Red dot/finders

[Jimmy Rocket]

Hi all, just received a finder from a member on here and I am very pleased with it, my question is why do people prefer the Telrad or Rigel? I have just got the Celestron starpointer pro which displays the rings rather than the dot, obviously this is a benefit so as not to hide the target. Brightness is controllable down to barely visible so why pay more for the other two which quite frankly are pretty damn ugly lol.

Would like to know your thoughts on the reasons why people rave about the Telrad and Rigel over the Celestron version?

 

[AstroKeith]

Experience with these has been mixed. When they work they are OK, but often they dont work for long! They are also more 'wobbly' than Telrads and very susceptible to dew.

A common issue is what happens when you remove or replace a scope cover. These models will at best get misaligned, and often ripped off.

[PeterStudz]

It’s personal. One isn’t better than the other. Eg I do most of my observing from my back garden which suffers from light pollution. A Telrad/Rigel can be used to star hop. But in my location there are so few stars visible with the naked eye I find this pointless and it just becomes a big and clunky RDF.

I also don’t find my simple RDF at all “wobbly” but then I have it on a solid DIY mount. What I do is simply use the RDF to get in the right area of sky and then use my RACI finder scope to star hop. 

Yes, they do have a habit of dewing up, but for me this doesn’t matter as long as the RACI is dew free. Even when the RDF is totally covered in dew I can still see the red dot and use it to get in the right part of the sky. If dew bothers you than a simple dew shield made out of cardboard or better still a thin sheet of craft foam improves matters no end and costs next to nothing. 

I last aligned my RDF about 9 months ago. It hasn’t needed to be realigned since. I’ve never had an issue of it being knocked off! And personally I don’t like the common way of fixing a Telrad/Rigel which is with double sided sticky tape. In my experience this never lasts as long as bolting the thing down, although there are options of doing this with a Telrad/Rigel. 

Edited December 3, 2022 by PeterStudz

[markse68]

I agree with Peter- my skies would make star hopping with a Telrad impossible- some nights i struggle to see the main stars in Ursa Major. I use my red dot to quickly point at brighter objects then a raci for fine tuning, though usually the rdf is spot on. I occasionally use the optical finder for starhopping, though haven’t had a need to since i got a starsense. Actually, since i got the starsense i only really use the rdf when i haven’t bothered to set the starsense up as it’s even more convenient at quick pointing than the rdf. 

Mark

[Elp]

It's because with a Rigel or telrad you have 0.5, 2 (and in the case of a telrad 4) degree circles in the viewfinder, these are far more useful for star hopping. DSO are harder to see than stars and the distance indicators make all the difference. The Rigel and telrad have fine adjustment knobs so you can fine tune the alignment of the reticule to your sitting position, and in the case of the Rigel I can use it with both eyes open and still get good alignment, a red dot I had to use one eye and have its alignment bang on otherwise it was no good.

[Ratlet]

I find the height of the quickfinder to be a bonus for just looking along it.  My skies are quite good so no issues seeing stars and it can be helped by sighting with both eyes.  Generally just quickfinder to something bright and then use my 32mm plossl to star hop (2° FOV) but I'm considering a raci as the plossl in the 130pds shows a lot more stars than a star chart and it can make it a bit disorientating.

The quickfinder was pretty bad for dewing up, but as mentioned above a few shield from craft foam is a winner.

Not had mine fall off and not had to tweak the alignment and I've had it off and on my scope a few times.

[PeterStudz]

1 hour ago, Elp said:

 a red dot I had to use one eye and have its alignment bang on otherwise it was no good.

I always use a red dot finder with both eyes open. For me I’m making things difficult with only one eye.

For example. If I’m location M3 from my garden I align the red dot roughly half way between Arcturus and Cor Caroli, slightly off to one side. Apart from these two stars naked eye I can’t see anything else - it’s quite a big distance of sky and I need both eyes well open in order to place the red dot in between the two. In this case the screen of the red dot finders only purpose is to reflect the red dot. Roughly 90% of the time M3 is somewhere in the RACI. For the small number of times it isn’t I’m close enough to star hop with the RACI. 

But all of this is personal and subjective. 

[Moonlit Knight]

Neither, have a look at a WO RDF. I aligned mine 3 years ago and haven’t touched it since

[Karl Perera]

Red dots are fiddly at best. I no longer use one at all as platesolving is so much easier and quicker and no star alignment needed.

[JeremyS]

I’ve tried many RDFs over the years. The small ones, like the Baader SS III, tend to be poor and poorly constructed. In fact I needed to get UHU glue out when a new SS III came apart.

Telrad work well (with dimmer switch), though bulky and too ugly for words.

The best I’ve used, and still have, is Baader SS V. Use on my C9.25 - but it’s too bulky for small scopes.

In the end, I prefer proper finderscopes 

[Moonlit Knight]

The last Telrad I had I could not for the life of me align it consistently, who knows why, the other one was fine. I quite like optical finders, I just don’t find them as accurate or useful as a RDF. The WO I use is a wonderful thing, 75 quid I think it was. I aligned it 3 years ago and haven’t touched it since, perfect. Light too compared to optical finders. I also had a Baader RDF, the big one. Over a 100 quid I think but amazingly good quality. I never had any problems.