tom33pr

Hi there, I've had one of those (10" Intelliscope), and yes - I would highly recommend it. Great optics, good quality scope. Regarding your questions Is it a good scope for deepsky?- Certainly is!Is this a good scope in general?- Absolutely (considering other DOBs with the same/similar price tag on the market)Should I get this instead of another reflector that is 10"?-Depending what you mean by another reflector... Do you have anything specific in mind?Should I buy this scope?- I am not sure anyone could answer this. You should maybe ask yourself a few questions first?Have you had any other scopes yet? If not, maybe it is a bit too early for a 10" then... Are you familiar with the sky? Do you know where to look for things? If not, maybe you could do more reading and experience with something smaller first... Or consider the push-to version of the same scope (Intelliscope type), that will guide you around the sky. Do you need a portable scope (are you going to be heading away to remote sites for observing)? If so, you need to take into account the size and weight of this bad boy. It is big... and I mean - big! It is borderline portable. I wouldn't fancy moving around anything bigger than that. Lastly, do you have any back problems? If so - this bad boy could only make it worse... Hope it helps.

A friend of mine is asking for a bit of help regarding starter bins, with the budget up to £100. Just got a pair of Olympus 10x50 but they arrived out of collimation so sent them back and he now considers going ever so slightly higher in magnification. Would a pair of 15x... make any sense, considering the tripod is a bit wobbly; however we are talking mainly indoors, terrestrial observing. What would you recommend within this budget? Thanks in advance for any input. Posted this in the wrong section yesterday btw. Sorry.

Hi there, A friend of mine is asking for a bit of help regarding starter bins, with the budget up to £100. Just got a pair of Olympus 10x50 but they arrived out of collimation so sent them back and he now considers going ever so slightly bigger in magnification. Just note that the tripod he has is not too sturdy, but the bins will be used mainly for terrestrial observing and indoors. What would you recommend within this budget? Thanks in advance for any input. ------------------------------ OOOOps, just noticed I've posted it in the wrong section. Apologies. Admin, please move this to Discussions - Binoculars Thank you!

As Steve mentioned - DOB would be useless as far as imaging is concerned... Roughly judging your budget based on the scopes you mentioned and the fact you don't want an EQ mount it will be a bit tricky to get imaging out if it... unless you stretch a bit and get sturdier alt-az GOTO scope... you could mount your DSLR on a Nexstar 6 for instance. ...and what sort of problems did you have with your brother's 127?

I used to use the standard 2x TeleVue barlow and was very happy with it. It's affordable s/h and I would consider it a big upgrade to the one you broke Good luck.

Apart from the star test It's good to do a 'day-light' check too: http://www.robincasa...ges/collim.html (you can just use a simple collimation cap for it). ...just to make sure

Why not jump in the car one evening and go to the country for a few hour session? I am sure you would enjoy it, and I'm sure you don't even have to drive that far to see all the objects from your list and many more...

Congrats, well done. ...How does the 26 perform (is your Tal f8)? Would you recommend? Thinking of getting the 24 for my Mak.

This is a beautiful shot!!! Congrats. One of my favourite objects

Thanks James. Geat answer!

Great Damian, thanks. I was wondering how the primary is attached... is there a spring(s) behind it? What gives it this smooth movement? Thanks.

Any Mak experts around here? I've been googling a bit on Maks and tried to find any useful diagrams that would show the primary mirror in a Maksutov (specifically Nexstar)... but couldn't really find anything detailed enough. I'm just wondering how exactly the primary mirror is built in Maksutov scopes. Any input appreciated...

It is weird... I must say I was a bit worried until I took it out last night.. As I mentioned I ended up with perfectly round offset pattern plus the stunning views of Jupiter and a few Messiers kind of convinced me that everything is ok. Out tonight again...

Thanks dirk. Had it out for a quick test and star-collimated it. It was a bit off, but after a few tweaks the offset appeared perfectly round. I'm pretty confident it is fine collimation-wise; however, the lack of sharpness on detail when looking at a remote tree this afternoon, still concerns me... Needs more investigation Anyway,thanks again.

Folks, My s/h Nexstar 5 has just arrived. I took it outside to do the alignment and when pointing at a very remote tree (noon time) I noticed that I can focus the scope on the tip of it fine, except the image it produced wasn't as sharp as I would expect. I had done that previously with different scopes and I was able to resolve much more detail than in this case. I mean the detail is there - it's just a bit too hazy... My guess is it is out of collimation... I tried to adjust the screws ever so slightly but it didn't help. I gave up after a few minutes - it is probably not the best idea to mess around with the screws using the tree as the point of reference. Any suggestions? Thanks in advance.