u/Miserable_Home1023

Finally got a clear night for the Perseids. Spent most of it just sitting out there watching.

Used my usual setup – 8" Newtonian scope, mirrorless camera on a tracker, red light so I didn’t kill my night vision. Had a Bluetti power running the camera and mount the whole time. Caught a couple decent ones, including that bright green. The rest were mostly short streaks but still fun. Plus a couple of wider Milky Way shots while waiting.

Processing
Stacked the Milky Way frames first for noise reduction, then finished them in PS. Used Nik for some detail work, TK luminance masks to bring out the Milky Way structure, and Astro Panel for star reduction. No fancy filters or anything, still figuring this out.

Happy with how the trail came out. Anyone else get lucky with clear skies this year?

Been prepping for a longer summer trip and honestly just got tired of the constant packing/unpacking cycle with hotels and Airbnbs. Last week I finally finished the full inspection, grabbed this C-class, and pointed it down the highway.

First real run was only 2.5 hours to another city. Overall it feels solid — sits nice on the road, no major surprises. Gas mileage is already making me wince a bit though, and there’s still some interior and electrical stuff that needs attention before I trust it for longer stretches.

Power’s coming from the bluetti apex 300 for now while I sort the rest of the systems. Plan is to keep refining it until I can actually live in it for a while and just keep moving — see some places, meet some people, not have to drag a suitcase in and out every few days.

Anyone else do a short shake-down run before going big? What were the first things that jumped out on yours?

Finally got around to sharing a few photos from a drive down Highway 1. I started around Monterey and headed south toward Morro Bay, which made pulling into the coastal overlooks a lot easier.

The weather stayed clear, but the surf was huge. Point Lobos, Partington Cove, and some of the random overlooks between Bixby Bridge and McWay Falls ended up being the highlights.

The short walk out toward Sea Lion Point was worth it, and the late-afternoon light catching the spray looked unreal. It turned into a much longer day than expected, but I eventually made it down to Morro Rock and stayed there longer than planned just watching the light change. Kept the cooler going the whole time by topping it up from the bluetti elite 300 in the back , didn’t have to start the engine just to keep things cold while I was out taking photos.

What’s the next stretch worth driving? Already can’t wait for the next trip.

Moin zusammen,

hab gerade die Mai-Auswertung meiner Anlage angeschaut und wollte das zum Anlass nehmen, mal eine Frage in die Runde zu werfen.

Kurzer Hinweis vorab: Mein Setup ist größer als ein klassisches BKW – ich hab eine vollwertige PV-Anlage mit Speicher, deshalb die Zahlen:

Gesamtertrag Mai: 906,99 kWh

Spitzentag: 48,57 kWh (14. Mai)

Kumuliert bisher: 3,55 MWh

Was mich zuletzt beschäftigt hat, ist eigentlich eine andere Sache: Ich hab seit Jahren eine Anker-Powerstation, die ehrlich gesagt die meiste Zeit im Keller steht und nur für Camping oder Stromausfall rauskommt. Das hat mich irgendwann gestört – das Ding kostet Geld und liegt rum.

Ich hab dann den Bluetti Balco Transfer Hub ausprobiert, der genau dafür gebaut zu sein scheint: Powerstation per Stecker mit dem Hausnetz verbinden, Solarmodule dran, und die Powerstation fungiert als flexibler Tagesspeicher. Das Praktische: Wenn ich sie am Wochenende für einen Trip brauche, zieh ich sie einfach raus.

Jetzt interessiert mich: Nutzt jemand hier eine portable Powerstation als Kurzzeitspeicher für sein BKW? Wie habt ihr das gelöst – mit einem fertigen System oder selbst zusammengestöpselt?

So a kangaroo nearly ended my trip on day three.

Was driving through some back roads in Queensland when one bolted straight out in front of the van. Heart genuinely stopped for a second. Then the next morning I woke up at dawn and there were maybe eight of them just grazing around outside. Didn't even flinch at me. That kind of made up for the scare.

Did my first solo off-grid trip a few months back – 7 days in the Queensland bush, just me and the van. Empty fields, mountains all around, not another person in sight most of the time.

Power was the thing I was most nervous about going in. Running a fridge, fan, lights, camera batteries, and a coffee maker – didn't want to be rationing everything by day four. Threw a couple of foldable panels out in the grass each morning and my Bluetti apex 300, it held up the whole trip.

Here's the van parked up. Anyone got good road trip spots to recommend – Especially interesting routes or hidden spots you’ve done lately?

Cheers!

My first proper solo trip — Flew into LA, a drove up the 395 to Rock Creek Lake in the eastern Sierra, then crossed into Utah for the Canyonlands area before flying home.

Camped under these giant pines one night, then woke up by the lake the next morning making coffee. Humbling and awesome at the same time.

Basic kit: a 3-season tent, 20° sleeping bag, one camp chair, a camp lantern, a coffee maker, and a Bluetti elite 100 V2 for power. That covered everything I needed.

Anyone else go solo for the first time and actually get hooked? What’s your go-to setup for multi-day trips like this? Appreciate any tips for next time.

I have a weird habit — whenever a piece of gear earns a permanent spot in my life, I eventually end up printing a tiny version of it for my desk.

A battery backup was inevitable. I'd been losing prints to random midnight power cuts for months. Finally sorted it out, which meant I basically hit "print whatever the hell I want" mode 😂 Finished more models in the last few weeks than the whole quarter before.

So yeah. Got bored. Printed the Bluetti Apex 300 and elite 400. They're just silly desk trinkets but they turned out pretty fun.

Anyone else ever printed a miniature version of something in your setup? What was it?

Been running everything off a desk corner for about a year — router, switch, NAS, all just kind of stacked and zip-tied together. Woke up one morning after a summer storm to find the NAS had rebooted dirty again. Decided I was done in third time.

Spent a few weekends sourcing parts and finally put together a proper little rack. Picked up a UniFi Cloud Gateway Fiber and USW-Flex 2.5G 8 PoE, ran everything through a patch panel, and actually labeled things this time. Also threw in a Bluetti elite 100 V2 to handle UPS duty, we get these random afternoon storms that knock power for like 30 seconds, which was apparently enough to ruin my NAS's whole day.

Way quieter than I expected and the cable situation is actually embarrassing compared to what it was before. Anyway, Anything obviously wrong or that I should fix before I call this done?