Telescope Reviews: Refractor recommendations for a beginner

Wow, an 11" SCT would be about the antithesis of portable. I mean, compared to a 7" APO, perhaps, but compared to any 120mm refractor and any 8" or smaller dob, I guarantee you'll get many more hours of enjoyment (due to easy setup) from these lesser scopes. In our Club we have a guy who owns a 20" F/4 and an 11" Meade SCT. From my experiences with him, I'd say the set up, though close, is probably a little less stressful for the 20". And the corresponding views? no contest!

But a 20" dob is a ludicrous notion for grab 'n go.

I have to note that this friend with the 11", as well as other friends who've owned all manner of push-to and go-to technology, all but one have had various troubles with their 'go-to' systems. The one that I do not know has had problems has one of the Orion XT10i push-to scopes. He's the only one I know of who hasn't had various problems with the technology at some point or the other. And this guy has done trouble-shooting for a different friend who did have trouble with his push-to Orion mechanism. I have a good astronomy friend who's deeply into astrophotograpy, even making some pretty respectable images, one of M33 that I have on my wall. But even he has had troubles with various computer go-to gadgetry from time to time.

The argument that go-to helps from urban skies observing has its problems, too. Although for a complete neophyte, go-to has a lot to offer in regards to suburban/urban astronomy, but for anyone who's had an undriven 4.25" reflector (or even a well used spotting scope or pair of binoculars), the benefits lessen considerably. There are only so many spectacular DSOs that still look pretty good in a small aperture scope (less than 12") under suburban/moon blighted skies. After one learns where M13, M31, M57, M27, M81/82, M8, and M3 are, well, you've not got a whole lot left, deep sky wise. I mean, you can find the objects, but they're usually not worth looking at under such conditions in anything less than truly large aperture. Go-to might be more beneficial for obscure double-stars, but again, even on a full moon night, Albireo or Eta Cassiopeiae are pretty easy for me to put in even my F/9 100mm refractor. I grant that tracking is definitely nice for public star parties and prolonged study of a particular target (especially Jupiter, Saturn, the moon, etc.)

Again, everyone is different and determining what will work for you, Mickey, is something no one here can really do. You'll have to find that out. Still, knowing what I know from my particular point of view, if I could have a go-to whiz bang 8" SCT (already huge and heavy at that size, btw) or the 120mm ED SW-cum-AZ4 as Dennis Di Cicco describes in his article on page 38 of the October Sky and Telescope, there's no contest for me. The refractor would win every time. I like the S&T summary header for the article. WHAT WE LIKE has a list of nice features, but WHAT WE DON'T LIKE has 'Nothing.' Dennis Di Cicco reviews and uses more scopes in a year than most folks will use in a lifetime. That's a pretty strong rec, people.

Oh well, I've definitely used up my 15 minutes of CN fame on this post. Good luck Mickey, and whatever you get, I hope you enjoy it.

CDS

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