Masu wrote: "I haven't looked for a good astronomy site on the WWW yet so do you have
any suggestions on a site that worth scrutinizing that keeps people
abreast of things worth looking at?"
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This fellow's web page is worth a look. He lives in Newcastle, NSW - about 900 km from Sydney more or less.
As for me, if I were to visit Australia (some day hopefully) the very first thing I'd point my scope at would be the star Eta Carinae and its surrounding nebula NGC 3372., located at RA (Right Ascension) 10h 45.1' and Dec (Declination) -59° 52'. (Your scope allows you to punch in these values directly, if I'm not mistaken.) E.C. (the star) is located very near the Keyhole Nebula embedded within '3372. Here's an overall view of the nebula from your neck of the woods. In this view, EC is the bright star at the 2 o'clock position:
There is evidence that Eta Carinae may actually be a binary system. Every five and a half years or so E.C.'s spectrum shifts somewhat and then returns to normal - a dead giveaway for an orbiting companion, may God have mercy on its poor blasted soul. Overall, EC is a naked-eye object with a yellowish-white color. Btw, if EC goes supernova - which it could at any time - it could very well be brighter than a full moon. EC is extremely unstable, so who knows? Also, in spite of its 8000+ light-year distance, EC is easily visible because it emits more energy in 6 seconds than our Sun does in an entire year.
The next thing I'd explore is the LMC (Large Magellanic Cloud) with its plethora of nebulosities, clusters, etc.; including the beautiful Tarantula Nebula, NGC 2070, located at RA: 5h 38.7', Dec: -69° 6'.
Here are some additional links which may interest you:
This fellow lives in my neck of the woods. Check out his website.
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My older brother lives in a remote part of Colorado. A few years ago he bought an 8" SCT. Like yours battery life was a problem, so we installed a cold-weather car battery in a small enclosure near his observing site (presently just a concrete pad he poured for his tripod. I hate tripods). I supplied a 15-watt photovoltaic panel with a lead-acid battery charger module to keep the battery topped-off.
A more portable high-capacity battery you might consider getting is one of those "gel-cells" used in toy cars kids (sit in and) drive around the yard. Most of batteries are 6V units, but I've sometimes seen 12V units as well. Or, if you can park your car close enough, you can use a cigarette-lighter adapter to power the scope.
Finally, as your scope probably has an alt-az, or fork, mount, be aware that as the scope tracks an object across the sky, the image will rotate in the camera's field of view. This trait makes such mounts impractical for astrophotography unless you can compensate for the rotation somehow. The simplest (and most reliable) method is to use an equatorial wedge., An equatorial wedge converts your fork (alt-az) mount into an equatorial mount in which the scope turns on an axis parallel with the Earth's axis of rotation. The down side of this is that your computerized mount still assumes it's an alt-az device and won't point your scope in the right direction. It is possible, however, that mfr's of these mounts can allow the user to switch between alt-az and GEM (German Equatorial Mount) modes to allow use of a wedge. You'd have to check your scope's documentation.
Motorized image (de-)rotators are another option, but these are expensive, require a high degree of precision (both in construction and motion control) and don't always do the best job.
As a courtesy to others on this thread, we probably should take this discussion offline. I'll email shortly.
Cheers!
-e
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Where is Antitheism when it hurts?
