Telescope Reviews: Top 3 public demonstration telescopes

Personally I have a 10inch dobsonian with a Telrad... I tell people it runs on "Steak and Eggs".

I'm a teacher and sponsor of the astronomy club at my school. Outreach is my passion. Everytime I take my 10 inch out, I'm pleased with it. People enjoy the views. Rarely do I have to get a stool taller than 1 foot off the ground for people to see in the eyepiece. I got my dob after owning a "Go-To", I found that the Go-To didn't work for much for me at out reach events, I like showing people a tour of the heavens... I move around quickly and faster with my dob than my Go-to motors go! I like my telrad b/c on bight objects like the moon I can look from the top of the tel-rad and see if it is still centered on it even while people are looking in the eyepiece.

I'm a member of the San Antonio Astronomical Assoc. and this past month I've done about 10 outreach events with them and have have about 1,200 or more people look through my scope. At our last outreach event (March 15,2008) we had 28 scopes set up and counted between 400-500 people in attendence. I try to set up at near the parking lot side of the telescope field so when people are leaving I can say... hey what did you see?, and if they didn't see something like a cluster, I'll say hey let me move my scope the this and that, and bam! in 20 seconds to 1 minute we are there!

Since the question is what 3 scopes would be best I'd say:

1. My 10inch dobsonian- Because of the following reasons, easy of use, light gathering ability, it was signed by John Dobson (conversation starter), and portability (fits in my 2007 Jeep Wrangler 2 door!

2. a 4.5 or 6 inch dobsonian...why you ask?...well, it is extremely portable, if you had to ride a bus to get where the outreach was you could. It would do great on planets, and the moon (both are big crowd pleasers); it shows the public what a good entry level telescope would be (instead of overpriced plastic junk that department stores sell), it is not intimidating so if you wanted to let the public use it. It isn't expensive so if a kid accidentally ran it down your not taking out a second mortgage. I'm seriously thinking about buying one for my wife, she started accompanying me on outreaches and it would be easy for me to run the 10" and her the 6"

3. A Mak-Cas 90mm go-to scope with electronic eyepiece and TV. I've got a 90mm MakCas Goto scope and a Meade electronic eyepiece, and a boom-box with a TV. I like setting up the scope to track the moon and have it display the image on a television screen. Also the scope is extremely portable, and it shows the public what a decent entry level scope would be.

What I like about these scopes is that I could run my 10" Dob, the wife man the 6" Dob. and we could have the Go-to tracking something and displaying images on the TV virtually unmonitored so with 2 people you've got three scopes going at once!.

I'm not against big scopes, but I think that portability and affortablity, and eyepiece height play a big part in selecting a scope for outreach! After all the best scope for outreach is going the be the one you can use the most for outreach, a 26inch might be too much work to setup for an hour long outreach event especially if Jane & John Doe don't monitor their children and they run into your scope!

Matthew

Ps. I made money a factor in this b/c to me it is a factor! I a teacher not a pro-football player.

Edited by matthew2000tx (03/20/08 04:37 AM)