Posts Made By: Philip Canard

Try an MSG filter. That is the Neodymium Moon and Skyglow filter made by Baader Planetarium. Get them from Astro Physics or Alpine Astronomical and possibly Anacortes carries them. I bought most of my Baader filters from Astro Physics, and the service was very fast and the prices are much more reasonable than the Thousand Oaks or Lumicon nebula filters. This filter is built on a Zeiss patent and of very high quality, optically and mechanically. Nobody but Baader has this filter, and I'm surprised it is priced so reasonably relative to other brands.

The MSG filter does not darken your view, but does knock out most manmade light pollution and gives the sky background a darker contrast while leaving nebulae and galaxies relatively untouched. My UHC and OIII filters hardly see any use anymore and a 2" MSG is standard filter and dust blocker on my 6" MCT and 8" SNT. It's also a good planetary and lunar filter and there's hardly any reason to take it out of the optical path unless you have heavy filtration needs.

I have since replaced all of the EP's that came in my Celestron EP kit. The Omni Plossl line is similar with nicer finish and they seem to be better quality. However, anything below 12mm has too short eye relief to be comfortable. I use a 12mm and 20mm Omni on my finder scope, and a pair of 25mm Omni in my binoviewer. The 4mm and 6mm kit EP's were given away to a kid as I find them too short eye relief. They were replaced with pairs of 4.4mm and 6.4mm Siebert Star Splitters which I like much better. A pair of 9mm Burgess TMB's replaced the 9mm kit EP. I prefer the 30mm Ultima to the 32mm Plossl. The 18mm Ultima is better than the 15mm Plossl or 20mm Omni Plossl, with much better eye relief. The 10mm or 12.5mm Ultima fills the hole between the 9mm kit EP, and they are much nicer as well. All of the Ultima EP's can be picked up used for well under $80, except for the 30mm Ultima which is in huge demand as a binoviewer EP. The Elite Plossl EP's out of Canada are very similar to the Ultima, as are the Orion Ultrascopics. Any of those are a fine upgrade over the Celestron kit EP's and when bought used are very economical. I will not get longwinded but say that the Ultima EP's are as good as they are reported to be in many reviews of them. The Tele Vue Plossl series is another excellent option and gives almost exactly the same performance. Panoptic or Axiom EP's will give a broader field of view, but contrast, sharpness, angular distortion and ghosting will suffer in relation to the Ultima series and TV Plossl series. In short focal lengths, the Burgess TMB and Star Splitter EP's (7.9mm and shorter. The 8.9mm and 9.9mm SS are 3-element Kellners) are sharp, have good eye relief, and work down to f/4 focal ratios. The 8.9mm SS is the sharpest EP I own for my f/15 Mak, but it will not work well at all below f/10. If I was to keep any of the kit EP's it would be the 32mm, but if a 30mm Ultima is available then the Ultima will always get used first.

If you buy the Baader T-2 Click-Lock EP holder and put it on the Baader 2" T-2 nosepiece, you can use your 1.25" EP's with any 2" filter. This rig also holds binoviewers better than anything else I have tried.

It's best to buy all filters in 2" sizes if you have any 2" EP's and reduce down with a 1.25" adapter or Click-Lock when using 1.25" EP's.

You need a wideangle 2" EP so that you can have the widest FOV without encountering mirror blackout. Something like a 35mm Panoptic, 31mm Nagler, 34mm Siebert Observatory or 30mm Pentax XW are good choices. There are several others as well. One you should especially consider is the 34mm Observatory by Siebert Optics. I have the 38mm version which is a custom order focal length. This wideangle design is extremely comfortable with absolutely no kidney beaning or blackout problems, lightweight, small for a wideangle design and priced very affordably with a return privilege if you don't like it. At $200 it's going to come in well under the price of the others even if you bought them used. Downside is you will have to wait a few weeks for Harry to build it. Cheap 2" EP's probably will not work well at f/4.7. The 34mm Observatory will work well at your focal ratio. A 34mm Axiom will not, although I have a 34mm Axiom that on an f/15 Mak-Cass will outperfrom the Siebert Observatory a bit, though at a higher cost unless bought used. I bought the Siebert Observatory for very fast focal ratios and you will have a very hard tome finding them on the used market because the owners like them. Harry said that almost nobody wants their money back on the Observatory series EP's. They are outstanding wideangle EP's for Dobs without the cost and weight of the premium priced brands.

Phil

Get a good used 6" or 7" Russian Mak-Cass or Mak-Newt such as a LOMO, Intes-Micro or whatever. Even a 7" Meade Mak-Cass would fill the bill. It would be near the best you could get for planetary, double star, and lunar viewing, as well as very good for brighter deep space objects. I can make out some galaxies fairly well in my 6" Russian Mak-Cass at a dark sky site. Gives better planetary views than my fast 8" Newtonian. I've become a lunar observer even though I once thought I wouldn't like it all that much because of my 6" LOMO Astele Mak-Cass. The OTA with 2" Mercury back and 2" Stellarvue dielectric diagonal was about $750 delivered. A TEC eyepiece turret set me back $500. A good Pelican Case was around $200 delivered. A Siebert BN22 binoviewer was $300. The LOMO Astele 150 Mak-Cass comes with a killer finder scope. You get 1/8 wave optics that give the best planetary and lunar views I ever saw. The Intes-Micro scopes sell for similar prices and can be had with 1/8 wave optics as well. You can get a good used mount in place of the TEC eyepiece turret for around $500 if you don't already have one.

An alternative is to get a good Synta EQ6 mount for under $1000 on the used market and mount a used long focus 8" Newtonian with high grade mirror and diagonal on it. No SCT will be able to touch it for high mag views.

Still, nothing can touch a good 6" Mak on a decent mount in the $1500 range if you like viewing fairly bright objects at high power. Achromats will have false color, Newtonians will have less portability and less ruggedness with higher maintenance requirements, and an APO refractor that can equal it will cost over twice as much.

If you are using an SCT you should be looking at the Axiom or UO Mk 70 series instead of the Pans, and saving some money in the process. Axioms are great at f/8 or slower with much less pincushion than the Pan design. I use a 34mm Axiom in my MCT and it's really great in a long focal ratio scope. Also, you might want to consider a 2" Siebert Observatory. The Pan design has lots of pincushion distortion to allow sharp stars at the field edge in fast scopes. With an f/10 or slower scope, you can greatly reduce pincushion distortion and still stay sharp at the edge with some other designs. No need to use an f/4 Dob EP in a Cassegrain scope. Use a Cassegrain friendly EP in a Cassegrain scope.

Phil

My Plossls in short focal lengths were replaced by TMB's and Star Splitters....and I've never looked back.

Phil

Kind of depends on what you consider inexpensive. A $600 Takahashi scope case is expensive. That makes my $200 Pelican case seem like a bargain. It's good for the money, but still not cheap. It qualifies as a waterproof shipping container, sort of expedition grade stuff. It will hold up to an Atlas EQ mount and accessories. Some smaller mounts with tripods might fit in welded aluminum double gun cases available at outdoor sporting goods stores. I only put tripods in fabric foam lined cases, as OTA's might get damaged and mounts are too heavy for their size to be protected in something like that.

As somebody else suggested, Coleman coolers may be the best bang for the buck, and they are insulated as well. You can buy large sheets of foam rubber or polyethylene foam and build any kind of foam lining you need by stacking layers of cut foam using contact cement.

Set the Meade GoTo mount to quiet slew mode and noise will not be a problem.

The fact that it is limited to 1.25" accessories means it will have a TFOV of around 0.6* and a lowest Mag around 82X with a 32mm Plossl. Orion Maks have been known to have appreciable mirror flop in the past, and the longer FL may mean that it got worse unless Orion had the Chinese address that issue. A used Meade LX200 7" Mak or a used Russian 7" Mak would be a much better place for your money, in my opinion.

Try the reviews over at Cloudy Nights. I think I saw a review on that scope over there.

At f/5, eyepieces become critical. Personally, I would get the 150mm f/8 Celestron and use a 50mm Axiom or 55mm TV Plossl. That gets you down to 24X. EP's that are even cheaper work at f/8. At f/5, you are locked into Panoptics and such pricey EP's.

Phil