My telescopes

[ian_d]

Well, if you can't take your gear outside, I thought to myself, you might as well have a play with it anyway. In the absence of any clear skies for ages, I've been tidying up and sorting out my gear. While I was at it, I took a few photos of it all, and thought I'd share it here.

I have 3 setups in total, acquired over the past seven years or so. My first proper telescope was my Celestron 6" Schmidt-Cassegrain on a CG-5 GOTO mount - a fantastic bit of kit, something that's given me a huge amount of viewing pleasure since the day I got it. Here's a snap:

I use this a lot when I'm doing public observing events with the Cotswold AS - nice and portable, but big enough aperture to show things off well to visitors etc. The GOTO cuts down on the time spent hunting too.

A couple of years ago I wanted to get something really portable as a grab-and-go, and ended up getting hold of a Skywatcher Startravel-102 4" refractor. I got an EQ3-2 mount (not driven) to stick it on. This is great for taking away on holidays etc, and is also pretty good as a back garden instrument for wide field viewing. I've got a Baader fringe-killer to try and minimise the chromatic aberration, but there's no real cure for that (other than spending much more cash on some fancy glass...)

Finally, the recently adopted workhorse of my observing - a Skywatcher Skyliner 250PX 10" Dob. No frills, no electronics, no alignment - just a whopping great mirror and a hole to look through! This is a brilliant back garden telescope, especially if (like me) you enjoy the time spent star-hopping and using your atlas to find those elusive NGCs. On a good night in my (semi-urban) location I get some really great views of the deep sky with this - and the planets are always brilliant. Jupiter in recent months has been phenomenal, and I've had some great views of Mars this year too. Highly recommended if you're all about visual observing.

In terms of eyepieces etc, I keep it really simple: just two eyepieces and a Televue 2x Barlow. My eyepieces are a 24mm Televue Panoptic, and a 7mm Baader Genuine Ortho. The Panoptic is excellent in all three telescopes, although the same can't be said for the ortho, and to be honest, I will probably look for something else soon for high magnification / planetary viewing. Something with a wide apparent field of view, to minimise the amount of Dob nudging I need to do in the absence of any motors!

Anyway, there you go - my pride and joy. Just wish it would stop raining so I could use the blumming things

[Vince1963]

Nice gear Ian.. How do you find the SW startravel.. I've been looking at these but i also spotted this one but don't know much about them Opticstar http://www.opticstar.com/Run/Astronomy/Astro-Telescopes-Opticstar.asp?p=0_10_1_1_52 .... Cheers

[ian_d]

Cheers Vince The Startravel is really good I think, chromatic aberration is what you'd expect, but not a problem at all for wide field stuff. I've never really ventured into astrophotography so can't comment on its use for that, but I've heard people say it's not bad for the price. I bought mine on the AZ-3 mount originally (it was only £20 more than the OTA on its own!) but quickly ditched that mount for an EQ3-2 off eBay, which really does the scope much more justice.

Couldn't offer any comparison with the Opticstar I'm afraid - only £13 difference by the looks - maybe others have some experience with that one. I'd have no trouble recommending the Startravel though!

[Vince1963]

thanks for that Ian, Yeah, Just want a quick "grab n go", nothing more. Would love to get into astrophotograph but i feel my EQ5 isn't up to the task (even with my modded motors).. I could get some images but i doubt they'd be up to much and to upgrade would be very expensive for me.. The reason i mentioned the Opticstar is it comes with a crayford focuser and i believe the Sw focuser is just the standard.. Anyway Ian thanks again for taking the time to post me