Which 1 for my firstscope?

yeokimsong · Post by **yeokimsong** » Mon Apr 21, 2008 11:37 pm

Hi all guru, with a budget of 2.5k with mount, i am seriously getting the below for my 1st scope:

1) WO megrez 110Ed APO
2) Vixen R200SS
3) Vixen R150SS

Anyone can advise which scope + mount combo to get if:

1) i want it to be a long time investment (dun feel like upgrading again)
2) will want to do deep sky photography in near future
3) potable in local (as i drive)
4) i want GOTO function.

Thanks

Meng Lee · Post by **Meng Lee** » Tue Apr 22, 2008 12:00 am

Here are my comments:

Since you are observing in local,

1) Megrez 110 is not good. 4" will let you nice planets and some deepsky objects and thats it. For photography its ok, but not recommended for visual in singapore.

2) R200ss is ok for visual, but planetary views will not be so good and you got to learn and perform very frequent collimation. For photography, it is very good but you have to match it with a medium mount such as G11 or EQ-6 pro. The whole setup is massive and you have to buy a massive mount right from the start since you want to do photography and don't want to upgrade again.

3) You can match R150 with a medium mount (reasons above). but 150 mm is too small for visual in singapore.

Bottom line, since you want to do serious photography, a medium mount is a MUST. I hope that helps.

yeokimsong · Post by **yeokimsong** » Tue Apr 22, 2008 12:22 am

there is WO 80ED going on sale for about a grand at the classified. Is it good then?

Meng Lee · Post by **Meng Lee** » Tue Apr 22, 2008 12:54 am

Its FD not ED. It is good for photography but visually u will only see nice (but not detailed) views of planets and very very limited deep sky objects in singapore.

Meng Lee · Post by **Meng Lee** » Tue Apr 22, 2008 1:10 am

By the way, just to emphasize the characteristics of the scopes that serve different purposes can be summarised as follows:

Visual:
LARGE aperture, reasonably good optics

Photography:
medium aperture (if you take a large aperture scope then the mount needs to be a giant), Focal ratio must be fast, at most f6. Minimum aberrations. Minimum field curvature. Focuser must be heavy duty.

tungkian · Post by **tungkian** » Tue Apr 22, 2008 7:15 am

i got a suggestion..u can try to self import in a celestron nexstar8SE. it's a darn good scope for the price! and u've got GOTO, 8 inch of SCT optics, and a really solid mount that can be adapted to other scopes in the future.

1399USD, so ard 2000SGD without shipping. judging from the box for the scope, i would say shipping is around 200 odd SGD via vpost.

Post by **weixing** » Tue Apr 22, 2008 12:28 pm

Hi,

a really solid mount that can be adapted to other scopes in the future.

If NexStar 8SE use the same mount as NexStar 6SE (most people said it is), I won't consider it as a solid mount... it would be an adequate mount sensitive to balancing. Anyway, you can only do lunar/planetary astrophotography with NexStar 8SE package.

Base on your S$2.5K budget and your requirement for visual and astrophotography, I think the Vixen R150S on GP mount might be your best bet (might still exceed your budget if brought new)... forget about GOTO now as your budget is not enough. You can always get the optional StarBook S GOTO upgrade for your GP mount later. Forget about the WO 110 ED and Vixen R200SS... it'll definitely exceed your budget unless some really good deal pop up.

I'm now using the Vixen R200SS, so I can tell you more about it. Vixen R200SS can perform well on visual, but not out of the box... I'm still exploring and finding ways to make it perform well in visual at the lowest cost. At F4, collimation is very critical... it'll not perform well at above medium magnification if collimation is off. Also, eyepiece requirement is quite high and focusing need to be very accurate... Luckily, Meng Lee include a motor focuser for the Vixen R200SS or I might be spending most of the time trying to get a good focus on my non-tracking mount. Anyway, I would not recommend Vixen R200SS if this is your first scope or your first newtonian scope.

By the way, I own a china made 6" scope before and it sure can show you quite a number of objects... in fact, IMHO, it can last you for a very long time even you only observe in Singapore. Also, if the quality of the Vixen R150S is as good as the Vixen R135S which I previously owned, the Vixen R150S should be a nice visual scope and with the optional reducer, should perform decent in Astrophotography too.

Lastly, you need to allocate part of your budget to get some eyepieces and collimation tools if you decide to get a newtonian. Also, don't expect to see image clearly like those astrophoto... unless you get an 18" scope under Mersing sky and don't expect to see colours except a few.

Just my S$0.02.

Good luck and happy shopping.

Have a nice day.

tungkian · Post by **tungkian** » Tue Apr 22, 2008 1:19 pm

hmm...i would say the 8/6SE mount is a very good mount. it's pretty solid and dampening time with the 6inch SCT and loads of accessories (total weight about 7 kg) come to about 1 second with tripod legs fully retracted. carrying capacity of the mount is pretty high too, considering the weight i've been putting on it for quite a while..ha..but yes, you shld balance the load to reduce stress on the motors..

ok..you cant really take astrophotos except planets..but then, how sure are you that u'll be committing lots of time at night to take deep sky photos? the GOTO is darn accurate if you do your alignment with a reticle EP at 200+ X, slews from one side of the sky to the other side and puts the object inside the centre FOV of a 21 mm EP.

oh btw, you can get a very good feathertouch focuser for the 8/6SE tube..makes focusing a breeze as well! and it is extremely easy to install too!

most imptly, it is very portable! you can stuff the mount and tube into a small luggage (those that they allow u to carry onto planes) with space to spare for accessories too!

Meng Lee · Post by **Meng Lee** » Wed Apr 23, 2008 12:16 am

I think he mentioned that he do not want to upgrade equipment next time, so if you want to do deep sky photography, equatorial mount is a must (although some will argue otherwise, but i will say that you will save a lot of technical trouble) and the scope + camera + everything must only load up to 70% of the mount's capacity.

Since you intend to make a one-time big purchase, better make sure your mount must meet the stringent requirements right from the start.

Post by **acc** » Wed Apr 23, 2008 8:54 am

IMO Tungkian's advice is spot-on unless yks is very very very very sure (x100) he wants to plunge head-on into serious deep-sky photography which involves lots of dedication, patience and time under the stars. For visual astronomy and basic planetary photography, the 8SE is an excellent OTA on a very stable mount.