SCT/Mak as a guidescope?

[scitmon]

I've been thinking about my future astrophotography purchases to add to my ED80 Ds-pro, specifically guidescope solutions.  I was thinking of going with the popular ST80, but I was wondering... because as I don't have a planetary scope yet, can I not put the money towards a SCT/Mak instead and use that as a guidescope?  Is there any pitfalls with this?

[Ibbo!]

Yes there could be .

The SCT can have mirror slop so will not follow the guidstar properly.

 

Why not go the finder guider route?

[scitmon]

That's probably what I will do now that I know that another SCT scope is not appropriate.

[MattJenko]

The other consideration is the finding and retaining of a guide star. Fast short focal length scopes end up with wide fields of view with plenty of stars. Not so with longer focal length slower scopes.

[Ibbo!]

So i would say get the SCT -it will have a finderscope.

get an adaptor so you can use the finderscope with the guide cam

make sure the finder bracket is solid

use that with the ED 80 and you will also have the SCT for planetary longer focal length work.

 

 

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