In the last post I introduced my new small scope, the PICO-6 60mm Mak-Cass. After having a positive first light, I decided the scope was good enough to be the center of a new travel observing kit. Here’s the scope mounted on a Universal Astronomics DwarfStar alt-az head and a Manfrotto CXPRO4 Carbon Fiber Tripod.
Here’s the kit broken down. The case is an AmazonBasics Medium DSLR Gadget Bag, which Doug Rennie helpfully put me on to. The Pocket Sky Atlas
and small Night Sky planisphere
go in the back pocket. In front of the bag from left to right:
- DwarfStar head with handle
- Celestron 8-24mm zoom eyepiece
in its metal tube case
- Orion 32mm Plossl eyepiece
(22x, 2.3-degree true field), standing
- PICO-6 OTA
- Orion Explorer II 6mm Kellner eyepiece (117x, 0.4-degree true field), lying in its cardboard box
- Astro-Tech 1.25″ dielectric diagonal
Here’s everything packed away. This was just a first pass. The final arrangement I came to is as follows:
- The left-hand slot holds the DwarfStar head with the handle removed and stowed separately, as shown here, and the 6mm eyepiece in its cardboard box, wrapped in a small piece of bubble wrap.
- The middle slot holds only the PICO-6 OTA, just as shown here.
- The right-hand slot holds the 32mm Plossl and the 8-24mm zoom eyepiece on the bottom, both of them in the beige metal cases that the zoom eyepieces come in (I had a spare). The tops of the two cases form a horizontal shelf which holds the diagonal, wrapped up in a small drawstring bag.
- Finally, a piece of bubble wrap goes across the tops of all three slots and gets tucked in at the edges and corners.
Oh, the vertical dividers in the case are held in with velcro so they can be adjusted or removed as needed.
For flight, the tripod can go in a backpack or in checked luggage, and the AmazonBasics case goes as my carry-on “additional item”. The tripod weighs 3.5 lbs, the fully-packed case weighs 6. For a total of 9.5 lbs, I have a full-size tripod, a smooth, variable-resistance alt-az head, eyepieces giving magnifications of 22x, 29-88x, and 117x, a scope which will show the Cassini Division and split Epsilon Lyrae, a planisphere, and a mag 7.6 all-sky atlas.
This past week I was out at Black Mesa, at the northwestern corner of the Oklahoma panhandle, to dig up dinosaurs. I took the whole kit, and I used it. On Sunday night I showed half a dozen people the moons of Jupiter, the ice caps of Mars, the rings of Saturn, a couple of double stars, and the full moon. Monday night I was too pooped for stargazing. Tuesday I spend a couple of hours observing with my parents and a couple of other visitors who were also staying at the Black Mesa Bed & Breakfast. We looked at the same run of stuff as I had Sunday evening, plus a couple more double stars, the open clusterM7, and the False Comet Cluster in southern Scorpio, which is a visual amalgam of the open clusters NGC 6231 and Trumpler 24. After that, we were clouded out for the rest of the week, but it was still more than worth it to have the little scope along.
Verdict: an amazingly flexible and capable setup. I look forward to many more adventures with it.
Here’s one more shot from the road. Nothing telescopic – on Thursday morning the rising sun was accompanied by a pair of sun dogs. This is a raw shot with my iPhone 5c. The best sun dogs I’ve ever seen in my life.