Scope and mount regrets?

[Bugdozer]

I have no regrets at all with any of my astronomy gear. It's always been what was exactly right for me at the time. More of an annoyance than a regret was that a couple of months after buying my Meade ETX, they brought out the Goto version, which I would have preferred. But I didn't regret the telescope I did have. 

[Stu]

Regrets? I’ve had a few, but then again….

I bought a new Orion Optics OMC200 and despite having some good views with it, I never felt it delivered what it should. I eventually worked out that the primary was clipped in the view when trying to collimate it, and drove it four hours up to OO for them to service it. Unfortunately I was fobbed off with a quick tweak of the secondary and was too naive to question it.

Just before I sold the scope, I took the back plate off and discovered that the primary was loose and tilted because a grub screw had fallen out. I refitted it, tightened the mirror in its correct position and hey presto, all looked good. Trouble is, I never got the benefit of it being properly collimated 🤬🤬

Other regrets; buying a Tak Sky 90 which I thought was not very good, even more annoying because I had sold a lovely FC-76DC to fund it. Eventually re-bought the 76DC.

That’s about it I think. I sometimes wish I hadn’t sold my Sumerian 14” Alkaid which was an amazingly compact scope for taking to dark sites.

[maw lod qan]

Only regret is not buying a 10" OTA instead of the 8".

And it wouldn't have been  much more!

[Flame Nebula]

On 07/02/2024 at 22:08, JeremyS said:

I usually use my C9.25 on an AZEQ6 in Az mode

That's one I have been considering myself, as I have a second hand ed80 I'd like to use for dso AP, 

[Flame Nebula]

Thanks for everyone's interesting comments. 👍

[dantro]

On 08/02/2024 at 12:19, jjohnson3803 said:

That's interesting.  I usually run my refractors with a ScopeTech Zero on an Innorel RT90C (carbon), but I have an AZ5 that I use now and then.  The max practical weight limit with my scopes was 11-12 pounds.  I'll have to put the AZ5 back on the 90C and see how it does with my ST102.  (What I really need to do is take notes when I try different combos so I don't repeat my "experiments".)

  I would be very interested in your comparison of the AZ5 with the ScopeTech Zero on a RT90C tripod especially at higher magnifications.  Thank you for the reply.

[SamAndrew]

Buying and selling astro gear is all part of the journey, I've had plenty of gear that didn't live up to expectations, but no real regrets on the astro front  I think I'm on about 30 telescopes in 13 years.

Biggest financial mistakes/regrets have all been car and motorbike related.

[glafnazur]

I've bought and sold numerous scopes but the only one I have regretted selling was my beautiful WOZS66.

One thing I do truly regret, and this is not equipment related, is the fact that I have not recorded all or at least most of my observing sessions. I record more and make sketches nowadays but when I first got my scope I never bothered.

[JeremyS]

The only scope I’ve sold and regretted was my lovely Pentax 75 SDHF refractor.

Ive regretted selling quite a few eyepieces so have given up doing that. My biggest EP regret was my Pentax XP 3.8. I sold at a crazy low price. They don’t often appear on the used market and it took me years to find another, in Japan, for about 3 times the price.

Edited February 11 by JeremyS

[JeremyS]

Buying regrets. In the 1990s I got my timing frustratingly wrong on 2 separate purchases.

The first was a Vixen SP mount. Nothing wrong with the mount, but just after taking delivery Vixen launched the new GP range. I eventually got a wonder GPDX.

3 years after getting the SP I took delivery of Vixens Skysensor 3D goto system. It was slow but ok. But then Vixen launched its Skysensor 2000. Again I upgraded to that which was a great piece of kit.

[John]

9 minutes ago, JeremyS said:

Buying regrets. In the 1990s I got my timing frustratingly wrong on 2 separate purchases.

The first was a Vixen SP mount. Nothing wrong with the mount, but just after taking delivery Vixen launched the new GP range. I eventually got a wonder GPDX.

3 years after getting the SP I took delivery of Vixens Skysensor 3D goto system. It was slow but ok. But then Vixen launched its Skysensor 2000. Again I upgraded to that which was a great piece of kit.

Many years ago I had a Vixen SP102M (under Bresser branding as it happens) which had the Skysensor 2 GOTO system, AKA, the "pale green brick". I think I only ever tried to use it once as a GOTO system but found it very awkward to set up so ended up using it as an over-sized controller for the motor drives.

Hopefully the later versions of the Skysensor were more user-friendly !

Edited February 11 by John

[JeremyS]

3 minutes ago, John said:

Many years ago I had a Vixen SP102M (under Bresser branding as it happens) which had the Skysensor 2 GOTO system, AKA, the "pale green brick". I think I only ever tried to use it once as a GOTO system but found it very awkward to set up so ended up using it as an over-sized controller for the motor drives.

Hopefully the later versions of the Skysensor were more user-friendly !

The SS3D worked well enough, but required the mount to be accurately polar aligned. I used in in the early dats of CCD cameras to get the target on the (small) chip.  Dry slow slewing 

The SS2K was a super piece of kit. As good as anything you get today. Fast slew speeds. 

[Richard_]

I didn't come here to brag, but I don't have any scope or mount regrets 🙂 This can be a very expensive hobby so I try to do as much research before each purchase.

I have two of each:

Mounts

• Skywatcher Star Adventurer 2i
• Skywatcher EQ6-R Pro

Telescopes

• WO Redcat51
• WO FLT120

Despite my Star Adventurer now sitting in a cupboard and not being used, this mount/tracker got me interested in the hobby for a low price (compared to how much I've now spent lol). I don't think it would have been a good idea to "buy once, cry once" when starting a new hobby so this mount/tracker was perfect for learning the basics.

A similar thing can be said about the Redcat. It was the first telescope I bought and was an upgrade from the 200mm DSLR lens I was using. I wanted an easy to use telescope (no flattener, reducer or collimation to worry about) and something lightweight the Star Adventurer could handle. The Redcat was a perfect, albeit expensive choice, and I still use it to this day as my wide field imaging scope.

Later on, I wanted to upgrade to a 100-120mm aperture telescope and stick to a refractor for ease of use. Due to covid, there were a number of supply issues so my choices were limited. The FLT120 had just been released and it ticked all the boxes for me. Just like the Redcat, this was probably the more expensive telescope from my choices, but that doesn't mean that it's bad.

Both telescopes have provided me with excellent images, don't require an awful lot of work to set up and don't need any tweaks for collibation etc.

On the other hand, there are a few accessories which I regret buying but that's outside the scope of this thread 🙂

[Beardy30]

Regret buying a 130 newt as my first scope - regret selling my 8” SCT which was my second- however buying my 4” refractor 102 was a good move and I’ll never part with it