Hi everyone. I hope your having better skies than me here
I have been considering getting a second telescope, with an emphasis on portability and ease of travel. Despite the current circumstances, I do find myself going around a bit, and I will make a point of getting my butt to at least 2000 m ASL as soon as that doesn’t land me in quarantine here in Germany (ergo, probably not that soon).
Anyway, 6 months ago I became the rather happy and satisfied owner of an 8” Dob, which has been a lot of fun to play with. However, portability is not exactly its strong suit, and I’m looking at something that:
a) I can take with me when flying
b) I can take with me on the sidecar when the wife and I manage to escape from family life again, or in whatever room is left on a car when dragging a family with 3 kids around.
My criteria are actually rather simple. It has to pack into as little volume as possible, allow me to mount it on a tripod or at best something like an AZ-GTi, and preferably no observable chromatic aberration on visual observation. I am ok-ish with waiting to buy something more expensive, with a somewhat limited aperture, and to fiddle a bit with it if needed. I like to do a bit of everything with the telescope, but I am also aware of the limitations these criteria impose. That being said, while the criteria are “simple”, the answers are all somewhat unsatisfying.
I’ve considered getting a small, high quality refractor such as a Televue or Takahashi 60 mm (basically marrying that thing, because at those prices, buyer’s remorse is not an option), a small Maksutov (but then I compromise on DSOs), a SCT such as a C5 (also a compromise), or even strip a Heritage 130p of its mount and carry the damn thing with me.
I live under Bortle 4 skies, and have the possibility of getting away to dark sites relatively often (epidemics allowing), but most of the time I have to pack lightly.
Do any of you more experienced ladies and gentlemen have any recommendations or insights on something that I may have missed?
- Tiago