new telescope

When I lived in Hawaii, I used to take my 12.5 Dob down to Wikiki Beach area
for sidewalk astronomy. Now in that area, they have some kind of light amost
every 15 to 20 ft, at midnight it's almost like daylight on the main blvd
that runs through it. But even with all the LP in that area, I could and did
show off the major planets and a few stars and even m42 from the sidewalk
there.


--

The Lone Sidewalk Astronomer of Rosamond
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"Starboard" wrote in message
oups.com...
Good advice, Errol.

Well Phil, pat yourself on the back. I have a pretty good teacher(s).
(Thanks again for all your past help)

Tell me, in *badly polluted* skies, does one benefit *as much* from
more aperture? I mean doesn't it seem that at some point, additional
aperture would, along with gathering more light from the object under
observation, also gather more light from the pollution as well?

Errol

Go with the XT-10

Will outperform any tiny aperture refractor out there. ;o)

Telrad
2" wide AFOV eyepiece

wrote in message
oups.com...
Go with the XT-10

Will outperform any tiny aperture refractor out there. ;o)

Telrad
2" wide AFOV eyepiece


Beware the aperture monster. It _can_ overwhelm and defeat enthusiasm.

I suggest getting a look at the XT10 in person before making a decision.
While portable in two pieces for the strong of will and strong of back, it's
awkward and difficult to move as an assembled unit without a handtruck.

An XT8 that you take outside every chance you get, is better than an XT10
that sits in the corner, defeated.

If I had to make the choice, I'd go with the 8. I've had the 10, and have
concluded that a scope I can carry assembled from point A to point B, at
will, is going to see more use. So, it may depend on whether or not you are
the type of person who likes to get out a few times a week, or a few times a
month. If the former, then smaller is better. If the latter, then by all
means, get as large a scope as you can transport and pick your spot
carefully, so that you can see as much of the sky as possible without having
to move the scope.

You might consider whether you're going the Intelliscope route. Why?
Without the Intelliscope's altitude encoder, the Classic is super easy
to assemble and disassemble. Not that the Intelliscope is all that
hard. Disassembled, the XT10 is easily transported. Also, the XT10
Classic comes with a 9x50 finder.

There's no reason to limit your aperature due to light pollution. In
fact, a large aperature makes better light pollution filters more
practical, since they dim the image.

The downsides of an XT10 vs. an XT8 are more careful collimation (get a
laser collimator), longer cooldown (get a fan), and slightly more coma
with cheap eyepieces (use widefield designs like Orion Stratus, Meade
QX and UWA, or Televue Nagler and Panoptic). The weight is a minor
difference.

On Mon, 6 Mar 2006 07:58:57 -0500, "Stephen Paul"
wrote:


wrote in message
roups.com...
Go with the XT-10

Will outperform any tiny aperture refractor out there. ;o)

Telrad
2" wide AFOV eyepiece


Beware the aperture monster. It _can_ overwhelm and defeat enthusiasm.

I suggest getting a look at the XT10 in person before making a decision.
While portable in two pieces for the strong of will and strong of back, it's
awkward and difficult to move as an assembled unit without a handtruck.

An XT8 that you take outside every chance you get, is better than an XT10
that sits in the corner, defeated.

If I had to make the choice, I'd go with the 8. I've had the 10, and have
concluded that a scope I can carry assembled from point A to point B, at
will, is going to see more use. So, it may depend on whether or not you are
the type of person who likes to get out a few times a week, or a few times a
month. If the former, then smaller is better. If the latter, then by all
means, get as large a scope as you can transport and pick your spot
carefully, so that you can see as much of the sky as possible without having
to move the scope.



I live out in the country where there is little light pollution. I
have an open area about 350 ft x 700 ft that is surrouded by trees
but I don't think that I would have to do a lot of moving once set up.
I will probably order one or the other in the next couple of weeks.
I appreciate everyone's input. Like I said, I am very green at this,
but looking forward to exploring the sky with a telescope.

If you have that large an area under dark skies, then get the biggest
scope you can manage with a handtruck. :-)

I have roughly 200ft by 400ft of open space and I absolutely loved
having the 12.5" F4.8 in a Discovery PDHQ structure because the square
box base made it easy to handle with a handtruck. It only took a moment
to move it from one spot to another. Unfortunately, where I live the
temperatures change faster than a 12" mirror can keep up with. Only on
rare occasions did the scope perform to its full potential. The 10"
scope really didn't do much better in that regard through most of the
year.

The 6" Newt that I'm using now has little trouble tracking the
temperature changes and takes but a half hour to 45 minutes to
acclimate a full 20 degrees (F) from the garage to the backyard.
Interestingly enough, the C9.25 does pretty well too, once it's cooled
(I have a Lymax SCT cooler if needed, but letting it sit out for an
hour or so before use is usually sufficient). I also have a feedback
regulated heater on the corrector end, as well as an aluminum
dewshield. I think that level of control over the corrector (consistent
temperature differential with the outside air), and the closed tube
design make it less susceptible to tube currents caused by changing
temperature for the primary mirror. Of course, nothing helps in bad
seeing.

Anyway, enough rambling....
Good luck with your decision.

I believe an acquaintance owns one and I've looked through it. If it is the
same scope, don't worry about planets. It's a good telescope on all objects, a
nice package.

If it is the same scope though (darn this memory!) then you might keep in mind
that the mount seems to be underweight for this large a telescope, and suffers
from unsteady tracking because apparently the dovetail bar that allows the
telescope to attach to the mount is too small and flexes as the scope is wobbled
from side to side. The cure is to simply make a beefier version of the dovetail
bar.

Good Luck !
--- Dave "Friendly Advice" Nakamoto
--
----------------------------------------------------------------------
Pinprick holes in a colorless sky
Let inspired figures of light pass by
The Mighty Light of ten thousand suns
Challenges infinity, and is soon gone




"96redneck" wrote in message
...
I have been watching post here for a couple of years. I took the
advice of some of you and bought a pair of binoculars and have been
star gazing for over a year now. I know a little about the sky now,
but still very green. I'm about to buy my first telescope, and so far
I've narrowed my choices to the Orion XT-8 or XT-10, but remain open
for suggestions. If I go with the XT-10, how does it perform on the
Planets and what accessories do you recommend?