New Dew Heaters
Back last fall I was fortunate enough to win a $50 gift certificate from Kendrick Astro Instruments in Toronto at the Fall’N’Stars Star Party 2010. I had won one in the past but lost it and forgot to use it/could not find it before it expired.
This time however I ordered almost immediately. I was looking for a spare heater controller as of the two we have, one is a little flaky. I was also looking for a heating band big enough to use on our cameras and or big 2″ eyepieces.
Well, the order arrived late last week. I was not lucky in that the controller I had ordered was discontinued and the new design was not in production yet.
Here is the new Firelite micro controller (with two standard size RCA jacks), and the Dewminator (2006-L DEW-Minator Large Eyepiece Heater 10 0.8 75 x 205 mm 3″ x 8″)
Using the micro controller is going to be harder than I thought. It has a single control button, used in various ways, (push, push and hold), sequences (wait until one state occurs than push for more commands), etc. It was a way to reduce the cost of a controller down from $120 to $76 but we will wait and see for a final judgement once we use it out in the field.
The specs say it can handle up to 12vdc, 7 amps = 84 watts, which is a *lot*.
The 2006-L Dewminator Large heater is designed for 10 watts.