most disliked scope?

Just wanted to know what was you most disliked scope, you can pick any reason, to big, bad optics or whatever else.

Mine was a Meade 7" ED with LXD-750 mount, the OTA went back to Meade 3 times for collimation problems, and the scope was never fixed! Plus the focuser had image shift, and the mount had computer bugs.

Chas P.

Mine was a Meade 97D 90mm maksutov spotting scope. Permanently out of collimation and just a pain to use in general. In fairness to Meade, the ETX series is far superior to it. From what I've heard the Orion maks are much better as well.

Joplin

My worst scope is the the opposite of the 7" Mead size-wise...a 20X40 Tasco spotting scope with 45 deg EP. I bought it for ~$59 thinking it will make a extra compact spotter. Reminds me of looking thru the bottem of a unwashed milk bottle when it's in focus. The optional 15X "wide angle" EP had the wrong thread so it could not be screwed in all the way. I kept it to remind me not to shop for optics below a certain price point....unless others have tried it and posted favorable reviews.

Erik D

It was some dept. store 4" Meade reflector, DS-114 or something like that. You name it, that scope couldn't do it.

It was so bad that I often tell people my first scope was a C5+ even though it was 2nd. I don't lie deliberately; it's as if I'm just trying to forget it ever existed.

Wow, sorry to hear that. One of my most liked was a Meade 7" Mak OTA. Fantastic images.

Least liked? Either an Astroscan or a Celestron C90 Astro. Couldn't wait to dump either one.

Don W

My first scope, a 10" Orion Premium DSE Dobsonian. And to paraphrase George Constanza; "It wasn't the scope, it was me.". Just couldn't seem to master the motions necessary to get on an object and reliably track it. Eyepiece changes, and general klutziness further complicated matters. Observing opportunities that were few and far between didn't help anything.

Optically it seemed OK; maybe even very good. Had no e.p. filters at that time and trying to observe Jupiter with it would nearly fry your retina. It did give me an excellent view of Hale-Bopp, however. I'll remember that forever.

A coworker borrowed it, liked it and ended up buying it.
Just not a Dob kinda guy...
Bob

"Never met a scope I didn't like."

Some I was glad to see go though.,..

1. ETX-70EC Could of been a decent scope if the optics had been as good as the Apogee Inc $99 80mm F5 special that replaced it. But even with a trip to the Meade factory, splitting castor was hit and miss. Frustrating.

2. Orange tube C-8. My first serious scope and I did have some good times with it. But the EQ fork mount made star hopping no fun, just too damn awkward to use. Add the fun focusing, kind of a trial and error process of adjusting the focuser and then waiting for the vibration to die out. Not the sort of real time focusing one gets with a Newt on a steady mount. And then of course dealing with the dew. Once I got hooked up with my first Newtonian, that scope just sat in the corner. Not a bad scope if you like adding gadgets to make things work.

Jon

Hi,

The scopes I dislike the most are Meade LX200 GPS. The standard LX200 are a breeze to align and use, but the GPS.... aaaarrrgggggggggg!!!!!!!

Maurice

Meade 12" LX200.
Even after painstaking collimation it could not bring anything to focus. I could see more lunar detail through its finder scope! Sent it back to Meade twice - they said it met their optical standards and wouldn't replace it. The 12" wound up being used as a poor photographic guidescope for a piggybacked refractor and 4" SCT.
http://home.earthlink.net/~emeryh/scopes.htm

My first "serious" scope was a Criterion Dynamax 8 SCT, Celestron's first competitor until Meade jumped in. I should have sprung the extra $200 for the Celestron. The mechanics were shoddy and it had terrible astigmatism. I didn't realize how bad it was at the time, I just knew it was a chore to use and the images were disappointing, I had more enjoyable use out of my 60mm refractor. Criterion really blew it with these terrible scopes, I think it damaged their previously good reputation and started a downward spiral they never recovered from.