cleaningdanax.blogg.se

1. #Ebay meade 495 autostar computer controller portable#
2. #Ebay meade 495 autostar computer controller mods#

VERY COLD, but worth the views of Saturn and 2 of its moons, nebulosity in Orion's Belt, and a weak view of Andromeda.

First night out with it, I had fairly good viewing conditions (full moon limited what I could see). I suggest using the "Best of the Evening" tours when you first fire it up (if you have the 497 controller). Let it cool down to ambient temperatures for half an hour or so before getting into serious viewing. You HAVE to have this thing level, pointed as close to North as you can, and on a sturdy tripod. It's very important to watch the Meade tutorials so you can perform fast, accurate alignments. Optics are excellent for the $$ and the GoTo system works OK.

#Ebay meade 495 autostar computer controller portable#

Good little scope, portable and easy to use. Instead, put that amount of money into a Meade LX or Celestron C8 or similar that will surpass these things. Just don't spend tons of $$$ like some of the sellers asking $1200 or more for their used scope. They are not research grade at all yet the USA models give nice views. Keep in mind that these are basically grab'n-go scopes.

#Ebay meade 495 autostar computer controller mods#

The focus mechanisms all suck for the most part but mods can be made to the 90/105/125 models that perform nicer and more tolerable. The cheaper aluminum ones are fair to lousy. Meade tripods make a big difference in stability. I dumped my smaller models quickly after having the USA made one. The views through the ETX 90, 105, 125 are so much better than the smaller 60/70/80 models. Otherwise pay $150 and fix it yourself to end up with a nice little performer. Mine had all of those issues and has taken mush time to repair albeit I did it myself, made improvements so it wouldn't happen again, and saved spending more $$ on a scope that should have been designed better from the start! People who pay several hundred $$ or more for these used on eBay are crazy! Only do that if it's in pristine, guaranteed working condition. All those issues will cause bad tracking or inaccurate auto-star finder. That's also a good time to check for broken gear teeth, split screw anchors in the ba se assembly, end play in the worm drive, and so on. The wires fray or sever and the entire scope base needs disassembled and depth of repair depends how badly the wires are damaged. Worse yet is when the 4 wires that run through the partially hollow RA locking bolt. Fix is easy if you know what you are doing to repair it. Most common failure is the broken Declination locking knob since it's plastic and snaps. Still they suffer from drive mechanism failures of different sorts. The latter three are Muskatov design and much better optically and made in the USA.

All ETX models are not equal, by far! The ETX 60, 70,80 are refractor types and built cheaper than the larger objective ETX 90, 105, 125 models. The ETX line is a good line of amateur scopes. Optically pretty decent - mechanical reliability/accuracy is questionable