8 inch skywatcher

[kris7125]

Can anyone give me there honest opinion of what I will expect to see using one of these as I have heard mixed views, I will be getting it with a celestron x cel 9mm eyepiece and a skywatcher panaview 38mm ep

[triton1]

I have a sw200p and they are quite good as long as they are set up properly(collimation).I havent been doing astronomy long but with a 10mm sw ep plus barlow i,ve seen bands on jupiter ,just made out the cassini division and possibly one of saturns moons.Your ep should should be alot better than mine.

Jonn.

I am going to strip my scope down to day to check to make sure of tolerances and accuracy.I will post progress.

[Laurie61]

I don’t own the 8” skywatcher but I can say that an 8” scope is a good all-round size of scope to use, is yours going to be the f5 or f6 version. The dob comes as an f6 and will have less coma and be move forgiving with collimation. I would be tempted to buy this even if wanting to use an EQ mount and then get tube rings ect to put on the EQ.

[Avocette]

kris7125 - are you getting the 8" Skywatcher on the Dob or Equatorial mount? Either way from what I read, the 8" is at a sweet spot in terms of light capture and weight/handling. I've only had mine for a fortnight and although I was originally looking for an 8" or 10" Dob, I'm very happy with the 8" (it's quite big enough to store and move). I'm basically still testing mine out in various early uses, visual observation of the moon and Saturn and simple lunar imaging with a DSLR. A couple of months ago I was viewing some of the globular clusters with my 15x70 binoculars, so I'm confident that if I stayed up later in the present spring/summer nights I'd be able to find plenty of interest.

[NGC 1502]

Can anyone give me there honest opinion of what I will expect to see using one of these as I have heard mixed views, I will be getting it with a celestron x cel 9mm eyepiece and a skywatcher panaview 38mm ep

Now this is actually a tough question to answer. What one person thinks is a stunning view, another will think is not much cop..........

However, the Skywatcher 8" scopes are good. I had a SW 200p Dob a few years back. I had it set up next to a clubmates 8" Orion Optics Dob to view Saturn. We could not discern a difference in what we could see. A great view in both. Perhaps in excellent conditions we may have seen a difference.

I think that an 8" scope is a great size to get, enough light grasp to do deep sky, good for moon, planets, double stars, in fact a nice all purpose scope, without being too heavy to set up.

As long as the scope is collimated and has had a chance to cool to ambient temperature, you won't go wrong in getting a SW.

Hope this goes at least some way to answering your question.

Regards, Ed.

[malc-c]

There are so many variables and as mentioned, what impresses one person will fail to impress another. A lot depends on the quality of the sky you have, you'll obviously see more from a dark location than you will from the centre of a town. Under most town conditions, a 200P will show you the four main moons of Jupiter, along with Jupiter's belts. Saturn's rings, and shading on Mars under good seeing conditions. As for deep sky objects, again depends on the the quality of the sky, but M45 (Orion Nebula) in winter, and M31 (Andromeda Galaxy) are quite remarkable even from a town location with moderate light pollution. However, don't expect to see nice colours and swirling dust lanes of the galaxies, like the images posted on this site. The eye doesn't have the ability to gather the amount of light a CCD camera can, so a lot of the brighter galaxies and nebula look like greenish grey smudges, often seen using averted vision. Again things improve if you are under really dark skies away from light pollution and with ideal conditions.

Best bet would be to contact a local astronomical society and pop along to one of their public observing events. You will be able to see for yourself how well each type and size of scopes perform under the same conditions.

[kris7125]

Thanks for the advice guys just looking forward to getting it now.

Have a great bank holiday

Kris

[planet15]

I was watching Saturn last night, and it was so nice Side by side with the TAL-1 and SW200P, the SW200P gave a lot larger and more detailed view of it. The Casini band, the moon, and the ring ... alll nicely visible. But the TAL-1 was also great - very sharp optics. Both are great reflectors - highly recommended.

[rory]

all round good scope , id be suprised if your unhappy with the results.

[JG777]

Must admit I have an 8 inch newt next on the shopping list, never seem to see the SWs OTA second hand so they must be keepers.

[malc-c]

One word of warning... if you feel there is the slightest chance of attaching a DSLR camera body to take some pictures, opt for the 200PDS version. The 200P is excellent visually, but recently a few of us (me included) have had issues with additional diffraction spikes when taking long exposures

[planet15]

Another thing - this 8" SW200P is large and heavyish mounted on Dobs (over 20kg). Carrying it to the other end of the garden from the shed back and forth every night sky is clear, is giving me good exercise. Will be cancelling the gym membership soon.

And honestly I would not contemplate getting anything larger than 8" Dobs unless I had a permanent observatory.

[kris7125]

Ok thanks guys I have made my mind up and shall be ordering it Wednesday! Thanks for the advice

Clear skies

[tibbz2]

You won't be disappointed.

Great size, cheap, easy to use and set up! (It's better to carry it in two pieces, then it's a piece of cake, all in one piece is a pain/awkward)

[LukeSkywatcher]

Any/all limiting factors aside (light pollution etc), an 8" scope is a good aperture scope to have.

[rwilkey]

Hi, it is a great scope, and good for DSO's etc, but don't get the 38mm PanaView with it, that's a bad choice in my opinion, the 32mm is much better and much more suitable for this scope, the 38mm will give an exit pupil of nearly 8mm, which will give a poorly defined view and possibly show the secondary mirror shadow etc.

[bingevader]

Or how about the 2" 28mm Maxvision before they're all gone?

It's a re-branded Meade EP that never made it to Meade and is worth well over double the £81 it's going for.

I feel as if I'm being disloyal to my 32mm Panaview!

Cheers

[kris7125]

Wilkey and bingbader I ended up shelling a bit more cash out and got the 16mm skywatcher nirvana, hopefully a wise choice, but it arrives tomorrow and now doubt the sky will be leaking!!

[rwilkey]

Hi Kris, a great and wise choice, the Nirvana's get great reviews on this forum, and especially suited to the 200P I understand, though I have not had the pleasure of trying one yet. The thing is with an f/5 scope you have to be careful what ep's you get, as not all are suited to this particular scope. Always get advice!

[kris7125]

Hi Kris, a great and wise choice, the Nirvana's get great reviews on this forum, and especially suited to the 200P I understand, though I have not had the pleasure of trying one yet. The thing is with an f/5 scope you have to be careful what ep's you get, as not all are suited to this particular scope. Always get advice!

thanks wilkey but how do I know if its an f/5 and what does it mean?

[farunj]

The f/ratio is the focal length/aperture. For example, if your scopes aperture is 200mm and focal length is 1000mm, then it's f/ratio is 1000/200 i.e 5. Thus it's an f/5 scope.

[rwilkey]

Hi Kris, the f/5 or similar is the focal ratio ie. the aperture (200mm) divided into the focal length (1000mm) of the scope, I am assuming you are looking at the 200P mounted on a EQ5 mount, otherwise the dobsonian version (Skyliner) is f/6 (1200/203 = f/5.91). The reason it is critical is because so-called 'fast' scopes like the 200P/EQ5 have a steeper light curve and therefore are not as tolerant to some ep's, especially cheaper ones, which will show softness at the edges of the view. The 'slow' and 'fast' scope expression comes from photography f/ratios but not really related, but you will see these expressions used in relation to telescopes.

[kris7125]

Ok thanks its the fob I have got, it's currently at my house waiting to be unboxed:)

[AlexB67]

Ok thanks its the fob I have got, it's currently at my house waiting to be unboxed:)

Oooh, the excitement builds, the unboxing moment, removing the wrappers and the moment arrives when you feel like a small child again. Good luck with it I must admit it, I was sad enough to watch a couple of unboxing videos before I got my scope delivered. Of course I did so to make sure that I wouldn't make any stupid mistakes unpacking and break something in the process

[kris7125]

Oooh, the excitement builds, the unboxing moment, removing the wrappers and the moment arrives when you feel like a small child again. Good luck with it I must admit it, I was sad enough to watch a couple of unboxing videos before I got my scope delivered. Of course I did so to make sure that I wouldn't make any stupid mistakes unpacking and break something in the process

Don't worry I watched those too :-/ quick question what lens is best to use when aligning the finder scope