Anyone got the new Evostar 1201 ??

[spaceboy]

A recent visit to the Skywatcher website I couldn't help but notice the Evostar 120 sees the return of a collimateable cell once again. While it may not be everyone's desire to have the worry of collimation I think this is a welcome return. I have had a couple blue tube EVO 120's and I always liked the fact the cell could be collimated so that I knew the scope was performing at it's very best. With the 1201 sporting the new black livery paint work it would also be looking it's best.

[John]

I'm in 2 minds about this. For those that like to fiddle and tweak, the ability to adjust the tilt of the objective lens is nice to have. It is though, only 50% of the collimation process with a refractor. The other 50%, which precedes objective tilt adjustment, is making sure that the optical axis of the objective coincides with that of the focuser and standard focusers rarely have the facility to adjust their tilt without resorting to DIY shimming. Maybe the new version of these includes focuser tilt adjustment too though ?

Further thoughts are that the collimatable objective cells are heavier than the non-collimatable ones which affects the balance point of the scope tube, substantially so on the 6" F/8 Evostars.

Overall I think it's good to be able to adjust things but perhaps they should go a step further and add the adjustment facility to the focuser too ?

[spaceboy]

That's a very good point about the balance John. Both my EVO were acquired used and the first one came with a user modified dew shield. This was made of plastic and fit like a glove on the lens cell and used the existing lens cover. The second EVO I purchased came with the standard steel (and much shorter) dew shield but this made it so top heavy that the diagonal was near enough dragging along the floor when balanced. This had me straight on the look out for a similar dew shield as I'd had on my first EVO as this made so much difference to the balancing of the scope as well as being far longer than it's steel alternative. I can only assuming the plastic dew shield was actually an after market part from the likes of TS or similar as trying to find a piece of plumbers black pipe that would fit the OTA as well as the lens cap was impossible.

Again I agree regards collimation but I thought the R&P focusers had a little room for adjustment, it's the crayfords that you pretty much have to make do with ?? TBH I always stripped my R&P focusers and replaced the guides with Teflon & double sided foam tape to help guide the draw tube more uniformly, reduce slop and backlash etc, but I can understand not everyone is comfortable stripping their scopes to make such mods.

[spaceboy]

Forgot to put the link in on my first post http://skywatcher.com/product.php?cat=3&id=239