First Light Skywatcher Explorer 150PL

[DeejayP999]

Well, I finally got first light tonight with my new Skywatcher Explorer 150PL.

It was a limited, quick look session and the first clear night since the scope arrived a week ago. Despite being a long-term observer (20+ years) this is the first reflector I’ve owned and I was looking forward to seeing how it performed.

One of the first tasks I attempted, with some trepidation, was collimation. I’d purchased a Cheshire eyepiece with the scope and the whole process turned out to be more straightforward than I’d thought.

Surprisingly, most of the required adjustment was to the secondary mirror which was offset and angled slightly away from the focuser – the view through the eyepiece was of a circle with part of the bottom cut off. Closer inspection showed that the spider vanes were loose. Tightening them evenly followed by a quick tweak on the secondary adjuster screws soon had it sorted. That done, the primary needed only a very minor adjustment and everything lined up textbook fashion. From that, I suspect that the scope was accurately collimated when it left the factory but that the spider vanes had somehow come loose in transit.

With everything set up my first target was, predictably, the moon. With a 32mm Plossl giving just shy of 40x mag, Luna was a spectacular sight – floating like a ball in the centre of the FOV. The image was exceptionally crisp and free from any optical aberrations that I could detect. With a 14mm Radian, the whole lunar disc still fit within the FOV at a very sharp 86x. Going up to 150x with an 8mm Radian lost very little in the way of brightness and showed incredible detail and even at 240x (5mm Radian) the image was still acceptably bright – even with the atmosphere boiling away across the FOV.

That done, I turned my attention to Jupiter. This is now relatively low in the Sky and well past it’s best but still worth a look. At 40x the Galilean moons were clearly evident and one band across the disc. At 86x more detail began to emerge with several bands showing. Tonight 150x was the limit and gave a very promising view although at 240x the image turned to mush – clearly down to atmospheric seeing and nothing to do with the scope.

For the finale, I turned the scope to the Pleiades – always a favourite. Obviously, even with the 32mm Plossl, the whole cluster didn’t fit into the FOV (not that I expected it to in this f8 scope) but nonetheless was an impressive sight with dozens of pin sharp stars on show.

Overall, I am already very pleased with this scope. It puts up impressive images even with tonight’s obviously limited seeing and I’m surprised just how much magnification it can take – even with that limitation.

Definitely recommended!

[Ronseal]

Nice report Deejay, sounds like you had a good session with reasonable vis. I've got the 150P with Hyperion ep's and the views are stunning, just need a moon filter for ease of viewing that bright moon and an x2 barlow as at F5 I only get x94 with an 8mm ep (the standard SW one is not too good!)