ZWO FF80 APO or Askar 80PHQ

[Grumman]

As the title says, I want to ask owners of these telescopes based on your experience what are the pros and cons as on paper they are identical and the price is exactly the same if we take into account the reducer…

[Clarkey]

Looking at the pictures and the spot diagrams, they ARE the same scope. One is green and one is red. Take your pick.....

[Elp]

Unless you have a mount restriction why not the Askar 103 triplet?

[Grumman]

1 hour ago, Clarkey said:

Looking at the pictures and the spot diagrams, they ARE the same scope. One is green and one is red. Take your pick.....

That's what I was thinking to be honest... red or green? 🤣

[Grumman]

40 minutes ago, Elp said:

Unless you have a mount restriction why not the Askar 103 triplet?

I hear you... however, the 103 is a triplet while the others mentioned are quadruplets.

I am not sure if I should give £1k for triplet  or £1.5k for a quadruplet...

[Elp]

One of the best imaging refractors ever the Skywatcher Esprit is a triplet...

The Stellarmira 90mm is also a highly regarded triplet.

[Grumman]

Just now, Elp said:

One of the best imaging refractors ever the Skywatcher Esprit is a triplet...

The Stellarmira 90mm is also a highly regarded triplet.

Point taken... thank you!

[Elp]

Depends what you want to image. For me, I'd take increased aperture and longer focal length, BUT, what you'd want to image also needs to frame up well. The benefit of having a scope which takes flatteners is you usually have a choice of flatteners you can use so you can adjust your FOV and f ratio.

Edited February 20 by Elp

[Grumman]

I agree, and I think a 600mm focal length scope with a 0.8x reducer is a perfect match for deep sky for my Canon APS-C and IMX178C CCD...

[SamAndrew]

4 minutes ago, Elp said:

One of the best imaging refractors ever the Skywatcher Esprit is a triplet...

The Stellarmira 90mm is also a highly regarded triplet.

But you need to add a flattener to both of these, so you end up with more glass in the end

[Elp]

6 minutes ago, SamAndrew said:

But you need to add a flattener to both of these, so you end up with more glass in the end

True, see above my edited comment.  Both my Z61 and Starfield 102 I have a choice of framing options due to having more than one flattener/reducer, makes them both more versatile. The SF however I've found to be an odd medium FL, too long for large emission nebulae, not quite long enough for the majority of the small galaxies out there. The next scope for me always has to offer something new unless part of the plan is doubling up on image acquisition, in which case they have to be similar to what you already have. The SF however is excellent for visual, so it's usefulness increases.

Edited February 20 by Elp

[Grumman]

13 minutes ago, Elp said:

Depends what you want to image. For me, I'd take increased aperture and longer focal length, BUT, what you'd want to image also needs to frame up well. The benefit of having a scope which takes flatteners is you usually have a choice of flatteners you can use so you can adjust your FOV and f ratio.

I had bad experience with my Sky-Watcher 72ED (pre 2019) where the flattener is "chewing through" the back focus and I have no room for anything else apart from my DSLR as I won't be able to focus... 

[Elp]

You'd have the same issue with a quad won't you, the issue of not enough room for any other equipment?

[Grumman]

1 minute ago, Elp said:

You'd have the same issue with a quad won't you, the issue of not enough room for any other equipment?

No they claim that there is no back-focus distance required, just focus on the target, unless you use a reducer but I can see that the tube is short and there is enough Focuser travel.

 

in comparison with the SW 72ED, the body of the scope is too long and Focuser can’t go inward far enough for camera to focus when using a flattener/reducer.