Mak disappointment

[vlaiv]

Good point being raised - can you do side by side comparison of the two to rule out atmospheric influence on particular observing night?

[Highburymark]

A 5” Maksutov should deliver tack sharp views of the Moon up to 175x-200x on a really good night. It should be home territory for this type of scope. 

[Dave1]

5 hours ago, John said:

I guess it is 200mm of aperture vs 121mm (the mak-casses work a little under their quoted aperture).

 

 That's only true of the 127 mm Skywatcher maks. The Skywatcher 150 mm and 180 mm maks designed were updated in 2016. The 150 mm Skywatcher now has a primary mirror which is 166 mm. The Skywatcher 180 mm mak has a primary which is 199 mm .

 

[banjaxed]

50 minutes ago, vlaiv said:

Good point being raised - can you do side by side comparison of the two to rule out atmospheric influence on particular observing night?

Good idea, I will do a comparison on Sunday or Monday which are the next nights forecast to be clear.

[johninderby]

Indeed the older maks actual aperture is less than the stated size. The latest Skymax and the Bresser maks are actually their stated aperture. That’s why I prefer the Bresser / Omegon 127 mak as they are actually 127mm

Edited April 8, 2020 by johninderby

[John]

14 minutes ago, Dave1 said:

 That's only true of the 127 mm Skywatcher maks. The Skywatcher 150 mm and 180 mm maks designed were updated in 2016. The 150 mm Skywatcher now has a primary mirror which is 166 mm. The Skywatcher 180 mm mak has a primary which is 199 mm .

 

Good. Can't really see why they put the design out with undersized mirrors in the first place. Its not as if it was an innovative new design 

 

[johninderby]

I think it was cost cutting using undersized primary mirrors so they used the diameter of the corrector instead of the usable aperture.

Edited April 8, 2020 by johninderby

[Dave1]

23 minutes ago, John said:

Good. Can't really see why they put the design out with undersized mirrors in the first place. Its not as if it was an innovative new design 

 

Beggers belief really, I think Skywatcher thought nobody would notice. Which of course people did, at least they did put it right, no doubt because they monitor the various forums probably.

Edited April 8, 2020 by Dave1
grammar

[johninderby]

3 minutes ago, Dave1 said:

Beggers belief really, I think Skywatcher thought nobody would notice. Which of course people did, and at least they did put it right, no doubt because they monitor the various forums probably.

Except for the Skymax 127. 🙄

[Louis D]

1 minute ago, johninderby said:

Except for the Skymax 127. 🙄

It's still a good deal when you pick up the OTA used for $200 and tell yourself it's really a 118 Mak.

[Dave1]

4 minutes ago, johninderby said:

Except for the Skymax 127. 🙄

It appears so, I know over at Cloudy Nights there was a thread where Skywatcher USA was releasing the updated specifications of the 150, and 180 Mak. He never did comment about the spec of the 127 on that thread. So I can only guess if wasn't updated. If you look on Skywatcher USA website you can see the updated specifications of the 150,180. But they don't go into so much detail with the 127.

[johninderby]

The Skymax 127 is still a good value scope though. Perhaps as they sell well they don’t feel the need to revise things. 🤔

[John]

Did they make the tube diameter larger to accommodate the larger primary ?

Big revamp if they did - primary and meniscus cells would need re-design I guess.

I know that Neil English had one of the original gold tube 180's and referred to it as his 170 mak-cassegrain in his reports on it. Perhaps the revisions to effective aperture were made when the colour scheme changed ?

 

[Dave1]

I don't know if it was with the colour revision. But this is the thread where they discuss a comparison between the Skywatcher 180 Mak compared it to an Intes Micro M703. But the Skywatcher USA representative comments on there about the new update of the 150 and 180 back in 2016. And gives the specs in the thread. Some of the owners Skywatcher Maks took apart there Maks, and took measurements. To confirm either way if indeed it was updated or not, they were. Some of the owners of Skywatcher maks put the optics at 1/5 wave. Skyward Eyes is the Skywatcher USA representative. Its quite a long read mind, so get comfy! https://www.cloudynights.com/topic/533792-at-last-a-skywatcher-180-v-intes703-direct-comparison-possible/page-7?hl=+180 +mak +spec 

[Timebandit]

49 minutes ago, Dave1 said:

Beggers belief really, I think Skywatcher thought nobody would notice. Which of course people did, at least they did put it right, no doubt because they monitor the various forums probably.

 

 

 

I would really like to have one of those new Skywatcher 150ED refractors

Do you think Skywatcher will see this and take pity on me and send a complementary 150ED to me 😀 

 

 

 

 

[John]

One thing that the Skywatcher mak-cassegrains do have is pretty decent optics. I've owned a 180 and a 127 for a short time but they both put up very nice, sharp and contrasty views. Another 127 (blue tube) that I observed through at an SGL star party a few years back showed Saturn wonderfully well

 

[johninderby]

6 minutes ago, Timebandit said:

 

 

 

I would really like to have one of those new Skywatcher 150ED refractors

Do you think Skywatcher will see this and take pity on me and send a complementary 150ED to me 😀 

 

 

 

 

I’d hold out for an ED180 if I were you. 😁😁😁

If they ever did produce such a behemouth mointing it could be a bit of a problem. 🤣🤣🤣

[vlaiv]

2 minutes ago, johninderby said:

I’d hold out for an ED180 if I were you. 😁😁😁

If they ever did produce such a behemouth mointing it could be a bit of a problem. 🤣🤣🤣

I'm signing up for complementary ED200 - F/10 folded design refractor on dob mount (with tracking, why not? ).

[Dave1]

18 minutes ago, Timebandit said:

 

 

 

I would really like to have one of those new Skywatcher 150ED refractors

Do you think Skywatcher will see this and take pity on me and send a complementary 150ED to me 😀 

 

 

 

 

See the above linked thread, some manufacturers are responsive to criticism. You can only but try, they can send the 150ED to me first!

[banjaxed]

Had a few clear spells last night and did a comparison between the Dob and the Mak and was surprised that the clarity of the images were not that different. Thinking back on my short astronomy observing sessions I realised that for one reason or another I have not actually observed a full moon. The crystal clear sights with my Dob have all been of crescents so my disappointment with the Mak is not really a fair comparison. It is just another reminder that we never stop learning new things about this amazing hobby, and would like to thank you all for your help and advice.

[Paul M]

This week I've had a go at Venus with both my 250PDS and my Celrstron 127 Mak.

I don't think the big Newt handles the brightness of Venus too well , it could probably do with a quick tweak of the  collimation anyway. Its fine on the Moon and stars are pin sharp so not that far out.

The Mak is really nice on Venus. I had it at 300x mag last night and it was still a very usable image.

I think the Mak will be my goto instrument for this year's Mars opposition.

Even if only to have the eyepiece in a sensible position!

[BS269]

On 08/04/2020 at 13:06, Captain Magenta said:

I collimated my SW mak 180 two nights ago. It was surprisingly easy and made an appreciable difference. I pointed it at Polaris at 450x mag, observed which edge of the (exquisite - seeing was good, I think) diffraction rings appeared the most squashed by putting my hand over the edge of the front of the scope to see where the obstruction appeared and therefore which colli screws were closest, adjusted it by trial and error until the "squashiness" got smaller and also changed orientation, moved to the new closest screws, and so on. I had the synscan handset in one hand on v fine adjust to keep Polaris centred as I made the changes.

Good luck...

 Bit of a late add to this thread.. would you recommend the SW 180 mak? I’m looking for my 1st scope upgrade (and first purchase) from my 4” reflector to sit on an EQ6R.  I’m very interested in planetary and lunar viewing/imaging and have considered this mak, a C9.25 XLT or a 8”/10” Newtonian. 
 

Cheers!

[Captain Scarlet]

I can't speak for the C9.25, but I do have an 8" and a 12" SW Newtonian, and currently 3 maks including the mak 180. To answer your question, yes I can definitely recommend the 180 mak, I really really like it, it performs well to my taste. Even after having completely reduced it to its component parts and reassembled and re-collimated it. See here.

One big difference between the 180 mak and, say, an 8" newt is the focal length. My SW 8" f/5 newt is focal length 1000mm, whereas the 180 mak is nominally 2700mm, and with an external R&P focuser more like 3000mm. In other words it's designed for very high magnification, and in that respect some would call it quite specialized, for planets and double stars. I've happily regularly used it on the Moon with a 6mm eyepiece, giving close to 500x magification. But I've also quite happily used it with my 35mm Panoptic eyepiece at only 77x magnification.

They only rarely seem to come up for sale used, which says something!

M

[Paz]

4 minutes ago, Captain Magenta said:

I can't speak for the C9.25, but I do have an 8" and a 12" SW Newtonian, and currently 3 maks including the mak 180. To answer your question, yes I can definitely recommend the 180 mak, I really really like it, it performs well to my taste. Even after having completely reduced it to its component parts and reassembled and re-collimated it. See here.

One big difference between the 180 mak and, say, an 8" newt is the focal length. My SW 8" f/5 newt is focal length 1000mm, whereas the 180 mak is nominally 2700mm, and with an external R&P focuser more like 3000mm. In other words it's designed for very high magnification, and in that respect some would call it quite specialized, for planets and double stars. I've happily regularly used it on the Moon with a 6mm eyepiece, giving close to 500x magification. But I've also quite happily used it with my 35mm Panoptic eyepiece at only 77x magnification.

They only rarely seem to come up for sale used, which says something!

M

They are rare and when they come up I think there's a hardcore of buyers ready and waiting. I really wanted a 180 maksutov and watched the second hand ads for a long time (a couple of years maybe), and got nowhere. In the end I gave up and switched to looking for a C8, and found one within weeks.

[nightfisher]

On 09/04/2020 at 11:07, banjaxed said:

Had a few clear spells last night and did a comparison between the Dob and the Mak and was surprised that the clarity of the images were not that different. Thinking back on my short astronomy observing sessions I realised that for one reason or another I have not actually observed a full moon. The crystal clear sights with my Dob have all been of crescents so my disappointment with the Mak is not really a fair comparison. It is just another reminder that we never stop learning new things about this amazing hobby, and would like to thank you all for your help and advice.

By heck this thread really got hi jacked with "how big is your mak"..........so what if its 118 or 121 or 127, by an large the skymax works well.

good to hear your one seems to be good, seeing conditions really come into it with Maks and they dont tend to lose collimation