Wow - a clear night at last!

After waiting for over a month, last Saturday night (early Sunday morning) was a nice clear and calm evening.  Reasonably good transparency too for a summer evening.  So, of course, I was out with the scope.

Most of the night was spent checking out the new 'ScopeStuff' focuser I purchased for my Orion ST-80 guide scope.  The focuser that comes with the ST-80 is pretty bad.  I was hoping a good quality focuser would help in both getting a sharp focus and holding the guide camera locked tight with no or at least minimal flexure.  After almost 3 hours getting everything mounted and re-adjusted, and fighting some software crashes with SGP (still can't get that program to auto-focus my camera), I was able to test out the new system with a photo of M20, the Trifid Nebula.

So here is the result ...

M20 - The Trifid Nebula
48 min (24x120sec) at ISO 800 w/Canon 70D
EdgeHD11 w/0.61x Focal Reducer

Based on the roundness of the stars and the guide plots on the PHD monitor screen (+/- 1 arcsec) I think maybe the new focuser helped out a lot.  But, I'll need to test more.  It could have just been the calm atmosphere.  Looks like later this week we might have another one or two clear evenings.  You'll know where I'll be :)