New SW StarQuest 130p - Initial Review

[Chris]

Hi, here is an initial review of the new StarQuest by Skywatcher. Thanks @FLO for loaning me the scope to review, much appreciated!  

There will be more to come once I've had a few night out with it of course. Maybe just bear in mind that these reviews are aimed at beginners as well as the more experienced, so I'm still working on the 'best' lingo balance for this. 

 

 

Edited August 30, 2019 by Lockie

[Chris]

First light already! Lovely and clear here so bagged Jupiter and Saturn both visually plus a bit of AVI footage with my modded webcam. 

Added thoughts after first light:

Good thing - Collimation was good which is a crucial as it's factory set, and the image remained sharp and contrasty at 140x suggesting the mirror should be pretty decent.

Bad thing - The bolt for the vixen clamp hits the bolt on the slow mo control whilst on it's travels. I was using the slow mo's to track Saturn and suddenly it stopped dead!

Good thing - The clutches are in an excellent place and really easy to find and use in the dark! This is a big thing in my book

bad thing - The tripod is the weak link in the rigidity and it did take a while for vibrations to settle, although perhaps only to be expected at the price point. The Mount head kind of deserves a tripod upgrade, so buyers of this package do have an upgrade path (good thing).

Good thing - I really like the focuser screws for holding the eyepiece. They are large and Knurled, and more importantly don't end in a point like with some cheap scopes. EP's are safe with these screws, yah!

Bad thing - it wont reach focus with my modded webcam without a Barlow. Not too much of a biggy as you want to be using a Barlow for Lunar and planetary anyway.  

 

[RobertI]

Nice vid and initial thoughts Chris. Entertaining and thoughtful as always.  It looks like a very nice little package. I think this factory fixed collimation is a great idea, it would be nice to have some OTAs only for sale like this. Watching your video made me hanker after my first ever setup decades ago; a 6” F8  Newt on a manual GEM mount. It was loosely clamped in the rings so it could be quickly rotated to get the eyepiece wherever needed, and had a third tightly clamped ring to stop  the OTA slipping down - worked a treat! 

[Ruud]

Thanks. That was definitely more than just an unboxing. Very comprehensive! (Left a like on YouTube.)

[Chris]

1 hour ago, RobertI said:

Nice vid and initial thoughts Chris. Entertaining and thoughtful as always.  It looks like a very nice little package. I think this factory fixed collimation is a great idea, it would be nice to have some OTAs only for sale like this. Watching your video made me hanker after my first ever setup decades ago; a 6” F8  Newt on a manual GEM mount. It was loosely clamped in the rings so it could be quickly rotated to get the eyepiece wherever needed, and had a third tightly clamped ring to stop  the OTA slipping down - worked a treat! 

Thanks Rob Yeah I was really sceptical about the factory fixed primary cell idea, than I owned a couple of the Heritage 100p's which are factory fixed at f/4! and they both held well. I was fairly confident that the SkyQuest collimation would be fine and indeed it was I'm enjoying the scope so far, there are of course a few little foibles as I've mentioned above, but this whole package retails for just 173 quid! SW really are the masters at making budget quality scopes

Funny you should mention a hankering for a 6" f/8 Newt on an EQ. I recently picked up an old Meade heavy duty pedestal EQ mount with RA drive. It has rings already in place for a 6" Newt, so I was either thinking of buying a replacement Newt for it, or extending the pier tube and putting a big 6" f/8 achro on it. The 6" f/8 would be more practical. This is all in aid of the budget mk2 obsy I'm going to erect in the garden Oh and the extra slip ring is a good call, as soon as I loosened the rings in the video the OTA tried to escape!  

[Chris]

1 hour ago, Ruud said:

Thanks. That was definitely more than just an unboxing. Very comprehensive! (Left a like on YouTube.)

Much appreciated Ruud Would you believe the original footage was over 40 minutes long! Lots of editing to get it down, I get carried away  

Edited September 1, 2019 by Lockie

[RobertI]

44 minutes ago, Lockie said:

Funny you should mention a hankering for a 6" f/8 Newt on an EQ. I recently picked up an old Meade heavy duty pedestal EQ mount with RA drive. It has rings already in place for a 6" Newt, so I was either thinking of buying a replacement Newt for it, or extending the pier tube and putting a big 6" f/8 achro on it. The 6" f/8 would be more practical. This is all in aid of the budget mk2 obsy I'm going to erect in the garden Oh and the extra slip ring is a good call, as soon as I loosened the rings in the video the OTA tried to escape!  

Ah, my old 6” was also on a pedestal and the mount had permanently attached rings, none of this vixen dovetail clamp nonsense! 😉 The pedestal was super-solid actually. Your Meade should be a great mount for a budget obsy. Have you posted any pics? 

[Chris]

22 minutes ago, RobertI said:

Ah, my old 6” was also on a pedestal and the mount had permanently attached rings, none of this vixen dovetail clamp nonsense! 😉 The pedestal was super-solid actually. Your Meade should be a great mount for a budget obsy. Have you posted any pics? 

Pics? Here's a video Oh and I also accidently bought a huge Dob whilst I was at the guys house too lol

 

[RobertI]

Very nice Chris! The mount looks great, a nice little refurb project and it should look the biz. That Dob is a bit of a beast, but should be great for resolving globs. Glad to see you’ve got a good garden for observing again, bet you can’t wait to get an obsy set up. I reckon a ‘roll away’ obsy on wheels would be really quick to construct for the dob, wouldn’t need to be very high as the dob would lie horizontal when  not in use, and wouldn’t really need foundations. You could have that one in a corner of the garden and another obsy for the frac in the other corner! I love spending other people’s money  😁

[Chris]

9 hours ago, RobertI said:

Very nice Chris! The mount looks great, a nice little refurb project and it should look the biz. That Dob is a bit of a beast, but should be great for resolving globs. Glad to see you’ve got a good garden for observing again, bet you can’t wait to get an obsy set up. I reckon a ‘roll away’ obsy on wheels would be really quick to construct for the dob, wouldn’t need to be very high as the dob would lie horizontal when  not in use, and wouldn’t really need foundations. You could have that one in a corner of the garden and another obsy for the frac in the other corner! I love spending other people’s money  😁

lol thanks Rob, well I've had one Obs sanctioned at least, and I have a nice spot lined up for it middle left when facing the back garden. For now the Dob can live in the garage and be rolled out on the dolly I bought for it (it's good to have access to 360 degrees of the sky from home ) There is a street light straight out the front of the house, but at least it's sodium so I can use my LP filters.

I bit more house decorating to do, then I can start on the Obsy. p.s. I like your new avatar with Buzz and the Orange 66

[RobertI]

I look forward to seeing the obsy plans developing (so does buzz). 🙂

[Chris]

Some Lunar footage from the StarQuest 130p using my modified Logitech webcam and 2.5x Revelation Barlow, so working at 1635mm focal length. 

I think it did really well, and I even noticed a spooky Lunar feature! I'm wondering if this feature has a name, does anyone know? 

 

[Ruud]

Yes, that was nice indeed! (Left a like on youtube.)

[Chris]

46 minutes ago, Ruud said:

Yes, that was nice indeed! (Left a like on youtube.)

Cheers!