Pascal Hilkens Astro Page

Saturday, May 24, 2025

ATT Essen 2025

My first visit to to ATT Essen, the biggest European Astronomy fair, was back in 2017. I missed some editions during Covid-19 period but attend all others. This year ATT Essen celebrated40 years. Beginning of this year I submitted a couple of pictures and a short text answerring their request "Wanted: Besucher-Statements für Jubiläumsschrift zum 40. ATT! Einsendungen mit Name und Wohnort erbeten bis 28.02.2025 an karsten.plewnia@sternwarte-essen.de. Awesome to see that my submission was published in their publication which was handed over at the entrance.

on the picture fltr: Pascal, Walter, Jean-Marie, Johan, Jean-Claude

This year only Helios colleague Johan and myself went to ATT Essen. We left very early around 7h15 which resulted in an early arrival in Essen. We parked our car at Parkplatz 1 and started electrical charging. When we arrived at the entrance it was 9h30 with a long waiting row.

Once inside we first visited the (class)rooms with used equipment. Johan immediately bought a set of color filters while I was looking for connectors. Around 11AM we split; Johan joined a lecture on optics and I visited the other stands. We met each other after the lecture and took a traditional German meal: Schnitzel and frites.

Some interesting things to mention :

A modular mount was presented which has some great features. I was also impressed by the PiFinder. A rasperry Pi with camera and software which is placed on your scope (typically dobson) to find your way at the sky. If you don't have a goto.. this is a great support; cost about 400€. I finally bought a ZWO715MC camera for a reduced price.

During the tour we met some people from Belgium: Philip from Mira, Hugo from Astromarket, Joost from Capella Hoegaarden and Daniel from our own solar chat. With Daniel, I also joined the lecture by dr. Udo Siepmann who shared his experience capturing the sun.