Antique meets vintage:

[canuck]

Not your everyday set-up, but I thought you might like to see something a little different 8) :

The scope is an 1890 T. Cooke & Sons 3 1.4 inch refractor, and the mount is a 1970 Polarex equatorial, (aka Unitron):

[John]

Beautiful scope, just beautiful ....

They really don't make them like that any more. What are the optics like ?.

John

[barkis]

Are you the owner of the scope Canuck.? It is one beautiful piece of work, and although most of the modern Apo's are very tactile instruments, there is a big difference. The Apo's you want to tough, this Cooke is a feast for the eye, and to just gaze at it is satisfaction enough.

Although John has asked about the optics indicates a possible desire to look through it, and I do share that with him. It would be a privilege to have an observing session with it.

Just wonderful.

I remember David Sinden had a Cooke, which he planned to restore when he retired. Unfortunately he passed away before he got the chance. Very sad.

Ron.

[SteelRat]

That's a nice looking scope Richard

[canuck]

How are the optics? In casual use it appeared to split Izar (in a low sky), in a very similar fashion to the way my 80mm Japanese Vixen Achromat does. I'm currently waiting for a custom built adaptor to arrive to allow the use of modern 1.25 eyepieces.

It is my scope...I've had it for awhile now, but never had a suitable mount. I've never directly compared it to modern scopes, but now that I have a mount that will properly hold it, I hope to.

By the way, I'd be happy for others to share in the experience of viewing through it (I don't believe in collecting just for the sake of hoarding things). But I think the logistics & weather lottery would just be too challenging for it to work successfully.

[Astro_Baby]

Its lovely - very beautiful

[Brass n glass]

That's a wonderful and rare instrument; Cooke objectives are supposed to be the best ever made in Britain. The most suitable modern eyepiece to try on such a slow objective would probably be an orthoscopic, but it will certainly work with any eyepiece you throw at it. The only Cooke I've ever had was a microscope, and that had superb objectives as well - Hugh