14" GOTO Dob for USD$2,700 (before shipping)

[Gary]

Enjoy the video. Nice to see it demonstrated beside a 6-foot human being for scaling purposes. If not for the portability factor, it makes visual astronomers wonder why they spent their USD$2700 on other smaller aperture scopes.



http://www.telescope.com/Telescopes/Dob ... egoryId=30

[khurram]

Amazing, there was this time that I was very interested in XT8 goto, due to aperture size. But after reading all the posts (including your advice, Gary) I am keeping a look out for portable 5 or 6 inch telescopes.

But the day I move to a place where I have a big space behind my home or a big car to transport, I am gonna go for these big ones, 14 inch, 16 inch or maybe 20 inch DOBs! I can't wait to try a bigger aperture telescope...

[Gary]

Haha. Yeah. And the best part, by the time we have the space and transport for it, prices would have dropped even further for the same specs.

Perhaps by then technology will be so advance the dob assemble by itself like a Transformer, auto collimate using built in-laser and after the ob session, transform back into a vehicle and drive itself back to our garage. Ah .... I have a dream .... LOL.

[khurram]

Hmmm you watch too much transformers... if the scopes were so smart, they will the rule the earth..

[Mariner]

Dammit. Makes me wanna grab one 14" for visual and permenantly set my 6" SCT on a GE mount for AP duties...

Oh wait, weight's gonna kill me....

[orly_andico]

There's an (illegal) but lightweight approach.

Well illegal to export out of the US, anyway.

http://www.ceoptics.com/ccd/i3.html

Gives a 2.5X to 4X gain in aperture (e.g. your 4" will turn into a 10" to 16" equivalent).

Two thousand US bucks. And it weighs almost nothing.

[khurram]

Wow now i want to get both of these one.day, imagine an eye piece like this on a 14 to 20 inch dob.

What is the biggest aperture you guys have experienced so far? does singapore has any big telescope for public viewing?

[Mariner]

Wow now i want to get both of these one.day, imagine an eye piece like this on a 14 to 20 inch dob.

What is the biggest aperture you guys have experienced so far? does singapore has any big telescope for public viewing?

The biggest I know of is the 16 incher at the Science Centre Obaervatory. Open every Friday for Public viewing from 7.45pm.

[cloud_cover]

Explore Scientific demo-ed a 16" DOB with full sized alt bearings and an obsession style rocker box and top, truss tubes, full sized altitude bearings. Targetted price supposedly less than 2K. Non guided but I think goto can be added later, not sure about the cost, maybe 1-1.5K. So total perhaps 3K-3.5K. That's not too much more to ask for a 16".
Also note Orion will not honor warranty if you are not the first owner or living outside the warranty coverage (according to a thread on cloudynights) so unless you buy from a Singapore dealer at a few times the cost, if anything goes wrong, particularly electronics, you are on your own...

[Airconvent]

The Dob seems very well thought out. The ability to move the scope even when aligned and tracking reminds me of Mr Aus's Celestron Ultima 2000 which was amazing but unfortunately discontinued. But that part about making it more height friendly is applicable to westerners only since majority of us is probably around 1.6-1.7m tall, not 1.8m which is the height of the presenter. We'll need to borrow rlow's stool!

And although it can be broken down into smaller pieces (kudos to them for this!), I think a 10" or 12" would be better suited to Singapore as all the parts would now be smaller and lighter plus 10" is a good size to catch galaxies even in Singapore (oldies remember Chuan Yee's 10" Galaxy Hunting Dob?).