Quick question

[Astro-Bob.]

Does the Nexstar 8SE come with lens covers and a big cover for the front end?

[Capricorn]

Guessing: Lens cover, well corrector plate cover, but not a dew shield, which I presume is the big cover referred to.

That seems normal for the Mak's and SCT's on offer.

Dew shield is easy to make, suitable strip of foam of some sort is what most use.

[Astro-Bob.]

Ahhh that's the word corrector plate cover, is that what you call the front end then? I did mean that, not the dew sheild, a sort of lid for the front

[LukeSkywatcher]

The plate/lens cover for the 8SE is one of the nagatives with the scope. It has grooves in it that must be aligned up with small screws on the scope itself. Very tricky to put on.

[Capricorn]

Not sure if the Celestron ones screw on, I would expect them to. The ones on Meades are screw on. Nice and safe but you can spend some time trying to unscrew them, the thread seems quite fine and there are lot of them. Also a pain if cross threaded.

On Maks and SCT's the front thing is a corrector plate, used to compensate for the spherical mirror.

The reflector in the centre helps fold the light back again and I think is also part of the correction.

All gets complex with regards the optics.

For a cheap dew shield I use the fairly thin foam from Hobby World (hobby Craft?), just don't think that a sheet is sufficent to circle an 8" scope.

[Astro-Bob.]

Excellent, thanks guys, I will expect it to come with a cover then, I did order a dew shield with it.

[Peter Drew]

The 8SE comes with a bayonet type fit for the front corrector cover, a big improvement over the original ones which always fell off. The eyepiece aperture has a nice red plastic plug to seal it.