STELLAMIRA 125 ED DOUBLET F7.8 FIRST LIGHT- APRIL 13TH.

[paulastro]

I've had the scope a few weeks, but only on Saturday did I have it out under Starlight.  I had already tested it in daylight on distant lichen-laden leafless trees against blue sky with sunshine.  Zero CA and very sharp with good contrast, so I had high expectations of it.

The 125 was mounted on the StellaLyra Dual-Altaz mount (similiar to the SkyTee2) which was more than adequate. I had also previously mounted it on my vintage Vixen GP which also took it very well.

I used a Baader/Zeiss T2 Prism Diagonal with a 34mm prism and BBHS coatings for my tests.

I started on the crescent Moon high in the sky as civil dusk set in.  Good seeing initially, but it deteriorated as darkness took over.  Jumping in at the deep end I put in the Svbony 3-8 mm zoom, which has had many plaudits.  Starting at 8mm and slowly increasing the mag, I was  surprised at what I saw - it was the zooms first night time outing too.

The image was extremely sharp at 8mm, and to my eyes there was little if any change as the mag went from x122 to x325 at the 3mm setting. The sharpness was very apparent more like the performance of a very good fixed focal length eyepiece. No CA noticeable on limb or crater highlights. Features observed were Janssen, M Nectaris, Fracastorius and the are to the S around Piccolomoni.  I forgot the testing and spent some time studying the very impressive detail.

I then tried my Baader Mk1 Maxbright binoviewer with x2 Baader Classic 18mm Orthos and x2 barlow element giving x217.  This usually out-oerforms any single eyepiece - but not on this occassion surprisingly, it looked less sharp  Though, the seeing may have dropped off a tad.  Still a great view.

Tried the Baader Mk111 8-24 zoom and that gave very good images too, though not as sharp as the Svbony zoom.

Alas Jupiter was now rather too low for testing the scope  (10 to 5 degrees altitude) but I couldn't resist popping in the Svbony zoom which surprusingky still showed the two equatorial belts and other bits of detail.

For viewing wider fields I put in the Celestron Ultima Edge FF 30/70 2 inch eyepiece, x32 and 2.1 degree field.  The field had a lovely sharp edge with no vignetting as in my daylight tests.  The contrast was as dark as I could have expected with the sky conditions, now a little hazy in places, very nice.  What was also obvious was the colour saturation in the different colour stars and also how small and tight the star images were.  Again very impressive, what I'd expect from a very good refractor telescope.

All in all a very good first light, the scopes optics are clearly of a high quality, very pleasng indeed.  

I'll write a full review when I've had some more night time forays.