So Excited About My First Refractor!

[Sunshine]

It was about time i finally jump on the refractor wagon, this Eon 115mm triplet is they only frac i have ever owned short of the 60mm toy i had as a child. Just yesterday i posted a response in another threat where a fellow asked "why a refractor", i will post the link to that thread below to save me from typing it all out again. In short, i will admit i have been missing out all these years, i now understand why some of you are die hard frac freaks, i acquired this beautiful scope just yesterday, i was tickled the minute i took it out of the case, i had a "this is what a telescope should look and feel like" moment. Last week i posted about potentially purchasing a used Orion Eon i saw in the classifieds, a 120, now that i see just how big this 115 is, i am glad i missed the opportunity for that 120. Maybe in my mind i just measured all refractors sizes based on the 60mm i had as a child, now that i see exactly the sort of girth a 115mm has, i shutter imagining what a 130 must be like and, how my Vixen GP just would not hold a scope that big. Thankfully it does handle this 115 very well, balances perfectly and is very stable.

The scope weighs in at 15lbs, it seems very well built, the focuser is a monstrous thing at 3", is very smooth with no slack or slop, i will not be loading it up with AP gear for a long time anyway. This is a front heavy scope being a triplet, i found myself having to rebalance once i extended the dew shield, a scary oversight, when i released the lock knob as the scope begins to move on its own, yikes! lesson learned. Once again, i was taken by the size of the glass on this thing, you frac owners have seen them all and may think "thats not a big frac" but to me, it is a cannon of a refractor, being my first i just didn't know what to expect. Once i nailed the dovetail bracket on....Kidding!,  screwed the dove tail on, i was ravenous about taking it outside for a cool down as the skies were clear but i knew clouds were coming on the horizon to ruin my first light, as though they know and plot agains us. Once the scope cooled for an hour, i put in my morpheus and went straight for the first bright star (i was so excited i didn't even check which star it was) regardless, the star test was beautiful. Perfect, concentric, centered, clearly defined rings on both sides of focus. When finely focussed, i saw the most perfectly defined point i had seen, as much as i love my mak as a planetary scope, it just could NOT focus stars to such a fine, orb like point, and so quickly, snap to, this was new to me, i was so used to searching for what i may have thought was fine focus. Now i know, what i thought a star looked like in any scope i ever had, was not what it should look like.

The optics seems to be great, as far as i could tell from that one test, next, the moon beckoned my attention, this is where i really let out a gasp, a wonderful creamy black void with the moon looking like it was etched into the dark background, razor sharp. Looking closer at high power i searched for any signs of CA, not the slightest hint that i could see, in any eyepiece, the definition on the lunar limb was beautiful, as though cut with a scalpel. Soon after the clouds rolled in, leaving me feeling like a child might feel if they had dropped their ice cream cone on the ground. This has been an eye opening experience for me, i feel like i am discovering the sky anew, i have said the same about my mak, i may sound a bit dense when i think about it but, i really haven tried a good frac and, spoke too soon. The field of view in this frac with my morpheus eyepieces is wonderful comparing to my mak, like floating in space in comparison. Wow, who would have thought i would find myself with my head spinning, butterflies in my stomach, thinking about my next session like a starstruck teenager (no pun intended). Surely, a bigger dob will show the fuzzies in greater detail but,  i think this frac will provide vistas with a purity which will be hard to beat, the future is bright.

Any suggestions from all of you experienced refractor owners will be taken as gospel, thank you!

 

Edited March 4, 2020 by Sunshine

[Knighty2112]

I do like a nice ‘frac! Enjoy! 👍🏻

[celestron8g8]

Congratulations ! Hope you have many great nights of viewing and imaging . Look forward to pictures if you get into imaging . 

[Sunshine]

Just now, celestron8g8 said:

Congratulations ! Hope you have many great nights of viewing and imaging . Look forward to pictures if you get into imaging . 

Thank you! it will be a while before i jump into the supermassive black hole that is imaging, id like to keep what little hair i have a bit longer.

[celestron8g8]

I don’t blame you abit ! Personally if your limited to one scope i think it should be 90% viewing time and 10% or less imaging . Alot of newbies want to jump right into imaging but personally i think one should learn the night sky and what’s out there before imaging ever takes place . 

[Sunshine]

1 minute ago, celestron8g8 said:

I don’t blame you abit ! Personally if your limited to one scope i think it should be 90% viewing time and 10% or less imaging . Alot of newbies want to jump right into imaging but personally i think one should learn the night sky and what’s out there before imaging ever takes place . 

You are so right, though i have been observing since i was a boy, i still find a pleasure in just wandering through the sky that never seems to get old.