Coronado PST 1st light

[mijijim]

HI,

I allready have a Hyperion zoom, now to convince my wife how much

she would enjoy the view.

mijijim

[John]

HI,

I allready have a Hyperion zoom, now to convince my wife how much

she would enjoy the view.

mijijim

Fortunately the PST also works very well with much simpler eyepieces - but the zoom is convenient.

My wife's reaction to the H-alpha sun was that it was "a pretty colour" but she thought I'd get bored with it quite soon

We will see .......

[spaceboy]

Looking good John. I have to make do with white light Baader film. Would love to see them promancies. ( forgive my spelling)

[Makron]

Interesting!

Thanks for the review

[JonH]

I really should not be reading this thread as it could get expensive!

John and Russ, how do you know if a PST bought on Ebay is safe to use? I'd be concerned in case it's been damaged in some way that's not immediately obvious.

[russ]

Hi Jon, unfortunately you don't and you take a risk. Mine didn't pay off. Just checking the lens over the weekend and i have the start of rusty coatings

The view is still incredible. And after some email exchanges with Ken (Merlin66) and Steve (Telescope House), i'm 100% satisfied it's safe. But it's highly annoying and if i paid the repair cost (£150) from Telescope House, it would have worked out cheaper buying a brand new Lunt LS35 (£415 delivered) from Ian King. Having a bit of a downer at the moment.

[JonH]

Hi Russ, thanks for your reply and I'm very sorry to hear that. I hope it doesn't spoil your enjoyment too much.

I've never bought anything used from private sellers on Ebay, preferring the peace of mind of buying from reputable dealers.

[russ]

Jon, i think you are very wise.... Telescope House will no doubt be having one of their 10% days in a month or so, could be a chance to grab a new one.

[JonH]

Thanks for the tip, I'll check out their site.

[John]

I'm sorry to hear of Russ's rusty lens issue as well - I hope you get it sorted soon one way or another, Russ

At least it does not appear to affect the views, at least for the time being.

I was originally going to buy new for just that reason but a PST came up on the UK Astro Buy & Sell website from a seller who I'd had some dealings with before. He also supplied me with the serial number and date of manufacture (well the date on the warranty card anyway) so I could check that it's not recorded on the "Cloudynights" forum's register as a scope with known issues. The serial number of mine (#102944) seemed to fall outside the range of those with known issues.

I'm still going to be looking carefully at the objective lens often though.

[Mark at Beaufort]

The view is still incredible. And after some email exchanges with Ken (Merlin66) and Steve (Telescope House), i'm 100% satisfied it's safe.

Hello Russ - I can understand your annoyance. However, I bought my PST from new nearly six years ago. It has rust. However, the views are very very good and I don't see the point paying £150 to repair it especially as someone once advised me that the view through the repair scope will not be any better. I just hope that time will prove this.

Mark

[russ]

I wish i had done the same John. Waited for one on Buy'n'sell or bought new.

In defence of the seller, the scope is like new and 100% sure they had no idea. I know Meade US have been replacing the lens free of charge, even for out of warranty scopes. Was sort of hoping i would be offered the same here but alas no such luck.

[russ]

Hi Mark,

Many thanks, you have made up my mind to do the same for now. If the view had been poor and safety an issue, i would have changed it. But it seems to have no issues.

[russ]

I'm sorry to hear of Russ's rusty lens issue as well - I hope you get it sorted soon one way or another, Russ

Thanks John.

Slightly annoyed with myself for not checking more indepth. But Mark and others have put my mind at ease.

[Macavity]

I found/felt the CN list useful too. I am "hoping" re. Ser:106812. Suppliers of the boxed version, who had NONE, a few months back, (RVO!) are presumably safe. No schadenfreude here either. For those with an aversion to "in" terms, without explanation [G], it seems to be a de-naturing of a cement or oil layer, integral to the objective? I guess it cannot thus increase overall transparency, so (presumably!) "fails safe".

[andre2]

Do the PST also work Well with a cheeper zoom? Then i can save my money to buy the baader hyerion 4 instead.

[Solar B]

I've never tried a PST with any zoom (that I can recall) other than the Hyperion Mk2 & 3 ... I seem to have fonder memories

of the views with the Mk2 over the 3 ... they do however work well with just any plossl EP.

 

Brian 

[Stu]

9 hours ago, andre2 said:

Do the PST also work Well with a cheeper zoom? Then i can save my money to buy the baader hyerion 4 instead.

I have read that the Seben 8 to 24mm zoom and similar clones are decent for solar Ha. The PST is f10 so not overly demanding. @Peter Drew rates them for this purpose as I recall.

[Moonshane]

I have used a seben zoom with my pst mod but not with the pst in the original form and it was really good. At f10 in the PST I am sure it would be good. I have a feeling the focus position is quite a bit different to e.g. plossls so bear this in mind. Cannot remember which way but maybe someone could advise.

[MarsG76]

Great report.

I'm glad that it was such a great view for you... I use the SolarMax II scope and similarly the views are amazing... so much detail coming out on the sun in those scopes.

[Pete Presland]

Love the fact that a 7 year old thread is still providing useful information.  I used a generic 8-24mm zoom on my PST and I now use the same eyepiece on my Lunt50mm. That said I mostly image, but I have found it more satisfactory on both scopes. I guess if you were going to use for an even wider range of scopes it might be worth a bigger investment. 

[Tyson M]

I regularly used a Barska 8-24mm zoom which I believe to be a Celestron clone ( but not 100% sure).  Views are stunning through my Lunt. 

 

My nagler and panoptic are sharper but getting just the right magnification is not something to be ignored in daytime seeing. 

[andre2]

Hi i had use my PST a few times and i notice that it is ofthen (?) diffucult  to few all the features without to have move the trypod all the time ( full disk fewing. If i see a filement to the left , move the trypod, then  a prom at the right is gone. And so on. So, is this normal fenomen for the PST?  Or has it to to with someting? What do you think? I want to do full disk ( sometimes if allow) without to move the trypod here and there. Thanks for the tip/ sugesstions!!  ( i hope also not have to think to buy a other, bigger scope...i just buy the pst and manny people love it)

[John]

I've only used a PST a few times but I did notice that it had a "sweet spot" in a certain part of the field of view where the solar detail becomes much more obvious. I have read about this issue with other PST's as well so I assume that it is normal.

 

[YKSE]

55 minutes ago, John said:

I've only used a PST a few times but I did notice that it had a "sweet spot" in a certain part of the field of view where the solar detail becomes much more obvious. I have read about this issue with other PST's as well so I assume that it is normal.

Yes, that's my experience too, even in low mag (< 20x),  I need to move the Sun disk around to see the all the proms around the Sun.