Posts Made By: Nattee Chotinun

If everyone follows these steps, there sure would be a lot less traffic on this forum!

However, some people just want someone to tell them what to buy without the going through the research process. Some people need to experiment in order to see what fits their needs the best. Star parties are great if you actually have the time and the patience to attend a few before making a buying decision. When I started out, it was difficult to figure out what it is I would be into. A few minutes at the eyepiece at a star party was not adequate to determine what I like or don't like.

After owning a few scopes and attending more star parties, I now know what I like to do and pretty much ignore most equipment recommendations that I read. Everybody has different requirement in terms of portabilty, time, type of observation, budget, location, blah, blah, blah. For many, it's a trial an error process. The bad news for newbie is there are some real bad beginner scopes out there.

Using something like the 3-step process, I recently came to the conclusion that the perfect scope for me is 16-18" dob with tracking. My living situation has changed drastically since I made my last big purchase. What the heck am I doing with a 10" scope? Now, all I have to do is raised the funds for it.

Nat Chotinun
Santa Fe, NM
portabilty? we don't need no stinking portabilty!

Hello,

I have the Vixen Super Polaris mount and would like it to accept the GP/CG5 dovetails. Anybody know where I can find the female dovetail saddle that I can attached to the SP?

Thanks,

Nat Chotinun
Santa Fe, NM

What's interesting is the price of the C14 OTA is now $3895 at Astronomics. It's was more like $4400+ range before (still $4479 at Anacortes).

Well, this changes my plans of getting a C14 in the future. Before, it was more like $8K ($4K-$5K for a goto GEM mount and then $3K-$4K for the OTA). Meade is offering a 14" goto scope for the price of a C14 capable goto mount.

So, the ball is now in Celestron's court. So, where's that Nextstar 14?

Nat

On apm germany website, http://www.apm-telescopes.de, they list the Intes-Micro MN165 (16" f/5) for $22,900.

Nat C.

Hi Mike,
Look at Astromart ad number 140761. There's a picture of the previous 13mm Nagler. The new 13mm type 6 are smaller and it's 1-1/4". Go to Anacortes web site. They have a picture of the 13mm Nagler Type 6.

Nat Chotinun
Santa Fe, NM

Hi Pete,
The WideFields are the predecessor to the Panoptics. I've looked through a some TV WideFields. The edge distortion is bad compared to the Panoptics. The Naglers & Radians came later. WideFields are no longer in production. The Paoptics has replaced them as a less expensive alternative to the Naglers.

Nat

Hi Ron,
Sure, but you should go look through a few 8" SCTs and see for yourself. Make sure the samples you look through is well collimated and properly cooled down. You saw the thread on SAA about 8"SCT vs 8" dob. I guess neither side convinced you.

For me the choice is easy. I don't like newtonians because of the eyepiece location. Period. I like refractors and all cassegrain variants because I like to be behind the end of the OTA, not up front beside it. Just a personal preference, like some people love hot spicy foods and some don't. Do you care where the eyepiece is located?

There are many good SCTs out there and there are many bad ones, too. I have a Meade 10" SCT on a CI700 mount. I recently bought Bob's knob for it and collimate the heck out of my SCT on a night of good seeing (8/10) and was rewarded with a jaw dropping view of Jupiter at 313x. There was the GRS, white clouds, barges, festoons, you name it. I had to come inside and look for a picture/diagram that shows what all these things are called so I can write them down in my log. The image was bright, sharp, and there was plenty of contrast. I've had only one other night this winter when the seeing was almost as good. That night, I could only only go up to 208x on Jupiter. My jaws still dropped, thought. I considered myself lucky because I think I got a good one.

A few months back I had a chance to look at Saturn through one of the new Nextstar 11GPS. It really surprised me. I didn't know such contrast was possible in an SCT. It has better contrast than mine! (Don't you hate it when that happens?) A friend of mine has a Celestron Ultima 8" that he raves about when it comes to planetary performance. This is from a guy who owns about 10 APO refractors and as many SCTs. (He did very well during the stock market boom and bought telescopes instead of a Boxster). He tells me to keep an eye out for an Ultima 8 if I want to increase my chances of getting a really good 8" SCT.

I don't think it's a question of whether SCTs are any good, but where can you get a good one. If you choose an SCT, find out if you like fork mounts or not. And by the way, I think Celestron always said their optics is "hand-figured". Other posters, please correctly me if I'm wrong.

Regards,

Nat C.
Santa Fe, NM
PS The garage is a good place to keep SCT during the winter. It helps with cool down time.
PPS Love your Light Cup observing reports.

David,
A little more information would help. What's the focal lenght of your dob? I found that a magnification around 100x-140x are good for galaxies. I use 132x most of the time. It's kind of tough to make recommendations without knowing the focal lenght of the scope.

I have 3 Panoptics, 1 Nagler, and one Pentax SMC XL in my wide field eyepiece collection. I have a 10" f/10 SCT. For me, an eyepiece with AFOV of 65 degrees is considered to be a 'good size' wide field. Lately there have been some buzz about the new 65 degrees offering from Orion (Expanse) and Adorama (ProOptic Ultra Wide). They are the same, just packaged under different names. They have AFOV of 65 degrees and comes in 6mm, 9mm, 15mm, and 20mm focal lenghts. The price is $49.95 each. Adorama has a deal where you buy 2 and get the third one free. Check out the reviews on cloudynights.com

If you want to stick with something with a reputation but don't want to buy a Nagler, consider the Panoptics (68*) and the Pentax SMC XL (65*). I have the 35mm, 27mm and the 19mm Panoptics and they are my primary Herchel 400 objects eyepieces. My Nagler is a 13mm Type 6 and my Pentax is a 10.5 mm. These two don't see as much use because of their focal lenght but they come in handy for those little Planetary Nebulae, small galaxies, and small globular clusters. Others will recommend other wide field eyepieces, I've used the Panoptics the most and can say that I love them!

Take a look at a 19mm panoptic. Maybe this is the focal length you're after? If you want something smaller, the 14mm SMC XL and the 10.5 mm SMC XL are very nice eyepieces. They usually go for $190 used.

Nat

We have this notification list you can get on. We will let you know when we're about to start the next batch of good weather...

Look on the bright side, it's a (near) full moon anyway and the Messier Marathon is still a month away.

Nat Chotinun
Stormy in Santa Fe.

I got the LXD55 mount for my MN56 just for this purpose. I was going to use it as a 'finder' for my CI700 mounted 10" SCT. Once it located an object, I would look in its red dot finder and then point the telrad on my 10" scopte to the same spot. I can then matched the star fields in SCT's ST80 finder to the MN56's FOV. That should get you very close. Plus, I will have a wide field of it in the MN56 and higher mag view of it with the 10" SCT. However, the Autostar died so I haven't tried out the idea yet. I have a replacement Autostar coming so I will try this out soon.

Right now, I just star hop with SCT and that's fine. There are nights when this combo would be very useful.

Nat Chotinun, Santa Fe, New Mexico