Cosmic Geoff

A dew shield. Essential in the UK climate. An external power supply. You should think of upgrading the 10mm eyepiece, as the kit eyepiece is usually of poor quality.

I recommend the Baader Skysurfer III - works well, looks smart and has not gone wrong yet (unlike the basic red-dot kit finders and the more expensive Celestron I tried). Red dot finders will let you correct a wide misalignment, so complement optical finders well. I have never seen the point of using a laser.

I don't think they are any worse than any other make in that respect. If a set of good eyepieces, an external power pack, a phone holder, etc were included it would put up the price to the point where customers would not buy or would go elsewhere. BTW, if you buy the Mak it needs a dew shield. It's essential, not an optional extra, in our climate.

Yes, we got that. But which one? There are scores of different equatorial mount models. A photo of yours might help us help you. But if the mount axis is pointing at Polaris, you may have solved your problem. If you are using the telescope visually, the adjustment is not critical anyway.

You do not need to search for a review of the 127mm Makusov - everybody here who has used one knows that these are fine instruments. I have not seen a Viruoso mount, but I wonder if this is the most suitable mount for your circumstances. Young children tend to grab anything within reach, not least the eyepiece end of a telescope. With a GoTo scope, he last thing you want is anybody pulling at or jolting it after it has been set up, as this will upset the alignment, and you will have to take time out to set it up again. It would seem better to put the scope on a heavy mount that is resistant to being pulled or knocked. I took a 102mm f5 refractor + AZ4-2 mount to an outreach meeting a couple of months ago, and was surprised to find that this low-magnification setup (chosen more for robustness than anything else) gave various members of the public a "wow" factor when aimed at Jupiter and Saturn or the Moon. Inevitably some forum menbers will suggest getting a Dobsonian telescope, where the same money gets you a bigger telescope and a more basic mount, less easily knocked over if floor mounted, and this is certainly something to consider. As for astrophotography, note that 1) it costs a lot of money, and 2) the kit bears little relation to what you would buy for visual use. The 127 Mak + Virtuoso does not look suitable for imaging other than of the most basic sort. For planetary imaging a dedicated planetary video camera attached to the scope,+ laptop will work much better (not child or dog proof?)

I suggest you check the Beginner Scopes from forum sponsor FLO, and then get back to us with any further questions. How far you have to carry the scope, how bad your skies are, and whether you like fancy tech may have a bearing on your final decision.

I would doubt that you need a 'back to the factory' to change an internal battery. I read somwwhere about the characteristics of the Evolution internal battery, and it seemed rather small... Having had to change a number of laptop batteries, I would not expect the Evolution battery to last longer than about 3 years. So long as you get a battery of the same type (e.g. Li-ion) and the same number of cells, a replacement ought to work, even if you have to do some soldering. Or just continue using an external battery/power pack, like the rest of us have to do. With my latest laptop I had to unscrew and unclip the underside, and unscrew the battery, in order to exchange it. I wonder how many owners of ultraslim laptops just take it to a service agent if the battery starts failing. Addendum: Have just read the Cloudynights post above, which details the battery and shows a picture - it has multiple wires going to it - just like laptop batteries have a multiway collector linking them to the charge circuit. Best of luck with changing that if it's wired in. Addendum 2: A post in the Cloudynights thread mentions a battery connector, so looks like it can be unplugged. The battery is in the arm.

I should think that the more solid the mount (and a CGEM II should be pretty solid) the less useful an electric focuser becomes compared with manual focusing. My flip mirror has a limited range focus on the eyepiece port. I suggest you look up helical focusers to see what they look like. I have two, from Svbony - with T2 or other threads one end of a barrel about 40cm long, and a 1.25" fitting for an eyepiece (etc) at the other. By rotating a sleeve they give a focus range of 10cm which does not rotate the eyepiece, camera or other device attached to the oiter end. These can be very useful but do remember that it inserts an extra 40 cm or so into the optical path.

Binoculars in general have a tendency to go out of collimation with time, usage or knocks (mine did.) Combine this with a zoom mechanism, expect it to stay collimated at all zoom levels, and you have a recipe for trouble. Also note that zoom eyepieces have a smaller field of view at low powers than the equivalent fixed eyepiece. In short, cheap zoom binoculars should be avoided like Covid-19.

Looking to the future, and maybe out of your present budget, but if you have the EQ5 with the Synscan GoTo, and a camera and laptop that allow you to platesolve, instead of struggling to get the (possibly invisible) object that you want to image into the field, you can platesolve and then tell the system to re-sync, placing the object dead centre in the image field. I have only used this a few times, but it's brilliant. 😀 (Actually, this should work with any Synscan or Nexstar GoTo mount.)

If you choose another mount and use the dovetail bar fixed to the tube, beware of where the eyepiece etc end up. Choosing an alt-azimuth mount with the arm on the same side as with the Dob base is least likely to result in a 'Gotcha'.

A Maksutov telescope would do all this very well. Maks are generally of excellent optical quality, compact and in most cases never require collimation. I have one and still use it regularly despite having a larger telescope. I bought a Startravel 102mm achro to complement it for widefield, but found that I was using the Mak far more. Buying one telescope (or mount) in hopes that it will do everything is a futile endeavour.

Anything is possible. The question is, what solutions are within your budget, or your technical ability? If you de-mount the optical tube, you could fit it with tube rings and a dovetail bar, and buy a mount with the standard Vixen dovetail clamp (alt-azimuth, equatorial, GoTo - your choice). Or you could buy a steel tripod with a flat top, and figure out how to attach the Dob base to the flat top of the tripod. Or you could make something out of wood and stand the Dob on top of it. Or you could fix a sturdy wooden post in your garden, fix a board on top, and stand the Dob on that.

This is a variant of a question other newbies have posed. Be assured, if it is a GoTo mount, it WILL track. ALL GoTo mounts track.

That is a frequently asked question here, and the answer depends to some extent on what telescope you ultimately buy. The point is, that it is desirable to have a set of three or more eyepieces, and the eyepieces normally bundled with a new scope are designed to get you started without deterring you from buying by adding significantly to the selling price. 🙁 The 9mm and 10mm bundled eyepieces are notoriously poor.

The Nexstar 130 SLT is probably an adequate starter scope. You should budget in addition for a set of decent eyepieces and a proper +12 volt power supply. The SLT mount is mechanically similar to a mount from Skywatcher, and both manufacturers seem to offer 130mm Newtonians and 127mm Maksutov scopes. Note that the Nexstar software is easier to use and more user-friendly than the Sky-watcher Synscan software, despite the ubiquity of the Skywatcher mounts. I have used both, so I should know...

The weight for a given telescope or mount can generally be found on the WWW somewhere if you search around a bit. Why do you need the weight? Have you portability in mind? Note that if you are buying a bundle, the manufacturers often include the lightest and most wobbly mount they can get away with. If it's for back garden use, you would be happier with a sturdy mount like an AZ4-2 with steel legs.

What exactly do you want the widefield refractor for? The CA may not matter on some targets. I have a Startravel 102 and use it mainly for dabbling in EEVA imaging and imaging of DSOs. The focuser is not that bad for visual use, and I added a low-cost helical focuser accessory for imaging. I have used it on a SLT mount (probably the same mechaincs as your 127mm Mak mount) Of course, if you spend more money, you can buy a better instrument. 🙂

I would suspect the 9mm eyepiece, if it came bundled with the telescope. The 9 or 10mm eyepieces I got bundled with new telescopes were not much good and spending £50 or so on a replacement worked wonders.

There seems to be no difference between the C6 OTAs supplied with various mounts (except maybe the colour). I have the SLT mount, so can confirm most of the rude things written about it. 🙂 I have seen some of the C6 SLT deals - they are best read as "Good price for great OTA + a free mount you can use till you get a proper mount, and then use the SLT mount for something else."

I do not recommend the use of AA batteries. The main purpose of the battery holder is to avoid having to bundle a PSU with the mount, which would increase the selling price. Instead use a +12v 'power tank' or a mains powered PSU. I have used my Nexstar SLT mount for imaging, mainly with a 102mm f5 achro refractor, but the mount is barely accurate enough for this. It does tend to drift about, and this is also noticeable when using it for planetary imaging with a 127mm Maksutov, where a very small active FOV is used. With a 102mm f5 achro + ASI224MC camera, exposures of a few seconds for deep space imaging are possible. For better imaging performance, you could upgrade to a Synscan EQ-5 mount. I don't like the Synscan operating system, but with the addition of software and a link cable to give platesolving and resync, the performance is impressive.

I managed to fit a Canon 300D camera to a Startravel ST102. It needed a T2 extension tube about 2 inches long to make it work. I regulary use the scope with a ASI224MC camera and a SVbony helical focuser (no diagonal or extensions).

I saw Venus last evening (17th Nov) for the first time in months. Spotted it at around 203 deg azimuth, 8 deg altitude, in between rooftops to SSW at around 16.50pm. I first saw it from the bathroom window & managed to find a spot in the garden where I could view it with my 127mm Mak. Saw crescent.

Do you intend to do any deep-space imaging? If you do, you need to choose the mount with that purpose in mind. If you do not, be aware that the technique (lucky imaging with video) used for planetary imaging is highly tolerant of mount vibration, drift, etc, so the same kind of mount used for visual observation can be used. It does not even have to be an equatorial, as the individual exposures are very short. This could result in a significant economy... I managed to obtain some satisfactory planetary images using a Celestron SLT light duty alt-azimuth GoTo mount and a Celestron 127mm Mak, similar to yours. It is also perfectly possible to perform planetary imaging with a driven equatorial, non-GoTo mount.

Let's be clear about what the Starsense (camera +handset) does. It automatically performs a star alignment, saving one the bother of choosing alignment stars, finding one of them in the finder, then the main scope, and performing a 2-star align or autoalign. While the Starsense is doing its thing, you could be moving accessory gear outside. Starsense works by plate-solving, but it is not a direct equivalent of the plate-solve you can perform yourself with your own camera and software. The results of a Starsense plate-solve cannot be directly accessed. I have found that the Starsense is of most benefit when attached to a quick-deploy setup like my C8 SE, where the whole assemblage can be caried outside as a single unit, Starsense started and the setup ready for observing within minutes (ignoring cool-down time). Personally I have not found the Starsense to be as accurate as a good 2-star auto-align. but it is accurate enough to get objects into a low-power eyepiece and it certainly saves some annoying fiddling about and crouching. And the handset has some handy object lists. If you have a heavy kit that needs to be assembled before use, and which has GPS, the time taken by doing a 2-star align is a small proportion of the total assembly & setup time (typically 20-30 minutes), and it hardly seems worthwhile attaching a £300+ accessory to shave a little off this time. What kind of imaging are you intending to carry out? Your choice of scope and mount implies that you have in mind either planetary imaging, or deep-space imaging of small objects. Be advised that while the former should be fine, the latter is by all accounts NOT for beginners. I have tried unguided images of planetary nebulae with a C8 and the images are no sharper (allowing for the difference in image scale) than those taken through a much cheaper 102mm achro refractor. You may get more satisfying results if you start your deep-space imaging with a small hgh-quality refractor, or even a camera + telephoto lens. Have you acquired and read the book "Making Every Photon Count" by Steve Richards? It is repeatedly recommended here as a guide for would-be astro imagers.