John

I've always wanted to own an Astro Physics refractor. They are like hens teeth to find over here though and command high prices when they do come up. I had the chance to buy an AP Star ED 120 around a decade back but I passed on it for one reason or another. I sometimes regret that decision 🤔 Right now I seem to be very attracted to an Ernie Elliot brass 3.1 inch F/15 refractor which is currently being sold. That desire is totally illogical though, given the other scopes that I already own. It's just such a wonderful looking instrument though ........

I find this tool for assessing Triton's position is useful but I generally consult it after having a go for it, to avoid averted imagination kicking in: Neptune's Triton Tracker (skyandtelescope.org) Stellarium and Cartes du Ciel seem to plot the position of these faint planetary moons quite accurately as well.

Sorry it's me again 🙄 I've seen Triton visually several times with my 12 inch dobsonian and a couple of times under very good conditions with my 130mm refractor. I was hoping to see it with my 120mm refractor at the last opposition but that didn't happen, or at least not conclusively, mostly due to poor weather. I still think it's possible with that scope though. Maybe even with a 100/102mm if things fall into place. When I had the 12 inch dob I also managed to see Oberon and Titania, Uranus's brightest moons. I've not managed that with a smaller aperture as yet though. Triton is quite magical to see visually. It's just a faint dot of course but it is the most distant rock and ice world that I've managed to see. I seem to specialise in faint dots of light 🙄

It would probably be my 100mm refractor for me as well.

I've tried to switch my radar off from time to time but it's just to hard too avoid peeking at UK Astro Buy & Sell and the classifieds on SGL a couple of times a day. It's a bad habit - I've just seen a C8 that I fancy but my other scopes are hardly getting used lately 🙄

If I was in your position now I would be looking very seriously at the Stellamira 125 ED doublet as well. When I was (quite a few years back) a good 125/127 mm refractor was not within my budget so I ended up with an ED120 instead. That was excellent and I use it a lot. The Stellamira 125 should be handled by your HEQ5 without any drama.

Hello and welcome to the forum 🙂 Of those that you list, I would only recommend the Skywatcher 200P Classic. It is tried and tested and there are many happy owners of it on this forum. The Visionking branded scopes do not look impressive to me. The scopes numbered 4. and 5 on your list would appear to be of the bird-jones reflector type which are generally best avoided. I have owned 2 Skywatcher 200P dobsonians, one quite recently, and they were both very good scopes.

Maybe someone in Bristol Astronomical Society has those skills ? You could try contacting the Secretary and they would ask within the membership: secretary@bristolastrosoc.org.uk

I gave up trying to justify (to myself and others) why I own many scopes and eyepieces. If I'm asked I just sort of mumble something now and change the subject 🙄

I did and I got the azimuth motion sorted with a single "milk carton washer". It was a very good scope but, probably influenced by the rather poor weather we have had over the past few months, it was not getting used enough so I let it go to a new home.

I have 6 scopes currently, all refractors: - Tasco 60mm F/13.3 achromat - Altair Starwave 70mm F/6 ED doublet - Takahashi FC100-DL F/9 Fluorite doublet - Vixen ED102SS F/6.5 ED doublet - Skywatcher ED120 Pro F/7.5 ED doublet - APM/TMB/LZOS 130mm F/9.2 triplet When I get the urge for some more aperture again it will probably be a reflector. I'm not sure I want to deal with a refractor larger than 130mm now 🤔

Thanks Mike, Yes, I still have the Tasco in it's wooden box complete with the rather wobbly alt-az yoke mount and .965" eyepieces. Every now and then I set it up and have a look at something for old times sake 🙂

Maybe we need a separate thread: "Tell us about your memorable astronomy event" ?

I don't know the answer to this Dave. It's much easier to see this dim target with a 12 inch scope but I have found it possible to at least glimpse it with much smaller apertures. Refractors are well known for their contrast and do seem to exceed expectations on DSO's quite often.

That was a memorable event. My only scope at that time was my little 60mm Tasco from the 1960's. I projected the sun's image onto a piece of card and managed to snap a few (rather crude) photos with my Pentax K1000 35mm SLR. As my children and their friends went to school (which was just across the road from where we live) I was able to show them and their parents some views of the transit. A lot of fun though 🙂 This was the "mighty beast" that I used that day:

I owned a Hyperflex 7.2mm - 21.5mm zoom for quite a while. It's optical quality was pretty good but the AFoV was narrower than the spec says - more like 36 degrees to 53 degrees perhaps ? (my estimations). I used it with the Baader Q-Turret 2.25x barlow and the high power performance in it's barlowed 9.5mm - 3.2mm zoom range was surprisingly good. I feel that the Hyperion 8-24 zoom (Mk IV) is a bit better (certainly noticeably wider AFoV) and the SVbony 3-8mm quite a lot better but the zoom range on that latter one only overlaps the un-barlowed zoom by a small amount of course.

I always felt that Messier 81 and 82 were more interesting through a scope than Messier 31 is. I guess I'm biased, though because those were the first galaxies that I ever saw with a scope. I found M31 later with binoculars.

I seem to 🙄 I really enjoy searching out faint targets with rather small aperture scopes. Stuff that is at the edge of what the aperture / conditions / observer can see. Usually it's that last component that is the weak one ! Next clear and dark night I'll be trying to spot the quasar 3C 273 in Virgo with 130mm or smaller apertures 🙂

I agree with the comments regarding the visibility of M31 above. Taking a different type of deep sky object, with the brighter globular clusters, these aperture increases will show noticeable differences in the resolution of stars within the cluster and the depth towards the core that is resolved. With a 10 inch and upwards aperture, M13 starts to look like some of the images you see of it. Quite splendid 🙂

The Askar 140mm triplet does look very appealing for it's cost. I'm a little wary about being an "early adopter" though. I'm going to wait for a larger body of considered feedback from owners covering a number of examples of the scope before considering it myself. There have been low cost triplets that have actually shown more CA than ED doublets in the past. I'm not saying the Askar is one of those but I'm just cautious.

Yep, the ED150 is quite big. This is it compared with my ED120:

Jupiter rarely responds well to really high magnifications, whatever the capabilities of the scope. In all the scopes that I've owned (up to 12 inch in aperture) around 200x is about the highest magnification that I've found really useful when observing Jupiter. Saturn, Mars, Venus etc are a different proposition. You seem to be able to throw more magnification at them and get decent results. Not Jupiter though.

For what I think you are interested in, the levels of accuracy of optical figure, polishing and coating are just as important as control of CA, IMHO, maybe even more so 🙂

Can any doublet be a "full apo" ? Thats the subject of many long threads on another forum I can think of !

There have been a few newtonians where the secondary mirror was positioned away from the optical axis of the primary mirror, on the side of the tube. Off-axis newtonians. No secondary support vanes of course. Here is a review of a DGM 5.5 inch off-axis dob by Ed Ting: Telescope Reviews, Page 7 It impressed the reviewer but there are a number of drawbacks with the design (cost being one of them). Orion (USA) even had one in their catalogue for a while but the design was not popular so it didn't last. I imagine that collimation is an interesting process 🤔