Celestron f/6.3 VS Meade f/6.3 (Focal Reducers Corrector)

[Merlin66]

Wait until the Amazon Celestron reducer arrives........ I hope it does live up to expectations......(I see Adorama are selling at exactly the same price)

[celestron8g8]

The tax is because the government changed tax laws on internet purchases . Made alot of people upset but nothing we can do about it . That’s why internet sells were so high , no taxes . 

[Hiddenpalm]

So the Celestron f/6.3 focal reducer finally came in. It looks pristine and brand new. Lesson here, if you're shopping for a Focal Reducer on Amazon, stay away from Meade, Astromania and Alstar and just get the Celestron. Or else you have a pretty good chance at getting a really sloppy job of a refurbished product even though they're claiming it's new.

Oh yeah ... and Celestron won this contest and even beat some surprise opponents, Street Fighter style. ?

Edited July 9, 2018 by Hiddenpalm

[HeliAv8r]

I just purchased a Nexstar 8SE and was comparing focal reducers, specifically the Celestron and the Meade.  Today's Amazon prices have them at $119 or $79 respectively.  I was leaning towards the Meade thinking it would be just as good but after reading this thread, I think I"ll stick with Celestron.  I did appreciate RonL's views on the differences between the two brands as well as the other opinions expressed here.

 

Thank you

[HenryV1598]

So, I'm a bit late to this party (by almost a year).  I found this post while doing a general Google search for some info on focal reducers.  There's a couple things I want to toss into the discussion.

First off, I would not recommend ANYONE use Amazon reviews (or any other major retailer's reviews for that matter) as any kind of authoritative source of information.  Amazon's reviews are just plain bad.  While some of them come from real users, an enormous amount come from paid users.  Do a quick Google search on the words Amazon, reviews, and fraud and you'll find several articles about the problems.  But to briefly explain the issue: Amazon, and similar sites, use reviews as a major element in their search result ranking (the full algorithm is proprietary, but they do acknowledge that reviews play a role).  As such, it strongly benefits a vendor to have the best reviews possible in order to appear high in the search results.  Research has also shown that most buyers don't look past the first page of results, and rarely on to the second or third page.  If you are a vendor with wares listed on Amazon and your product doesn't show up on the first page of search results, then you aren't going to see much, if anything, in the way of sales.  You could have the absolute best product to match a customer search, but if you're not on the first page, the odds are against the consumer actually seeing your listing and buying from you.  And even on the first page, if you're not at or near the top, you're likely to not see many sales.

Because of this there are a number of companies that hire people to fraudulently review their products.  Other businesses exist to provide SEO optimization for companies, and they hire people to do the fraudulent reviews, insulating the company that's only paying for the optimization.  In the long run, you end up with a review system that's entirely unreliable.  Does Celestron do this?  I can't say.  But if you look at the Celestron PowerSeeker 127EQ, arguably one of the WORST telescopes Celestron offers, it has glowing reviews.  Some of these are probably honest reviews from people who don't know better.  But with over 2,200 reviews giving it an average of 3.8 out of 5, I strongly suspect that a lot of the good reviews are not from real customers.

The other thing I wanted to mention is the comment from someone about Celestron accessories being optimized for Celestron products, and, I would assume, the claim would be that Meade accessories work best with Meade products, etc...

And while there may be some truth to this, mostly it's unfounded.   In fact, most Celestron products aren't even made by Celestron anymore. 

In 2005, Celestron was purchased by the SW Technology Corporation in Delaware, which is a subsidiary of the Synta Technolgy Corporation of Taiwan.  Synta had a long relationship with Celestron prior to this point, manufacturing a large amount of their equipment.  But as of 2005, they outright own Celestron.   nearly all of the hardware sold under the Celestron brand name is made by the Suzhou Synta Optical Technology Company, which is located in Suzhou, China.  Synta manufactures most of the hardware sold under the Celestron brand name here, along with that sold under the Sky-Watcher brand name (which was created by Synta in 1999), and Tasco, which they also bought out in the 90's.  In addition, they manufacture a lot of hardware sold by Orion and others.   While Meade is owned by the Ningbo Sunny Electronic Company of China, I believe it highly likely that at least some of their hardware is manufactured by Synta and re-branded.

The dirty little not-so-secret truth in the industry is that a handful of manufacturers in Taiwan and China, including both Synta companies, Ningbo Sunny, and Guan Sheng Optical (GSO) produce the vast majority of the low and middle-range priced telescopes and equipment on the market.  Apertura and Zhumell, which offer some excellent Dobs, are both made by GSO.  Astro-Tech, which is the house-brand of Astronomics, is GSO.  Third-Planet Optics, or TPO, which is the house-brand of Oceanside Photo and Telescope (OPT), is made by GSO.  Orion's SkyQuest line of Dobs is made by Synta, but their SkyLine Dobs are made by GSO.  With the exception of some of the higher-end brands like Takahashi, ASA, Planewave, and the like, most (not all, but most) of the consumer astronomy products are made in China by only a few manufacturers.  In some cases there are modifications done either to spec during manufacture or after delivery to the distributor (for example, the Astro-Tech 8" Imaging Newtonian has a set of baffles that are not found on the otherwise identical TPO 8" Imaging Newtonian).  But the core of the equipment is the same.  And between these different manufacturers, it's difficult to tell the difference in production quality.

Only one major instrument that I know of sold by Celestron is actually made in the US, and that's the C14 (thought I wouldn't be surprised if they also made some of the RASA instruments).

With this in mind, it's hard to defend the statement that those accessories work best with telescopes made by the same brand. 

In the case of the Celestron EdgeHD scopes, this is true, only because the f/7 focal reducers made to go with them are made specifically for those scopes.  The EdgeHD SCT line has built-in field correction enhancements, and using the standard Celestron f/6.3 reducer/flattener would over-correct.  So Celestron sells the f/7 reducer for these scopes (and they're not interchangeable between models) which takes into account the flattening that's already been done.

I don't know for sure, but I strongly suspect that the Meade, Celestron, Antares, Alstar, and other f/6.3 reducers are manufactured on the same production line and just branded after-the-fact.  I've been told that the Meade is optimized for smaller sensors (it was introduced for use with the DSI series and Meade's 8" f/10 SCT and its larger siblings), but I haven't seen any documentation proving that it's different from the Celestron. 

In the meantime, nearly everyone I've seen doing astrophotography, either professionally or for fun, uses a combination of equipment from a variety of manufacturers.  Personally I use an Orion Newtonian OTA with a Baader Planetarium coma corrector and an SBIG camera with a Vernonscope guide scope that has an Atik camera for autoguiding, and all of this is mounted on top of an iOptron mount.  And it works just fine.

So, unless someone can offer up documentation that shows that a Celestron focal reducer works better with a C8 than the equivalent Meade reducer, I'm going to remain highly skeptical.

[flyguy909]

Whew!   Thanks for the comprehensive background info.   I came here researching 6.3 FR's and based on what I read from people with firsthand experience, I think I'll still buy Celestron😉

[celestron8g8]

I’m partial to Celestron and accessories since I’ve been dedicated to Celestron since 1997 when i bought my C8 . My friend bought the Meade LX200 8”SCT . We fid lots of comparing optically and from our comparing side by side we both agreed Celestrons optics were better . Now everyone has their right to their own opinion and experience . Me and my friend both wore glasses with astigmatism . However at that time Meade was already dealing with China  while at that time Celestron was still made in USA and main plsnt was in California at the time  . I do know now Celestron deals overseas as well so with optics now i cannot honestly say how they compare . But your certainly are not going to loose buying Celestron accessories. But i will stand by the fact that name brand accessories do work better with same brand scopes cause they are optimized in the lab with their own optics . Don’t have to believe it just cause i say it but test things yourself and see . Check out this Cloudynight discussion on FRs’ . 
 

https://www.cloudynights.com/topic/642238-focal-reducer/

[RT65CB-SWL]

10 hours ago, flyguy909 said:

Whew!   Thanks for the comprehensive background info.   I came here researching 6.3 FR's and based on what I read from people with firsthand experience, I think I'll still buy Celestron😉

Hi @flyguy909 and welcome to SGL. 

I have the Celestron after reading the many reviews here on SGL and other forums. I use it with my C6/SCT...

...and with my 're-modded' ETX105, (images below)...

   

[ollypenrice]

On 06/07/2018 at 07:06, Merlin66 said:

Hmmm

"No name brand" v's Commercial established vendors - Celestron/ Meade etc. (Could be they are using others rejects? or what?)

I'd like to think that the branded product (with original warranty) would be much better.

 

This is a good point with a wide application in astronomy, I think. It's in the nature of commercial lens manufacturing (and probably in the nature of high end lens manufacture as well) that final quality will be variable. When a supplier makes a batch of products they will find some that don't meet their customer's specs so either they won't send them or they'll have them sent back. Are they then going to take a hammer to them? I very much doubt it! They'll go to the dozens of re-branders out there.

I haven't bought an SCT reducer for years since I don't image with our SCTs and the reducers offer no advantage in visual FOV over a 2 inch back and a widefield EP but I've never noticed any difference between Meade and Celestron reducers. That may have changed. Quality control is really one of those things you pay for when you buy expensive optics.

Olly