Celestron C6R - Moving back in to RefractorVille

[James4]

After trying a variety of different scopes - most recent being a C8 then an Explore 152 Refractor, followed by a C9.25, I felt the call to return to Refractor Ville. I started purusing the online ads and forums and digging out the old Meade and Celestron Catalogues looking for my next big gun.

I had almost talked myself into the $2,000 Explore 127mm Apo - but at the last minute, noticed some of the accessories becoming optional extras. I also wanted to try the new VX Mount because the CGEM had proven too heavy to easily throw into the car for outings. I saw a package with the VX and The C6R for $1299 and decided that seemed like a pretty nice deal. If the big achro didn't please me, I can move it on and keep the VX.

I read some good reviews on the optics of the C6R and reasoned that it had to be just a little more pleasing than the shorter and more CA prone ES152 (which by the way was killer on deep sky) which blotted its copy book on Jupiter. Even with a Baader fringe killer it wasn’t a great view

Nothing to be impressed about when unboxing the big achro. No 2” diagonal and a standard rack and pinion focuser. Also very front heavy and in need of counter balance.. Still I knew all this already – some very good information online about this long lived scope.

First light saw Vega overhead – I pointed there and saw a very nice picture of the brightest star in my sky.

At low power almost no purple halo at all. I pushed up to 236 to look for diffraction rings. Now a definite purple halo, but a stunning view of Vega as a small white disc with faint rings perfectly concentric.

Wow I was impressed with that. On The C.925 I was barely ever able to see the Airy Disc, not sure why.

Likewise with the ES152 I never did see an Airy disc,

The double double – gorgeous little white discs with equally separated dark space between them – all four easily in the same FOV. Really lovely.

2^nd and 3^rd light saw a stunning view of The Veil – Eastern and Western (I drifted over to find both sections) with an OIII filter. A gorgeous view! Best for last – while looking at M13 and trying to decide how resolved it was (very nicely resolved in fact) I noticed an object down to the left. I looked across and realised I did need to use averted vision – but it was the edge on galaxy which appears in so many astro photos of M13.

Now I have looked for that view in many scopes and dismissed it as a photographic only view.

But here it was – easy to see with no filtering - using a 32mm Celestron Ultima LX – giving 37.5x and 1.9 degree FOV.

I made a few changes to improve the basic nature of the scope. I relocated the heavy metal dew shield to the back of the OTA as a counerweight. I replaced the focuser with a JMI Event Horizon EV3R and used an Orion Flex Dew Shield as a sliding dew shield which is both very light and much longer than the original dew shield. I also put an accessory rail on top to use as a handle when setting up the scope.

I’m really liking this scope more and more – but I have not pointed it at a planet! So looking forward to see what the CA is like on Jupiter – it’s the litmus test for a refractor. I don’t mind CA as long as it does not dominate.

[twotter]

A great read & I'm looking forward to hearing the verdict on Jupiter

[NGC 1502]

Sounds great and thanks for the review.

One of my clubmates has a C6R among his collection of telescopes, he rates it highly, but admits it's undermounted, sadly I've never looked through it.

One of the things I like about refractors is the 'tighter' stars they generally give.

Please come back when you can with a Jupiter report, thanks.

Regards, Ed.

[SpookyKatt]

Nice report James, I've had a helios and now have a skywatcher variant of the

same scope and must confess they are a great scope to use. They really do give

some superb views, I generally use it as my planetary scope. I look forward to reading

how you think it performs against Jupiter.

Kathleen

[John]

Nice report and congratulations on the new big refractor

I've owned a few 6" F/8's, mostly like yours and one Meade AR6, and had a lot of fun with them. I used to use a device callled a Chromacor to remove the CA and SA and the scopes performed like ED doublets then

Nice scopes even in their standard form though

[Stratis]

Nice report and congratulations on the new big refractor

I've owned a few 6" F/8's, mostly like yours and one Meade AR6, and had a lot of fun with them. I used to use a device callled a Chromacor to remove the CA and SA and the scopes performed like ED doublets then

Regarding the Chromacor, did you notice any odd effects from eye positioning? The few people I've spoken with that have used them reported a 'swimming' effect as the eye moved dictating perfect positioning to keep the CA at bay.... any truth to this?

Nice review of the C6R by the way, I was offered one before going for my 102ED and had to practically break my own finger to turn away from that much glass . I think a 6" frac will be my next scope purchase down the line, you're right that even the achromats make spectacular deep-sky scopes. The weight though...

[ronin]

James, you must get some good dark skies around where you are for use with a 6".

Any curious bears however ? :eek:

[John]

Regarding the Chromacor, did you notice any odd effects from eye positioning? The few people I've spoken with that have used them reported a 'swimming' effect as the eye moved dictating perfect positioning to keep the CA at bay.... any truth to this?

I don't want to hijack this thread so I'll just post a link to some thoughts I posted a while back on the forum about the Chromacor:

[James4]

I did catch a quick view of Saturn last night with the big rerfractor

It was very low in the sky but I did see a reasonable picture of it with natural creamy colour.

Thanks everyone for your encouraging comments and yes to the question about bears -there are plenty around

luckily I have managed to avoid them.

My Canadian friends tend to laugh at me because they're so used to the wildlife they don't even consider it.

I