Lady Isabella

This take by Roland Christen on flourite/fluorite

http://www.cloudynights.com/item.php?item_id=388

No doubt the dealer was peeved because you went for a TMB, for Takahashi have been building triplet refractors for 40 years now. The first one decribed as semi-apochromat was built in 1969, then in 1972 they brought out an 80mm fluorite triplet scope. Five years later a 90mm model was introduced. By 1983, the FCT range was in development with many models hitting the market by 1985.

Over the years I've been fortunate to look through many fine and splendid refractors from different makers. But I have to say that one of the best scopes I have is my 30 year old Towa 80mm f/15 Achromat with its standard magnesium lens coatings.

The planetary and double star views are simply stunning.

Just as an interesting note, Sir John Herschel tells us about object-glasses

built by Dr.Blair, that were free from chromatic and spherical aberration.

These were made some 25 years before the Cooke triplet lenses.

When the Cooke p-v scopes came out, they were regarded as being excellent,

sadly for Cooke's, the new Schott glass that was used turned out to be reactive

with the elements. This led to much public mud-slinging, with claim and counter-claim being made. A nice article on the whole episode can be seen here:

http://www.europa.com/~telscope/hdtaylor.txt