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Ok so now have £3500 to spend on refractor for visual only and mount.


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22 minutes ago, nicks90 said:

Why bother with an eq mount if it's visual only? I can't think of any more of a waste of time setting up an eq if you aren't taking pictures!

Setting up an EQ for visual takes very little time and has the benefit of allowing tracking for high power views of planets, doubles etc without nudging all the time. Much easier to concentrate and pull out the detail.

That said, for star hopping at low to mid powers I agree a many alt az or dob is simpler.

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I almost always use an EQ mount for visual, both for tracking and because I prefer star-hopping in terms of RA and Dec, so I fully understand wanting an EQ6 (especially if it has to carry a big frac). I can see the allure of a frac for doubles, but for planets I personally prefer my C8 (also for portability), although a 7 or 8" Mak-Cass could probably do both really well (sorry, veering off at a tangent again).

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I've grown to love my tracking eq5 for my fracs.  As much as I really enjoy my big dobs I'd agree that a biggsh ed frac would be a good buy for the stated purpose. If you could get a Tak 120/128 then that's what I'd go for but any of the ones suggested above would be a fine instrument.

 

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10 hours ago, nicks90 said:

Why bother with an eq mount if it's visual only? I can't think of any more of a waste of time setting up an eq if you aren't taking pictures!

Tracking objects at high power for one! I find it tricky observing planets and doubles at high power with my Dob, and if I want to share the experience with others the tracking mount is a big bonus. 

It doesn't take that long to point an EQ mount towards Polaris I promise, my EQ3 takes only a minute longer than the Dob to setup. 

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1 hour ago, Lockie said:

and if I want to share the experience with others the tracking mount is a big bonus.

That was the main reason why I chose the tracking option on my Dob mount when I found that was possible.  It doesn't track in the fancy way that the imagers use, but it makes a huge difference if you want to keep an object in the EP for 15-20 mins (depending on the scale of the image) so a number of different people can take a look.  I remember we had a look through a non-tracking telescope years ago and we still recall with hilarity my father's comments centred around "I can't see the 'mild expletive' moon" as it kept shimmying out of the EP view.

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So thanks everyone for some amazing input. Have taken everything on board and looks like I will be setting on an Esprit 120 with AZ EQ6 as you can never truly discount a little bit of photography somewhere down the line. May throw in a Quark also at some stage. 

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