Pro tip: Stop keeping your telescope inside the house all winter

I stored my 8-inch Dob in the garage for three years thinking cold temps would wreck the mirrors, but last December I brought it out on a 20-degree night and the view of Orion was so crisp I nearly fell over. Turns out the thermal shock of dragging a warm scope into freezing air actually creates worse image distortion than just leaving it out for 30 minutes to acclimate. Anyone else been babying their gear wrong and missing better clarity because of it?

2 comments

2 Comments

andrew77817d ago

Yeah, I gotta agree with this... I kept my 10-inch dob in the basement for like two years cause I was scared of cold weather damage. Finally took it out on a clear 25 degree night last January and the difference was night and day. The mirror took maybe 45 minutes to stop fogging up but after that, the views of M42 were unreal sharp. I think I was actually making things worse by keeping it warm and then shocking it every time.

lilycraig17d ago

Huh, I gotta push back on this a little. I've been keeping my 8-inch SCT in a heated basement for years and I take it out on 15 degree nights all the time. The key is to just let it sit outside for a good hour before you start observing. Yeah, dragging a warm scope into cold air causes fogging and thermal currents at first, but if you give it time to equalize, the views are still solid. I've had some of my sharpest nights with Jupiter and Saturn after that acclimation period. Maybe your garage was actually colder than your house, so the shock wasn't as bad? What kind of temps were you dealing with when you stored it?