Skymax 102 OTA

[Bino Pete]

Hi

I have at the moment a pair of 15x70 bino's mounted on a Horizon 8115 Way Heavy Duty Tripod. I know if I bought a 'Skywatcher Skymax 102 OTA' this would be able to attach to my tripod but would this be any good?

PS. Storage space is a problem.

[ronin]

Well it is 102 not 70 so over twice as much light collection.

You can select eyepieces for different magnifications and viewing requirements. You will see a lot more of Jupter at 80x then at 15x.

Cost is one bad aspect. You will need eyepieces, Antares plossles are about £20 I think and a good finder. Maks have narrow fields of view so you will not manually point it at something and then expect whatever to be in the field of view without a well aligned finder. So besides the OTA I would say a £30 RDF and say 3 eyepieces (32mm, 15mm, 12mm) 32 is to find the object initially. Maybe 32, 20, 15.

Without motors the object will move, and the higher the magnification the quicker it will move out. The tripod will therefore need to be smooth when you manually track anything, no jerkiness.

I might have chosen a 102 achro refractor myself. Same aperture, and wider field of view. Realistically not perhaps as much magnification and some CA on bright objects. But easier to live with. But longer if this is a problem.

[Bino Pete]

Thanks, I'll have a look at the '102 achro refractor'