CN FORUMS ARCHIVE Telescope Reviews: Thirty-dollar keepers -- a very cheap 10x42 roof

This is one of those things that I hesitate even to admit (like my purchase of a worse-than-department-store small refractor telescope some years ago, when I knew better) -- but maybe it will be somewhat interesting to someone. (If anyone challenges me about this purchase, I might claim that "the devil made me do it", because it's contrary to what I'd advise anyone. But anyway...)

I guess this is sort of a mini-review, FWIW.

After many many months of not going there, I ended up at Wal-Mart the other (cloudy) night. They had something I hadn't seen there before -- a 10x42 roof prism model: eye relief 19mm, weight 22oz, almost 6-deg. FOV (305 ft/1000 yds).

In spite of it being only "fully coated" and in a sealed package, due to the price of $30 I found that I couldn't resist buying it. It's a Bushnell Sportsman, made in China. When I went online to look up that model, I found not much and have concluded that it must be a long-discontinued one.

Well, I think I've decided to keep it, maybe mostly due to the light weight. But I get pretty good pinpoint stars and moons of Jupiter -- at least as good as my Orion Ultraview 8x42. Due to it being only "fully coated", there's of course a lot of glare -- e.g., if the Moon is within maybe 30 or so degrees, there's a sort of crescent of white light on one side of the FOV, lined up with the Moon. Looking directly at the Moon, I'm pretty sure that I now know what chromatic aberration is, as there's a colored halo around it. (That halo is not there at all with my FMC Ultraview.) But the Moon's craters and mountains are pretty sharp.

It doesn't say anywhere what the prism glass is. The exit pupils are round (maybe very slightly ovoid in the vertical direction).

The right-diopter adjustment is kind of "grindy" (I don't know what else to call it.) but works okay. The center focus wheel is very light, very easy (probably too loose). The IPD goes narrow enough that even my "cousin-in-law" (who has a hard time finding any that do) was able to use it with even a bit of room left.

The roof-prism design sure does make for a different feel in my hands, along with the light weight. I can't hold this one exactly like my Ultraview, because this one is so narrow. But it's easy to hold, even one-handed.

The shaking/jitter is pretty similar to my Ultraview and my old Bushnell "GlassesOn" 10x50 (32oz, 6.5-deg. FOV, 22mm eye relief, BK-7). A lot of the time at my primary observing site, I lean on or against the roof of a telescope shed. When I did that, it seemed like, if possible, there was less shaking than with the Ultraview (28oz) held the same way.

I'm not sure what the actual usable eye relief is, but it seems that I'm seeing the entire FOV with my eyeglasses on. It has twist-up eyecups, like my Ultraview, and they seem to work okay.

It came with a soft case and thin strap but no lenscaps. (I'm puzzled as to why they didn't include lenscaps. How much would four cheap lenscaps have cost?)

I haven't really tried it in the daytime yet but certainly don't have high expectations!

At the incredibly low price and given that it does appear to work okay (for the money), it can if nothing else be for "public star party, anyone can manhandle it" or "keep in the 150-degrees-in-the-summer car" use, etc.

I'm getting more and more of a feel for the primary consideration between 8x and 10x binoculars, which for me is the trade-off between field of view and image scale (given pretty comparable shaking). I really like the larger image scale of the 10x, but I also really like the wider FOV of the 8x. It's just a trade-off that has to be considered. Beyond that, the six-ounce weight difference between this one and the Ultraview is definitely significant.

Now, my next purchase has to be a 12x, if not a 15x, for attempting to see C/73P Schwassmann-Wachmann 3 fragments, if at all possible. There's not much time left for that; they're almost here.

Ed Cannon - Austin, Texas, USA

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