Advice Needed Please.

[Kaliska]

I'm in the fortunate position in having roughly £2k to spend on a 50th birthday present for myself and I am being pushed and pulled in all different directions as to what i should buy. My current setup is an Esprit 80, AZEQ6 gt, Canon 700D (AP Mod) and I'm only into AP.

I'm contemplating a WO FLT 98 or a FLT 132 (or any other nice frac that pops up) or a Mono Camera of some discription (all second hand). What would you do if you were in my shoes?

I live in a semi rural village and although light pollution is there, its not too bad actually (all street lights get shut off at 1am).

[wxsatuser]

Mono camera and filters.

[michaelmorris]

1 minute ago, wxsatuser said:

Mono camera and filters.

What he said 

[RayD]

7 minutes ago, Kaliska said:

I'm in the fortunate position in having roughly £2k to spend on a 50th birthday present for myself and I am being pushed and pulled in all different directions as to what i should buy. My current setup is an Esprit 80, AZEQ6 gt, Canon 700D (AP Mod) and I'm only into AP.

I'm contemplating a WO FLT 98 or a FLT 132 (or any other nice frac that pops up) or a Mono Camera of some discription (all second hand). What would you do if you were in my shoes?

I live in a semi rural village and although light pollution is there, its not too bad actually (all street lights get shut off at 1am).

The Esprit 80 - AZ EQ6 combination is great.  I personally wouldn't go with another 'scope, I'd go with a decent mono camera, good filter wheel and some nice filters.  All used this may give you a little change for a coffee at Costa.

[spillage]

+1 for the mono camera. You can get the asi1600mm-c with filters and wheel for under 2k.

[alan potts]

You have a very nice scope, I would opt for the camera and filters, I like the look of Atik models but then I know nothing.

Alan

[brantuk]

Same here - mono camera, wheel, and filters would be my choice.

[Kaliska]

Thank you people.

I was originally thinking of the camera route, but then got tempted with a couple of lovely scopes which were offered to me, hence my hesitation.

Now to do some homework on which camera as i want to future proof it as much as possible. Second hand or new? Hmmmm....

[alan potts]

Personally with tech stuff I would always buy new, there never seems to be what you really want in the S/H market. There are some lovely cameras on the market in the last few months, I want one myself but no idea what really maybe a Atik 490ex, a bit expensive though. I would go for a one shot colour but everyone tells me I should go RGB.

[spillage]

You could get a brand new asi1600mm-c with lrgb ha o s filter/wheel and a 130pds and comma corrector for just over your budget. If you managed to get the 130pds on the second hand market you could say a few pounds there. Worth shopping around and comparing prices. I know microglobe were the cheapest for a cc when I purchased one.

[michaelmorris]

1 hour ago, Kaliska said:

Now to do some homework on which camera as i want to future proof it as much as possible. 

With the current whirlwind rate of developments in cooled astronomical cameras, I think the concept of 'future proof' is an illusion.  The future seems to be cooled CMOS chipped cameras, with new cameras coming every few months.  However, many would argue that CMOS technology still isn't quite up to CCD standards yet, but the prices are far cheaper than the equivalent CCD cameras and quality is steadily improving.

I went down this route 12 months ago and decided to stick with CCD technology (Atik 460EX).  

[Kaliska]

So, I've been looking at the following cameras ASI183 and ASI1600 to use with the Esprit 80. Anyone have any pro's and cons with this setup for the Esp80 or maybe another suggestion even? I've might be pushing the button on a Starlight filter wheel later (36mm unmounted version), I'm guessing this will suit this set up as well?