Any owners faithful to one scope design ?

[alan potts]

I am out on this one. I probably have more different types of scope than most but I have to say of all a large refractor is the one that holds my attention the most, there is something about refractors that I can't put my finger one but I do like them a lot. I have a 4.5 inch APO but would like a 6 inch at which point cost is a major factor, I bought a 180mm Mak to see if it would help me stop wanting a bigger APO but it has not worked.

Alan.

[Paul73]

Dob Dob Dob Dob Dob.

That will be mirrors then!

But I do like my little frac. The stars are lovely (but always too dim by Dob standards). An altogether more subtle experience.

Paul

 

[timwetherell]

12 hours ago, spaceboy said:

I wonder what a 12" apo would perform like though. Larger apertures magnify atmosphere no matter what the design so would such a large frak come with it's own draw backs ?? I keep wanting to go to one of the open nights at Greenwich to have a look through their 28" but the distance and unpredictability of UK weather means that's probably never going to happen

I suspect in the UK a 12" apo might be a bit of a disappointment - especially if you'd just sold your house to buy it! We just don't get the atmospheric conditions to use that much potential resolution. It would be good on deep sky stuff if you could afford to live in a national park to get the dark skies - but then again, probably not not spectacularly better than a 14" dob at 2% of the cost   I had a look at Jupiter through the Lick 36" refractor over in the states and it was very cool and very very bright! But to be honest, the view was better through a 7" apo that was set up outside. Anyway, this was my impression of the view through the 36" refractor

[MattJenko]

Much like Steve, I am a flighty so and so. Refractor, Newtonian, Ritchey Chretien, Dall Kirkham. I couldn't pick one, but if I had to, refractor I guess as I just love imaging and I am lazy.

[Commanderfish]

No I sleep around.  I mean I'm pretty faithful to my family of fracs, but I had an SCT on the side for a year and now I have a dob which I keep in the garage like the dirty [removed word] she is.

[Commanderfish]

Ha!  I got bleeped!

[Linda]

13 hours ago, spaceboy said:

I wonder what a 12" apo would perform like though. Larger apertures magnify atmosphere no matter what the design so would such a large frak come with it's own draw backs ?? 

There used to be a 37cm public refractor in Oslo city center, a long time ago. The scope was 7 meters long. That length is where the problem comes in for having such a scope privately, and also the weight of it.

[ollypenrice]

I must have a particularly faithful character because I'm faithful to SCTs, Newts, refractors and binoculars....

lly

[CraigT82]

13 hours ago, Alien 13 said:

Its a sad fact but only fracs let you see the original photons emitted from a star or galaxy provided you have a prism diagonal of course.

Alan

I'm not sure I follow you there?!  Can you elaborate?

I've had fracs, SCT and Maks, always keep coming back to Newts, though.  I think it's because they're so modifiable and I do love to fiddle.

[swamp thing]

Scopes are tools so you should use the correct one for the job. I have no preferred type of scope but I do prefer to observe galaxies and for this aperture rules. The best (read cheapest) way to get large aperture is with a Dob mounted newt.

If I suddenly lost my senses and found myself interested in planetzzz zzz zzz! (Sorry dropped off there a minute  ) I may look at getting something else.  

[YKSE]

36 minutes ago, swamp thing said:

Scopes are tools so you should use the correct one for the job. I

Can't agree more. I don't feel that I have to be faithful to certain type of tools needed to do the work. As long as they're suitable and reasonable easy to handle for me, they're fine tools.

Not many of us unlimited resource, therefore buying scope(s) is a way of many compromises (cost, quality, portability, user-friendly, etc, etc...). The important thing is to understand major strengthes and drawbacks of each design so that we choose an enjoayable tool for our own to do the star gazing.

 

[ollypenrice]

13 hours ago, Alien 13 said:

Its a sad fact but only fracs let you see the original photons emitted from a star or galaxy provided you have a prism diagonal of course.

Alan

 

Because photons pass through glass but are absorbed and re-emitted by reflecting surfaces? I don't think this is true in the the quantum mechanical description of light's interaction with matter. Photons are absorbed and re-emitted by the atoms in a glass lens as well, if I remember QED correctly. The idea of an 'orignal photon' is lost in the quantum description.

Olly

 

 Like this

 

[Stub Mandrel]

8 minutes ago, ollypenrice said:

 

Because photons pass through glass but are absorbed and re-emitted by reflecting surfaces? I don't think this is true in the the quantum mechanical description of light's interaction with matter. Photons are absorbed and re-emitted by the atoms in a glass lens as well, if I remember QED correctly. The idea of an 'orignal photon' is lost in the quantum description.

Olly

 

 Like this

 

I wouldn't lose sleep over it; it's like saying you don't really kiss your lover because there's a fine layer of moisture between your lips...

What matters is the information that is passed on from source to senses.

[ollypenrice]

1 minute ago, Stub Mandrel said:

I wouldn't lose sleep over it; it's like saying you don't really kiss your lover because there's a fine layer of moisture between your lips...

What matters is the information that is passed on from source to senses.

I entirely agree. The moment you 'go quantum' you're with Alice - in wonderland...

Olly

 Like this

 

[Moonshane]

I suppose in many ways, we are all faithful to the scope we are currently using 

[CraigT82]

21 minutes ago, ollypenrice said:

 

Because photons pass through glass but are absorbed and re-emitted by reflecting surfaces? I don't think this is true in the the quantum mechanical description of light's interaction with matter. Photons are absorbed and re-emitted by the atoms in a glass lens as well, if I remember QED correctly. The idea of an 'orignal photon' is lost in the quantum description.

Olly

 

 Like this

 

A quick google turned up this in an article by a physicist in The Scientific American:

" In a quantum-mechanical picture, light consists of photons, or packages of optical energy. The photons of the light reflected from a metal (or a dielectric mirror) are identical to the incident ones, apart from the changed propagation direction. The loss of light in the metal means that some fraction of the photons are lost, while the energy content of each reflected photon is fully preserved. Which of the photons are lost is a matter of chance; there is a certain probability for each photon to be absorbed."

[Moonshane]

This doesn't say it's the same ones, it says they are identical. I suppose this could mean they are the same ones but it's unclear and does it really impact on our choice of scopes? I've never considered it as a criterion myself.

[Commanderfish]

It's the same photon bouncing off of the surface.  How do I know?  Because the cat is NOT alive and dead at the same time

[CraigT82]

18 minutes ago, Moonshane said:

This doesn't say it's the same ones, it says they are identical. I suppose this could mean they are the same ones but it's unclear and does it really impact on our choice of scopes? I've never considered it as a criterion myself.

Indeed. And whose to say that the photon that's passed through thousands of light years of space, then through miles of earths atmosphere, before entering the scope is the very same one that left the star! It's certainly and interesting thought but a bit deeper than I'm willing to think when I'm picking out my next scope  

[Commanderfish]

Now

14 minutes ago, CraigT82 said:

Indeed. And whose to say that the photon that's passed through thousands of light years of space, then through miles of earths atmosphere, before entering the scope is the very same one that left the star!

Given the absence of anything (which is what space is) present to intercept the photon before it enters the scope (other than our dreaded atmospheric particles) I'd say it's reasonable to assume that it's the original photon.  Which is one of the coolest things about astronomy - the photons have been travelling in a straight line (other than occasional mild curvature due to intense gravitational sources such as galaxies) for thousands or even millions of years to end their entire oddyseys by hitting you in the retina. Decadent of us or what?

[johnrt]

I only have 1 scope, my 6" RC, to which I am entirely faithful, well, until I win the lottery that is.

[MattJenko]

It is nicer to think of a higher level construct than a photon (which is a shifty entity at best), an example of which someone mentioned above, in considering the 'information' transmitted by distant objects, the transport mechanism by which this happens is still only vaguely understood. We are after all considering the romance of the situation, not the scientific.

[Chris]

I always get stuck in a kind of loop when it comes to scope type. I'm fairly certain refractors are my favourite for their pin sharp stars on a black velvet sky, basically because of their HD contrasty views. Further to this I simply love the aesthetics of refractors, as much as I know they're only tools, I can't help enjoy looking at a nice frac as well as through it.

Then we get to the kicker which is the want to go deeper! At this point I'll move onto an SCT or Newt to get say 8" of aperture to go deeper then miss the quality of view and the experience of using the frac. 

The closest I've got to scope Nirvana is my past C8 Edge HD, I don't know how it did it but it was 'almost' like using a very big frac when combined with hyperwide EP's, not the FOV perhaps but the sharpness was close.

The only solutions as I see it are to win the lotto and buy a massive Apo, or have more than one type of scope.       

[CraigT82]

41 minutes ago, Commanderfish said:

Given the absence of anything (which is what space is)

Interstellar space is anything but empty!  But I think that's something to be discussed in another thread  

[Peter Drew]

I'm fortunate to have a large range of types and sizes at my disposal. Most have different characteristics and applications but the most used, which is what it's all about are the 16" SCT's for public outreach and a 6" F10 which I use most for Ha viewing. "Wow" telescopes like the 8.5" refractor, 12" aperture reflecting binoscope and a 30" Dobsonian hardly ever get used. A 20" F3.5 Dobsonian about to be commissioned may well be very popular though.