Nicola Fletcher

It looks absolutely fabulous- and also the sort of setup you’ll get loads of use out of. Congratulations! Mine has arrived in Dublin and cleared customs so I’m hoping for delivery on Monday (fingers crossed). What do you think it’ll be like for DSOs? I’m assuming planets will look wonderful. I think we will get a lot of fun from these scopes 😊

Thinking of just going all out and getting the Altair RACI - I haven’t used a finderscope in a while but I really liked the one that was on my LX200. Wicklow is a good place for reasonably dark skies - although I brought my little 127 Mak to the Burren in Co. Clare last summer and Wow the skies were great! Leitrim and Sligo would be good too I imagine

Thanks a lot - I’m thinking of getting the Altair RACI finder too. Yours looks great on your scope!

Thank you - having everyone’s input made it easier to press the button. I might hold out for the AZ-EQ5 - I really like the look of it and I think the scope will look great on it. Enjoy yours!

It looks absolutely fantastic - can’t wait to see mine in the flesh! Hope you get clear skies soon 🤞

Thank you all very much for your help - I just bought the scope and a star diagonal from Altair. Now to wait until mounts are easier to find than hens’ teeth! @Carl Au looking forward to seeing your setup!

Do you mind me asking which RACI finder you are using? I just bought the same scope and I haven’t picked out a finderscope yet. Do you know if the Altair finder comes with the bracket to fit it to the scope? TIA!

Thank you very much for all these suggestions. The AZ-EQ5 would definitely fit the bill. I think I’ll stick with a 4 inch - I learned my lesson with that 10” SCT - really appreciate your input and help.

Hi all, May I ask your advice? I’d really like a refractor, for visual only, that is portable. I recently gave up on a 10 inch Meade LX200 which was just too big for me to move (I live in the Wicklow mountains in Ireland with Bortle 4 skies but really nice dark skies facing south away from Dublin). I’ve been using a 127 Mak and binoculars for the past few years and I love them, but I have refractor-envy and am happy to pay £1000 - £1500 for the scope, and then buy a suitable mount separately. I’ve been looking at this: https://www.altairastro.com/starwave-102ed-r-fpl53-refractor-459-p.asp and wonder what your opinion is? Also, mount-wise, there doesn’t seem to be much choice in the way of alt-az, GoTo mounts that can handle this payload but are still portable - is the HEQ5 Synscan a terrible idea given that I only want to use this setup for visual use? I’ve been looking online and reading reviews for too long now, and hope you might be able to steer me in the right direction. Thanks in advance! Nicola

Hello from Roundwood in Wicklow!