Hyades, Pleiades and NGC1499

Star Trails

A post on UK Astro-imaging alerted me to the Star Trails application. Here's my first attempt to use it. This image required a lot of retouching to remove the plethora of aeroplane lights criss-crossing the frame, but I think it was worth the effort.

Atik 314L review

Here's a review that I wrote on a pre-production Atik 314L CCD camera.

The Whale and Hockey Stick galaxies

A pair of interacting galaxies in Canes Venatici

CosmicThreads Launched!

If you would like some bespoke enbroidery whilst supporting a worthwhile charity, why not have a browse over at my Wife's webpage! If you are interested please send her an email.

Sieg C3 Mini-lathe

I felt I needed to get back into some amateur telescope making so I've bought myself a Mini-lathe. I'll be using it to make adapters and the like for my scopes and cameras. it should be fun. There's quite a bit of useful information on the web. Tom How's site is a good read, especially for those starting out. His advice is based on his experiences starting up a home workshop, and getting the most out of these machines. On his site you will find links to other relevant sites.
As I progress I may post articles on what i learn if I think they will be of interest. I bought the lathe and a starter kit from Arc Euro Trade Ltd in Leicester, They were most helpful.

I also bought a bandsaw from Chester UK Ltd. This is a super bit of kit, which makes light work of preparing stock for lathe and other projects.

Widefield Mosaic of the Christmas Tree and Rosette Nebulae

This is a 3x3 mosaic of the area taken with a Borg 100ED f/4 telescope.