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Dual-purpose scope


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The other night, my youngest (6yrs) and I went to the village green with my setup to look at the Moon, Jupiter, Saturn and Andromeda. He viewed them all on my ipad via my AISair and was mesmerised....even though the Moon, Saturn and Jupiter barely rose about Terry's roof and looked rubbish. It warmed my cockles. Surprisingly, he asked if he could seem them himself...and he meant through the telescope and not on the ipad. I can only imagine he knows this is an option thanks to my Youtube viewing history!

As much as I love my R200SS, it's a reflector, it's a bit of a nuisance at the best of times, and for visual astronomy on an EQ mount....I really can't be bothered. So I'm thinking about a refractor, both as a visual scope with jnr and as an astrograph, giving me a nice field of view option between my Redcat 51 and the 800mm of the Newt. 

I like Vixen stuff! So, would something like the SD81S combined with its flattener/reducer (which would give roughly 500mm, f6 and weight 3.9kg) be just as good as as Askar 500 (500mm, f5.6 and 5.2kg)?

Despite Vixen's apparent 30% price hike recently, The SD81 would still work out about £300 cheaper, be lighter, and give me my Vixen hit. I know the Askar would be a touch faster, but really not much. Am I missing something obvious? 

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34 minutes ago, Steve Ward said:

500mm FL won't get you much of a view of the planets ... 😉

Quite right too - awful things! I've got my 8" newt for those anyway but as long as the little one can see the rings, he'll be happy!

17 minutes ago, happy-kat said:

Looks like small and crisp image and likely CA won't be a problem. Do you have a altaz mount to use with it and a barlow to boost views?

Yeah, I've got a Porta Mount a goto EQ and an EQ with just a RA drive on, all of which would be great with it. I do have a Barlow....not sure where though!

I didn't order the flattener to go with it because my ASI camera is only a small chip so it might be ok without. I'm no pixel-peeper!

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Having had a clear evening last night, I agree. I plopped it down in a bit of the garden with a view of Jupiter, put in my 9mm Nagler, and just soaked it in. Wow....just wow! I thought the best view I've ever had of a planet was through a Mewlon, but although this was smaller, it was immaculate. I could have spent hours just staring, but work beckoned!

I did put it on my SXD2 though and thought I'd see how it handled the Fireworks Galaxy. Now there are no calibration frames (obvious when you look) but for an f7.7 to produce this in just 36 mins (18 x 120"), with next to no processing, then I'm excited about getting the reducer/flattener for it. 

821769889_1600Stack18_Light_NGC6946_120_0s_Bin1_ABEcopy.thumb.jpg.9ba503df8aff0215f01c4f9e2a914526.jpg

The three foil spacers around the edge of the lens assembly do show themselves in a weird diffraction pattern, but they're "honest" diffraction spikes, as my dad might have said. 

Edited by osbourne one-nil
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On 19/08/2022 at 15:14, Steve Ward said:

500mm FL won't get you much of a view of the planets ... 😉

Not the best, perhaps, but I remember watching a shadow transit of Jupiter from beneath a streetlight in my old home town. That was in a Genesis, a 4 inch F5.

Olly

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12 hours ago, osbourne one-nil said:

I've seen that in Japan Vixen are offering an upgrade of the spacer rings at a discounted rate

Yes, that's an excellent service for their domestic customers but not really viable for overseas Vixen owners. 

Vixen price rises again, wow, can they go any higher? Their scopes are not made of gold are they?

I have noticed that Japanese domestic retail prices are considerably lower, for example, SD115s in Japan is about the same price as the SD103s over here, madness!

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