John

Fantastic scope ! I have the F/9.2 and the optical quality is outstanding. The F/6's are just as good despite their faster focal ratio I've heard. The build of the scope generally is really excellent as well. I use an AP Maxbright diagonal with mine but I'm mulling over a Baader BBHS prism in the 2 inch size as an alternative.

When I had those early AZ100 units to try out I had them on an Uni 28 and found that I could carry around the mount / tripod in one piece, with some care and, as John says, I would not have wanted to negotiate stairs with it.

Does this spell the end of the dielectric dominance of the diagonal world ?

This is quite a good representation of Alnitak through a 101mm refractor It can be quite a tough one though if the seeing is unsteady, scope not quite cooled, etc ,etc.

The only issue that I've seen people run into when replacing the focuser on the ST80's is making sure that the replacement unit is of a suitable optical length so that eyepieces will come to focus when a 2 inch diagonal is used. A 2 inch diagonal has a longer optical length than a 1.25 inch. The great thing about the ST80 is that even with the stock 1.25" focuser you can get a 4 degree true field with a 24mm super wide eyepiece such as the ES 24 / 68 or Panoptic 24 or a 32mm plossl

I'm not bothered about having a mirror in the system, as long as it's a good one. Likewise, I'm happy to use lens based eyepieces in my 12 inch dobsonian

That's how I feel about OO as well

Having checked the spec of the Baader T2 prism I use with my Tak, it appears that it is the BBHS version so I'll try it in the 130mm triplet sometime and see if I can notice any differences over the Astro Physics Maxbright that I use with that scope currently. I probably need a night of exceptional seeing so that might take some time ! (Can't seem to get "seeing" of any kind lately )

I've been wondering about moving to a 2 inch Baader BBHS prism diagonal for my 130mm F/9.2 triplet but I'm doubtful that I will notice the difference for the additional £'s spent

I used to have one. I now have the Giro Ercole which is very similar Getting the tripod right and, with these "T" type alt-az mounts makes a lot of difference to how steady they are and how smooth their motions are. They do have a lot of capacity. ED120 on one side, ED150 on the other:

I use a Baader T2 Zeiss spec prism with my F/9 Tak FC100-DL but Tele Vue and Astro Physics mirror diagonals with my other refractors. I have not yet tried the prism in one of my faster refractors - I might one night, out of interest.

Depends on the model. The FC100's range from 2.8kg to 3.8kg. The tube length is as, if not more, crucial in determining the success or otherwise of a scope / mount combination.

I'm a great fan of the alt-azimuth mount as well. I have had a few equatorials over the years but now I only use alt-azimuths.

Meade produced an F/6.3 SCT in the 8 and 10 inch apertures a few years ago. It was not a great success as I recall. People seemed to prefer the performance that the F/10 versions produced and would use an F/6.3 focal reducer if they wanted wider views. Mak-cassegrains have always been F/10 or slower as far as I know. Mak-newtonians can be faster though but you don't get the advantage of the short tube length with those because its not such a "folded" optical design. Schmidt-Newtonians are fast scopes available in focal ratio of F/4 but again you don't get that really short tube advantage.

I have read of people applying dark red nail varnish to the light source to dim it down. It's not a colour that I wear though

It can be done. This is 50% better looking

That one is basic but the cost is low, the window has some dew protection and is larger than some and the "dot" is not as much of a "sploge" as some. One of the worst RDF's that I have used is the Tele Vue Qwik-Point which I had on a Tele Vue Ranger refractor. It was barely usable in all honesty. Cheap but not nice. No wonder the Tele Vue lettering started to wear off so quickly - perhaps it was embarrassed

I've owned two scopes with Orion Optics mirrors in them. Both have been good performers. My current one has 10 year old coatings which are still in excellent shape.

I have had a few of those those RDF's over the years - a bit too bright on all the settings for astronomy IMHO The Tele Vue device does at least have some sort of dew shield. That's an odd looking scope in the 2nd picture - very small aperture ?

I will look forward reading your findings Dave And I'm with you all the way with Meade, having had quite a few disappointments with their stuff over the years

Like most astro accessories there are a wide range of options and prices of finders available. What's a days wages in return for a lifetimes excellent finding anyway ? I'd still like to try one.

I think many RDF's we use are based on rifle sights so originally intended primarily for daytime use. The Rigel and Telrad finders were developed by astronomers. I would like to try a Tele Vue Starbeam sometime and see whether their price is justified: https://www.widescreen-centre.co.uk/tele-vue-starbeam-finders.html

Yes, exactly that.

I now find that RACI optical finders do practically all I need in terms of finding with my refractors. I do use the Rigel Quikfinder and 9x50 RACI optical combo on my 12 inch dobsonian. The 100mm and 102mm refractors have their own 6x30 RACI's and the 120mm and 130mm refractors, 9x50 RACI units. I have a couple of spare Vixen RDF's knocking around just in case I feel that's a better tool for a particular task but 90% of the time the RACI opticals get the results. The slight downside is that I now have a collection of 5 RACI's and 3 illuminated reticule finders. While the Skywatcher type finder mounts with the sprung pin and two nylon screws do work pretty well, I have a couple of finder mounts that use three screws at both ends and those hold finders much more solidly, virtually never needing re-adjustment with the main scope optics. This type of finder mount: I like my finders to be aligned to the point that what is on the centre of the cross hair will be in the centre of the field of view at 200x plus though the main scope.

Well, when I compared the Meade 4000 UWA 6.7mm with the Pentax XW 7mm that I replaced it with, even I could see the difference in brightness when observing smaller DSO's such as planetary nebula. On brighter targets such as the moon, planets and double stars, the light transmission has no real impact though. But, as we must always say, "your mileage may vary"