Thanks Gus. You might be seeing a gap in the white haze or a curve of one of the swirly scribbles. I went back out to the obs and do not see any bubbles or anything that might be considered an "oil level" line (how does one keep oil inside a lens cell anyway? But that's a different subject). I'll take your and Clive's word that it's oil spaced, but for the life of me I can't find out for certain whether it is or not in the literature I have from back then, on A-P's website, or by googling. I just assumed it was air spaced. I did find online a reference to the 130 being oil spaced, but that's all.

The elements have never been taken apart. It's been in my possession ever since it was shipped here directly from Rockford, IL. I got on the waiting list 9/30/97, placed my order 3/24/98, and it arrived 12/9/98. I've never so much as wiped or dusted off the objective, nor touched it with my finger. It's always been kept capped and in the observatory.

Maybe I should have returned the lens right away, but who wants to spend all that money and wait over a year just to say, "I don't like it", and send it back? Besides, I guess I didn't know any better, or was in denial. When everyone says it's the best telescope made, you want to believe it. And when I called, they told me it was normal.

Last night I spent hours looking through 39 pages in the Post a Picture of Your Refractor forum with a lot of lens-on shots. Finally it hit home that mine just isn't right, so I thought I'd try cleaning it myself, and ask here how to go about it.

Jono