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Some advice please


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After a decade and a half, I'm in the process of returning to Astronomy, which I hope to eventually tie-in with my love for Photography. With four children my budget is pretty tight and my ten year old Son has also taken an interest in the hobby.

A pair of Olympus DPS-I binoculars have been ordered from Amazon, so now my thoughts are turning towards the inevitable telescope. Martin and others at FLO have been outstanding in their advice but, due to the interest from my eldest, something like the Celestron 127 SLT is looking likely first. Personally, I'd prefer not to go down the GOTO route but I fear his patience will wear thin if he has to wait for Dad to star-hop his way across the night-sky!

Even with perhaps a modest telescope in mind, such doesn't mean I haven't already considered upgrading the eyepieces. I must state clearly that if the SLT is purchased, it's likely to be passed on to my Son one day in its original form and any upgraded equipment will be staying with me. These upgrades will probably be used in a modest Celestron SCT or a 200mm Skywatcher Newtonian.

With all of this in mind, I've been looking closely at the Celestron X-Cel LX range. With my long-gone DarkStar, I used Ultima Eyepieces but I was single back then and so the X-Cel range is truly at the very top of my budget. Therefore, any kind of input on the LXs would be welcome along with any other range I may have missed.

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At that price point, the Celestron X-Cell LX's are very good and will work excellently with the Celestron 127mm maksutov-cassegrain scope.

The BST Explorers (not sold by FLO) also get high praise and cost around £25 apiece less.

Both the above would work well with your potential future upgrade scopes too.

Do budget for dew prevention gear from the start with a mak-cass (I'm sure FLO will have advised you of this) as they are "dew magnets" like all scopes with "glass at the top end".

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Thanks, John. First Light Optics have indeed been most helpful, and dew prevention is very much at the top of my list.

I've seen the BST Explorers mentioned more than a few times now here at Stargazers and will certainly be giving them a look. It's good to know though that the X-Cel range will add something to the SLT and still prove to be of great merit to any other future telescope upgrade.

Going back to the SLT though, what are the alternatives to a Power Tank? Car battery I assume?

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The only real alternative to a powertank is either a leisure battery or a PSU. I wouldn't use the car battery if you want it to start in the morning - especially after a long, cold, moist night. That said you can get cheaper power tank equivalents from places like Maplins - the scope manufacturer badged ones tend to be silly money for what they are.

Also - I have now started two cars with flat batteries at Kelling after a night of star gazing using the 5 in 1 Maplins field pack - including my own lol :)

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Basic portable power supply can be had at maplins for £29 mate , I just use it to power my scope and nothing else and it's fine, just don't turn the attached compressor on by accident cos it sounds like two cats fighting in a dustbin ;)

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8mm BST is an excellent EP for this scope. Maybe look at decent plossls - GSO, vixen NPL for example - for others as they will work very well with this scope too and offer significant improvement over the 'in the box' kit while being significantly cheaper than the x-cels (x-cels are an excellent EP though).

Also, am I the only AZ GOTO user who finds rechargeable batteries to be more than adequate for a night (or two!) of observing? I've never had issues with going this route and wouldn't dream of carrying a power pack around with me if it meant ruining the portability of the set-up.

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Thanks for the further input there, breezy and Proto Star. As for the portability side of things, tjr, I can see where you're coming from and I shall certainly be looking at the cheaper eyepiece options!

Excuse the typo there, Russe. That's what you get for trying to multi-task!

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Great advice again. I certainly be looking up, Skys the Limit.

I've woke-up early and dared to peek outside to find 100% cloud cover. No visual observing of Venus near Regulus tonight even...fingers crossed for tomorrow.

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