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The reason I don't really want to recommend the 4SE mount is that, if it is anything like the mount that came with my 4SE,

Made a tiny mistake, meant to say my 8SE instead of 4SE, I never had a 4SE.

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I have a 6SE and a 127... the 127 definitely punches above its weight! The 6SE has a more solid mount, but I probably wouldn't have appreciated that at the beginning. The mount on the 127 just requires a little patience while focussing, or a motorised focuser. The 4/5SE mount looks like it has thicker legs than the 127 but not the same as the 6/8SE, so it would be hard to judge whether it's worth the extra. Both pack away quite tidily, although the 127 is more portable being lighter and the legs slide more into themselves reducing the overall mount length if you were chucking them in the back of the car or something.

In the way of accessories, you'll want dew shield and a power tank of some description. There are so many eyepieces to choose from, take your time to research and experiment.

I don't regret my choice(s), but like of the other guys have mentioned, there are plenty of other choices that may work better for you, depending on what value you place on goto, etc. I've loved every session I've had, the only frustrating thing being the weather! Doesn't stop me wanting a whole collection of scopes :)

Whatever you choose, take some time to get to know it, enjoy it, and get out to a darker site from time to time - you'll be surprised what you can see :)

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I'm a happy 4SE owner. Really sharp and I see plenty of detail on planets, including Mars.

I have been dabbling in photography with the 4SE. The trick is to take the scope off the mount and attach the camera directly to the mount, then set up the mount in equatorial mode. I can get up to five minutes without star trails at 55mm focal length, so once I have some filters and lenses in the 50-100mm range I will get to dark skies and try some widefield images. You have to be psychic to polar align the mount though - no polar scope so you just have to point the north leg at polaris and sight along it :-)

The 4SE is well made and a nice package.

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The eyepieces I got for my 4SE are 24mm hyperion, 17mm hyperion, 9mm TS Planetary, 6mm TS Planetary. I also subsequently bought a 9mm Speer WALER...

One accessory you will need, but you can make it from a camping mat, is a dew shield. THe corrector plate on the front gets fogged most summer/autumn nights.

In response to the suggestion to get a startravel - I own a StarTravel 80 and I can say that the optics of the 4SE are top-drawer and the ST80 are bargain basement and will only give low-magnification views of faint objects. StarTravels are appallingly bad for viewing planets because of the false color fringes they show.

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you will need a dew shield and a power tank and lead, You can get the power tank from maplins which will be cheaper than the celestron or skywatcher one. The lead is a 2.1mm tip positive. Many people make their dew shields out of camping mat.

Dunkster mentioned the mount on the 6 and 8se as being a lot more solid, so it is but that is a completely different mount to the 4 and 5se although they look the same.

The 4 and 5se are not bad scopes, they are however in my opinion bad value as they are very overpriced in comparison to their skywatcher equivalents best value of the se range is the 6se and the best view is the 8se. The 6 and 8 are the best portable goto scopes around. the 4 and 5 are trading off the name. the 4se is a fine scope the celestron 127 or skymax 127 are better and cheaper. I have a nexstar 5 and I can't in all conscience recommend it as a best buy I love it to bits but I bought mine second hand and so got a good deal If I was to choose between a full price 5 and a 127 mak I would get the mak on grounds of value the 4 even more so anything the 4se can do the 5" mak does better and cheaper the 6 and 8 se are different animals altogether.

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You'll want to get a low power EP and will probably want to replace the rather poor 10mm lens that comes with the 127. The 32mm Celestron Omni Plossl would be a good budget buy. To replace the 10mm you could look at the 9mm Celestron Excel LX - that range is gaining a lot of fans as you get more comfortable eye relief compared to the equivalent plossl types (not an issue with the 32mm Omni though). Can't offer any advice on the Webcam unfortunately.

If you have any spare change left after that, you can buy a tin of orange gloss and a paintbrush ;-)

Love that. !

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The only problems have with the mak127 is the mount/tripod, been reading its a little flimsy compared to the 4se.

Paul

Mounts can be upgraded (i.e. replaced with something better). That's what I did with the 8SE. People said to me 'Buy the best mount you can afford' so I got the NEQ6, takes the 8SE with ease and will probably take a 12" SCT with ease too (me being able to lift it is another matter!) No doubt I could have got a smaller mount and saved some money, but it would not have been as stable.

The 4SE / 127 scopes will be easier to transport than the 8SE and when coupled with a smaller mount than the NEQ6 could provide some excellent viewing, the mount is as important as the scope, which is no good if you can't focus or get a steady view because it shakes too much. The smaller the mount, the shorter your maximum exposure time will be with a camera due to inaccuracies in tracking.

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Here's another thing to consider - do not underestimate the value of a Crayford focuser. I found the combination of the focus knob and wobbly mount of the 8SE to be a poor combo, since fitting a Crayford twin-speed focuser (the original focus knob remains in place, it is a separate system entirely) and moving to a better mount I have never looked back. You may well experience the same thing with the 4SE, which is why I think the TAL 100RS looks like a very attractive scope (it comes with a single-speed Crayford focuser which will no doubt be much smoother than the standard one on the 4SE).

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Jonathan,

You seem to be moving away from what i want from a telescope !

Portability is a big factor - small car, no real dark skies in area but not too far ;)

Ok lets rethink,

I want a low maintainance scope defo so a mak style setup, plus maybe piggyback imaging as im a photographer by trade and have high end wide angle lenses and long upto 200mm.

Budget £450 max and i mean max ;)

Paul

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How easy is manual tracking anyway ;)

With an EQ mount:

If you polar align correctly, a simple RA motor drive can do tracking for you. Manually turning a knob is not something I would recommend for photography (it would be akin to turning the handle on a cine camera).

Planets will move through the frame of your telescope or zoom lens quite quickly if you don't track, but it's easy to find them again by just turning one of the slow motion controls as the mount will track / follow the rotation of the earth if the mount is positioned correctly (facing North).

For photography though, the bigger the mount the better! Not just for stability, but for better quality drive gears and motors.

EQ mounts do a better job of tracking than Alt/Az mounts for photography purposes, according to everything I have learned, but for visual the Alt/Az tracking is fine providing you get a good star align in the first place and you set the Goto up correctly with date, time, and latitude (date and time are not maintained when the power is disconnected - for want of a small watch batter, Celestron.. why?)

If you are like me then I think you probably will not be swayed from the 4SE, so go ahead and buy it.

You will need to get (£20) or make a dew shield at minimum, expect it to be attacked by dew not only on the front glass but also on the red dot finder (this is usually only used during star align so it won't matter if it dews up later). Dew heaters may not be necessary on the 4SE, but they can set you back £50 easily as you will need dew heater controller too (it is possible to make your own dew shield, controller and heater tapes if you are technically inclined, but I could not be bothered so just bought the Astrozap stuff).

You will also want to get a power pack of some description as AA batteries in the mount last no time at all and are low on power. Maplins usually have an offer on their 5-in-1 car starter jump packs - these are OK to use providing that you don't drain them down fully and recharge them immediately after use using a decent car battery charger, forget the daft little mains charger that comes with them. These cost about £30 - £70. You will also require a power lead (£14 - or make your own), the jump start kits usually come with one but it may be too short.

Moon filter is a must, otherwise you will make your eyes water looking at a very bright moon. (£19)

The 25mm Plossl that comes with the SE scopes is actually a fine eyepiece, I still use mine and have not felt the need to replace it. You'll probably want to get around a 10mm, I have the Celestron X-Cel. 9mm or 12mm Plossl is £29 from FLO, not sure which one would suit the 4SE best.

A red LED torch is good for maintaining your night-adjusted eyes. I have the Skywatcher dual LED torch and find it excellent with variable brightness and white or red LEDs at the flip of a switch. £15.95

As you can see, the accessories soon mount up!

4SE - £395

Dew shield - £20

Power pack - £30

Power lead - £14

Moon filter - £19

High magnification eyepiece - £29

Torch - £16

= £523

If we take away the eyepiece, moon filter, torch, and make your own dew shield (not that hard to do) then it's down to £439.

Don't be afraid to email the FLO guys and ask advice on what they recommend for the 4SE, they know their stuff and will point you in the right direction to get exactly the right kit to suit the scope.

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The Nexstar mount that comes with the Celestron Mak 127 is perfectly adequate if you are mostly intrested in visual observation and doing a bit of webcam photography. If you wanted to do long exposure photography then you wouldn't want an alt-az mount anyway - Nexstar or SE. The controller software in the Nexstar mount is also the same as with the SE.

The 4SE is poor value for money, though I suspect that you will buy one anyway. However, if you do get a chance to use a Mak 127 at a later date then you will kick yourself that you didn't buy one when you had the chance :-)

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For 95% visual, the 127 wins because of the larger aperture, and you can always observe from softer terrain or get the anti-vibration pads to damp the vibration.

And it gives you more £££ for accessories... you'll chew through batteries fast, so it's more economical to get a power tank right off the bat.

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Good choice.

I have been very happy with mine.

Have a look at my signature and you can have an idea what I use.

I have got no barlows, I don't need them.

Any question please let me know.

Clear skies

Scosmico

Hi

I have made my decision on my first scope as you see.

I want to buy a barlow and higher mag eyepiece too. Any ideas ?

So who has this scope ?

Paul

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Hi Jonathan,

Do you think the 4se moutn can carry the tal100rs?

I am thinking about to buy a refractor.

Clear skies.

Scosmico

I have to agree on paper - for the money the Nexstar SLT 127 looks slightly better than the 4SE, however my experience has mainly been with the 8SE so trying to imagine only being able to see half of what I can currently... hmm. I wonder if it would be only marginally better than an ST80? In which case you could save yourself a lot of money by not having the Goto mount.

Currently I am looking for a small grab and go scope set up, on my list is the Celestron CG-4 mount:

First Light Optics - Celestron Omni CG-4 mount - £220

That leaves about £230 for an OTA (Optical Tube Assembly) in your budget...

First Light Optics - Skywatcher Startravel 102T OTA

First Light Optics - Skywatcher Evostar 120 OTA

First Light Optics - Tal 100RS Refractor Optical Tube Assembly

I think you would be pleased with the views through any of these scopes, you should be free from dew (which you will get with the 127 / 4SE, so a dew shield or dew heaters may be required), and the Tal comes with Crayford focuser and two eyepieces which should keep you happy for quite a while. Not sure if the Tal comes with star diagonal, best to check this although one is shown in the picture.

The reason I don't really want to recommend the 4SE mount is that, if it is anything like the mount that came with my 4SE, it has seen more time trying to set it up than actually using it - the Star Align is an art form which I just couldn't get the hang of, and nowhere near as fast as the basic art of putting an Equatorial mount on the ground pointing North (polar alignment is only necessary when doing DSO imaging, which I would not really attempt on a CG-4).

The CG-4 mount would allow you to use many different scopes, the 4SE / 127 mounts not so because of the limitations of weight allowance, balance, and size of scope (that may hit the base when pointing upwards); plus, the single fork design may result in much more vibration than a decent EQ mount (such as the CG-4).

The CG-4 does not come with motors as standard, but they are easily added for basic tracking and I think that is all you will really need. Goto is not something to consider when on a budget in my opinion as it will take away money that could be spent on the optics. I never truly appreciated the capabilities of my 8SE until I had an ST80 to compare it to, size really does matter!

So, for £470 you could have a Tal 100RS on a CG-4 mount, I hope others can come in and tell me if this would work (not sure if the Tal would be too long / heavy for the CG-4). Astro-baby swears by her Tal, indeed the image on First Light Optics was provided by her.

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A 4SE mount cannot carry a refractor satisfactorily. I mount a short ST80 on the mount and get collisions with the base routinely. The problem is the arm of the mount is straight above the base so if you try get close to the zenith (or the north pole in EQ mode) the tube bumps into the base.

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