Louis D

A bit late to reread this post, but did you remember to subtract VAT from the UK prices before comparing them to US prices? As I've repeated many times, US sales tax varies from state to state, county to county, and city to city. As a result, it cannot be included in the listed sales price online. I have no idea how local governments collect their VAT. Do they get a fixed cut of the national VAT on every sale?

I'm a bit confused. The Celestron 130 doesn't appear to be that big of a scope relative to something like a solid tube 8" Dobsonian. How small of a car do you drive to Scotland? How much other luggage goes with you to Scotland? My daughter takes her Chevy Equinox camping. It has plenty of room for her, her fiance, her dog, their camping gear, their clothing, a 127 Mak, tripod, and alt-az mount. It's considered a rather compact SUV by American standards (as compared to a Chevy Traverse or Suburban). I take my old Chevy Astro van camping, and I can pack my 15" truss Dob in back fully collapsed with plenty of room to spare for gear for the entire family with the third seat removed. It would help to understand exactly how you're getting to Scotland, and how much space you have to spare before making travel scope recommendations.

What? You told the wife you're getting these? I usually until I've had the chance the use them a few nights to ensure I want to keep them. Then, when she asks what I want for Christmas, I tell her I'm already taken care of, and she can wrap them up at that point. She's usually thrilled to be done so easily with shopping for me.

Try putting some vibration dampening pads under each tripod foot. I found that vibration dampening went from 2 to 3 seconds down to a half second with them. This was with my rather solid DSV-1 mount on a Manfrotto tripod and a 72ED scope.

I agree with @scotty38. I'd take my 17mm ES-92 Barlowed to 8.5mm any day over my generic 9mm Kellner.

🤔

Was it a flat field scope? I've noticed field curvature in short f/6 refractors rather quickly ruins the field; thus, I use a TSFLAT2 with my 72ED. If it was an 8" f/6 Dob, then it can basically be treated as flat field. I'm sorry it didn't work out for you either way.

Here's how the 20mm SVBONY UWA looks in my 127 Mak from the same distance as the above comparison image: I included the Orion Centering SWA for comparison because it performs more poorly at both f/6 and f/12. It is a bit wider, but notice that the edge marks are less distinct. To my eye, the SVBONY looked fine at f/12 while the Orion did not.

This is more what is likely to happen in the US. They redesign a 90 degree intersection into a "roundabout" by putting a raised, circular island in the middle of it. Next thing you know, some drunk comes tearing down the street late at night and hits the raised island, launching it through the air: I was most impressed it dislodged the large boulder.

Pretty much, all American "traffic circles" are roundabouts in reality. The old fashioned traffic circles like Columbus Circle are all but nonexistent nowadays.

Forget about obscure scenarios like that. Americans have no idea who has to yield the right of way at traffic circles. I've seen drivers go crashing into circles thinking those in the circle will yield to them, and I've seen drivers bring the circle to a stop to allow another driver to enter from the side. Since we didn't grow up with them, they're a complete mystery to us.

At what f-ratio did you test it? I've found the 20mm performs fine at f/18 in my Barlowed binoviewer and nearly as well in my f/12 Mak. They do suffer at f/6, but the central part is no worse than a 20mm Plossl. I would presume the 15mm to perform no worse since they're a scaled design. Worst eyepiece I've looked through was a 20mm generic RK (Reversed Kellner?). See below for an f/6 comparison with other eyepieces at this focal length. The SVBONY 68 does quite well in comparison. For the $20 I paid for it, it's hard to fault it.

Also, be aware that not all planetary copies are the same:

I'll have to check my $50 2" dielectric Amazon diagonal against that one. The biggest problem with it is that the 2" compression ring is mounted too high and forces eyepieces with undercuts up at an angle. Otherwise, it works just fine.

From Wikipedia: In observational astronomy, a double star or visual double is a pair of stars that appear close to each other as viewed from Earth, especially with the aid of optical telescopes. This occurs because the pair either forms a binary star (i.e. a binary system of stars in mutual orbit, gravitationally bound to each other) or is an optical double, a chance line-of-sight alignment of two stars at different distances from the observer.

I really like the GSO 2" dielectric diagonals. I don't think the quartz upgrade makes any difference that I can see (I have both versions). I really like their zero added height 1.25" adapter. If your 1.25" and 2" eyepieces all focus at or near their shoulders, then this really speeds up switching between them because of minimal refocusing. The casing is built like a tank, so flexure isn't an issue even with the heaviest 2" eyepieces. I believe they are sold as Revelation Astro in the UK as well as TPO in the US.

If you've got the available in-focus, and the planets are always low along the horizon for you; then I think the ZWO ADC is well worth a try for as little as it costs relative to premium planetary eyepieces. I usually see them sell quickly for a high percentage of new cost on astro classifieds if it doesn't work out for you.

http://skyinspector.co.uk/atm-dispersion-corrector--adc/ https://astronomyconnect.com/forums/articles/zwo-atmospheric-dispersion-corrector-product-review.34/ http://www.weasner.com/co/Reviews/2019/ZWO_ADC/index.html

The Zhumell Z8 is discontinued. The Apertura AD8 and Orion SkyLine 8" are the same thing and the latter is currently available in the US. It's also sold as StellaLyra in Europe. All are made by GSO in Taiwan. It's a really good starter scope. Another really good option is the Explore Scientific (Bresser in Europe) 8" FirstLight Dob. The big altitude trunnions make for better motion in that axis than either the GSO or Synta (Sky Watcher, Orion SkyQuest, etc.) Dobs with their smaller diameter axles. There's an affordable 2 speed focuser upgrade available to bring it into parity with the GSO Dob. JOC presumably makes both the ES and Bresser versions as it is their parent company.

Just don't try to use canned air to blow off dust as this is the result:

Being an engineer and being a stickler for precision, I always want to measure these items to see if they are exactly 454g as labelled and not 453g or 455g. If not, false labelling. 1lb leaves a lot of wiggle room when it comes to measurement precision. Is pound cake referred to as 454g cake there?

I'm surprised the EU never got on your collective case for not switching.

I always wondered if Brits prounce meter "metray" like resumé since the r and e are reversed. You're kidding. There's no consistency, and yet they're pronounce the same? How do you spell better? Good, bettre, best?

No confusion here, though the closest to your "long necks" here that I can recall was a 1983 Budweiser poster:

No one has brought it up, but do you have astigmatism in your observing eye? Check you eyeglass prescription's CYL or cylinder amount. If it's greater than 1.0 diopter, you might want to looking into longer eye relief eyepieces at the longer focal lengths. If you don't wear eyeglasses at all, then you're all set to use whatever you want. Keep eyepiece weight in mind with that scope's helical focuser and two pole truss design. I would imagine flex might start being a problem with heavier eyepieces. However, since it can't accept 2" eyepieces, this tends to naturally keep eyepiece weight down.