Don Machholz left us on August 9th, 2022 Unfortunately, with big sadness I just found out that one of our members is no longer among us. This is what Don Machholz’s wife announced on Don’s Facebook page: It is with profound sadness that I share with everyone that my beloved husband, Don Machholz, passed away unexpectedly and swiftly from COVID at 3:15 AM on Tuesday, August 9, 2022. He was a very kind, gentle and loving soul, we love each other from the moon and back. Don was a world famous comet hunter. He discovered as many as 12 comets during his lifetime and never gave up his passion. Unt ..read more

And it is finally done! Perfectly silent and with zero backlash. Last night I finished calibrating and allowing the mount to carry the full weight of all scopes I’m using and still perfectly silent and smooth. I’m hoping for some great and starry nights ahead of me soon. https://astroniklas.com/wp-content/uploads/2022/06/IMG_0986.mp4 The gap in the foreground where the timing belt will come through R.A. motor in a close up image R.A. axis opening with the LED-light in the background Rowan Astronomy Worm Mount Rowan Astronomy Worm Mount middle and right. The old wo ..read more

And so I’ve decided now to open up the mount and begin the process. I really helps a lot watching a few YouTube videos and reading Rowan Astronomy‘s instructions thoroughly. There are a few minor steps that would easily make me damage my mount. Below are a few photos attached from the very first steps of taking the mount apart. The post NEQ6 Modification – Day 2 appeared first on Astroniklas ..read more

And finally it’s here! I just received the final few pieces for modifying the whole mount. The kit was purchased from Rowan Astronomy, and I truly can’t wait to begin the modernization in my mount’s tracking capabilities. The NEQ6 Pro mount has served me faithfully for over 10 years now and it’s time it gets some tuning and new gears to keep up the new gadgets that its going to carry around while tracking. I’ll try and post the steps in a guide/tutorial over time with lots of photos and “lessons learned” from this journey   The post NEQ6 Modification Kit appeared first on Astroniklas ..read more

For you who might’ve not been aware, Milky Way is the name of our very own galaxy where our solar system and subsequently ourselves live within. It is our galactic home filled by a vast amounts of stars, interstellar dust, energy, old star clusters, black holes, our very own supermassive black hole in the center and other wonders. Our very own star, the sun is a modest little star in comparison to other giants out there. Every single star that appears in the night sky is our neighbor that belongs to our immediate galactic neighborhood. When we look at the night sky from the northern hemisphere ..read more

Welcome to WordPress. This is your first post. Edit or delete it, then start writing! The post Hello world! appeared first on Astroniklas ..read more

I remember in my early days my old astronomy club had a monochrome CCD camera from SBIG which was used for scientific projects. The club opened its doors to students allowing them to discover new supernovae and other cool features in the night sky involving fotometry. Years passed by and as an amateur astronomer I’ve dealth with DSLRs for the most part of my observing sessions. While DSLRs can be suitable for using them both at day and at night, unfortunately they can’t compete with dedicated astronomy cameras. CMOS technology has advanced more and mover over the years as well, bringing their ..read more

When you’re planning to head out for astrophotography, one of the things in your check lists it to figure out your power consumption (or it should if you haven’t figured that out yet!). Some people rely on batteries, others again have a steady power supply from a plug in their homes/outdoor observatory sites, and finally some would rely on a power generator. To figure out how much power your equipment consumes per hour, there’s a simply calculation method. If you know your Watt-hours and Volts (most astronomy equipment is powered by 12 Volts) to Ampere-hours you can use a simple formula t ..read more

Maintaining batteries can be tricky if the weather doesn’t permit us from practicing our hobby over extended periods of time. 2021 was an exceptionally bad year for astronomy. Wildfires, wet winter with lots of precipitation and snow in the mountains. Unfortunately deep cycle batteries need to be taken care of and not allow them discharge below 20% of their capacity. It should be enough letting them charge over a couple of hours once a month. Unfortunately, just like many other users, I forgot to follow that routine, ending up with a dead battery. The replacement process is easy when you follo ..read more

Finding yourself in the midst of planning an observing session somewhere remotely means you’re already aware on the amount of equipment and checklists that you need to prepare. It is very easy to forget something that would ruin your excitement once you’re on site and realize you’re missing a cable, or other important gadgets. To make things worse, with today’s technology and computers you also have to remember even more stuff. Charging the laptop to full battery, bring your cell phone, etc. PrimaLuceLab EAGLE Manager For PrimaLuceLab’s Eagle owners (astronomy dedicated mini PC), there’s one m ..read more