not matter the size of the springs, tiny or large, $4.99 for 2 springs.

Here is what I used 3 springs for, to keep the triangles pointed a certain way.





I now have lots of SU carb springs.

I bought some telescope making stuff today, picked up the water pump for the work truck on the way home, I bought a sheet of Marine grade plywood, I paid $185.00 for that 4' X 8' sheet, I picked up 8 truss tubes and a couple small pieces of aluminum for little things like wiffle tree arms for less than $90.00, so now I can start on the base and side bearings, I am going to try to make these things smaller this time(use less materials), this will also make it lighter, but the mirror is heavier so it will likely be a wash and likely will weigh about the same, but I might be able to lighten my side bearings on the other scope, so if it works it is a win for both dobs.

Damn, I obviously haven’t priced plywood in a while

Taterhead wrote: ↑Fri Mar 04, 2022 7:54 am Damn, I obviously haven’t priced plywood in a while

Marine grade does not have holes in the different layers on the sides, it is made better, that is why it is more expensive, when I asked them about Baltic Birch they told me that they had to buy whole pallets at a time and it was not worth doing that with how many folks come in asking for it, it does not have holes either, and it comes in many different ply counts, the best is 15 ply, the marine grade was 7 ply, I made my other 16" out of 5 ply Maple, the base I made for the 12" dob was made out of 5 ply cheap plywood, I have already had an issue with sagging so I am going to remove the "Lazy Susan" bearing and put a full size bearing using that plastic sheet and Teflon pads, right now I have the two circles of plywood C-clamped together to try and make the one that sagged flat again, but the bearing I am going to make will flatten it anyway, I might try to do this tomorrow, I am not sure I have enough plastic sheeting to make everything I need to make now, I might have to buy more Monday.

Oh, I expressed interest in a 20" F/5 dob mirror this evening, we shall see if that works out for me, I would rather have a 24", but I have not seen one in the Cloudy Night Classifieds, this came up so I made an offer, but it would have to be shipped as it is in Texas.

I just in the last couple days had an issue with my unused Pay Pal account, since I do not have a secure internet connection, I refuse to use it, I will not even log in, I called PP on the phone, told them my story, they took care of the opened claim(someone sent me money and wanted it back and opened a claim, scam???), between what I told them on July 5th 2021 and my concerns about this claim they agreed to close the account like I asked them to do July 5, 2021, I do not want something open that can be used without my knowledge just because I will not log in to the account because my internet access is not secure.

I was checking clearances with what I have made so far and was unhappy with the mirror height, even though i was easily over an inch lower that my 16" dob I made a year ago I wanted it to be lower, so I made a new primary mirror frame to mount the mirror cell to, this one is 2" smaller.

I made a wood jig to hold my metal pieces at 90 degrees for welding



Here is one of my welds, I am using gas so it looks better than my flux core welds.



I ran out of gas and had no flux core, it was after 5pm and I was wondering what to do and I looked at my welder, I have an internal bottle that I have never used, it has no gauge so I did not know if it had anything in it, but I loaned the welder out over 5 years ago and it appears the guy filled it at some point, that was great and I was able to finish what I started.



Here is the finished base with the mirror cell installed, the old base is next to it so you can see the difference.



It is kind of hard to explain how this will lower my primary mirror height but I will try, when I put side bearings on this frame and that is set in a base, when I tilt the frame assembly the back of the base raises and the front lowers, the base piece has to be a certain height to not hit the box below it, now if I make the mirror cell base smaller I can sit the base in the bearings lower because at 45 degrees I have about an inch more clearance, I just thought of a better way to explain this.

OK, here are photos of the original mirror cell base in the box I made for test purposes, here it is level.



And here it is tilted 30 degrees or so, you can see how the front piece is getting closer to the floor, the new mirror cell base is 1" shorter so it should be around an 1" higher and then I can make the base it is sitting in an 1" shorter therefore putting the mirror an 1" lower with just this modifacation.



Now you might say to just make the front piece shorter but I cannot do that because I have to mount the truss poles on this frame, the frame has to be sqaure so all the truss poles are the same angle and length, if I shorten the front then the front 4 poles would be at different angles and need to be different lengths and I am not smart enough to make it work that way, I am a great believer in the Kiss mode, "Keep It Simple Stupid", then it does not matter which truss pole goes where as long as they are all the same length.

I bailed on this early version, and went back to the larger first version, just about everything is done on the base, I am ready to start on the upper tube assembly, I made the rings but did not have enough material so I will save them for what I bailed on, I already have thought about another project.

Anyway here it is.

Here is the brace for the side with Teflon holding the sides where they are supposed to be, I may make a laminate for the Teflon to ride against, it is a project with upgrades to be made as I think of them.


Here are the lower truss tube mounts, I made a jig to drill them all the same both bottom that hold them in position, and top for the lock bolt and set nut so hey do not come loose like they do on my 16" dob I already made, I will be upgrading that scope also.


This is the end of the cross braces, I did the same thing I did for my 16" dob I made last year.


This is what I did on that dob, when that coupling nut is tightened it squeezes the rubber pieces together and locks the coupling nut in place so the coupling nut does not move, then I can use it to stabilize the side bearings.


Here is the base, all it needs at this time is sealed, but I think I am going to cut extra weight out of the side bearings, I suspect a 1/3rd of the material will go away


A scrap piece of truss tube locked in place.


I will need to buy more plywood to make the upper tube assembly rings, I only had enough for one large ring and now I have none after making a set that are too small, I goofed on the size, they will be good for a smaller UTA.