Unboxing video for a Celestron CGX 800

24 May 2019

Bill (er, that's me) has done a new video for the Optics Central YouTube channel. This time I've unboxed a CGX 800, which is a Celestron CGX equatorial go-to mount with a Celestron 8" Cassegrain telescope on top.

Not the biggest scope and mount we have, but plenty large enough.

The video is in three parts.

Part 1 is me showing off the three rather large cardboard boxes, and then opening each in turn. Like a kid at Christmas, I take out all the parts and spread them all over the floor in the showroom.

In Part 2 I get all those pieces and build the tripod, mount and telescope, going through all the parts in turn.

In Part 3 I turn the mount on and show a little about how it's aligned. Of course I wasn't able to do a great job for this part because it's during the day and we're indoors! I hope you get the idea though.

For astrophotographers, however, I didn't go through the Celestron "precise polar alignment" routine in this part.  This is a way of improving your polar alignment without having to use a fiddly polar scope or an expensive Pole Master (or similar electronic aid).

Have a look and let me know what you think.

Do you have any other suggestions for a video?