Skywatcher Quattro 12S

[dph1nm]

Decided to take the plunge and replace my (very) old Fullerscopes 8.5" f6 Newtonian by a 12" Quattro (which at f4 has much the same focal length as the Fullerscopes). Turns out that I can't get anything much bigger in the observatory, so although an f5 12" would have been easier on coma etc, it would probably have hit the walls!

It arrived in two parts - one box for the OTA (large enough to hide a person in) with secondary attached and one smaller one for the primary mirror (in its cell) and a pack of springs and screws. Seems I got the last one in OVL's warehouse, and it went 'missing' for a few days, so for a while it wasn't clear if there were any at all in the warehouse! Turned out someone had 'put it aside' then promptly forgotten about it. Anyway it turned up only a few days late in the end. Strangely there were no instructions in either box, so attaching the mirror to the OTA required a bit of guesswork - turns out you need to unscrew the white 'collar' at the end of the OTA and attach this to the back of the mirror support, then man-handle the whole lot back into the OTA.

The assembled beast is not exactly light, but it can be carried by one person, although attaching to my EQ8 was a bit of a struggle. Did a quick collimation with a laser, which showed the secondary was surprising well-aligned to the centre spot on the primary, which is just as well so far I have not been able to loosen either the centre screw on the secondary, or any of the three adjusting hex screws! No idea how Skywatcher have managed to get these so tight.

Another slight issue is that I was planning to buy a Skywatcher Aplanatic coma corrector, but due to production difficulties none are expected in the country until the end of October. Anyway, in the meantime, here is the first light image of Albireo (28secs, ISO1600, Canon 1000D), cropped to hide the coma!

NigelM

[triton1]

Nice image,collimation looks good too.

[Rob_Jn]

Nice setup, been considering one of these so I'd be interested to see how you get on with imaging through it. Is the steel tube rigid enough? What gauge is the steel?

Thanks,

Rob

[Northernlight]

Hi Nigel, I'm just up the road at whitley Bay. I've been considering the 10" and 12" quattro for my EQ8. How do you find your mount handles the scope ? In regards to the scope, how have you found it for imaging? Does it hold it collimation across the sky. Also have you noticed  any tube flex.

Sorry for all the questions, just keen to get some feedback from someone who actually owns the scope rather than people who just have opinions about it.

Cheers,

Rich