Telescope Reviews: Need Help Deciding What To Do

Well, you folks have really hooked me into binocular viewing and that is now giving me a headache!! I need some advice.

I recently acquired a pair of Tak 22x60's and I am now thirsting for the same quality views at somewhere between 30x and 40x, and I have between $2K and $3K to get there. I also have a Tak 152mm refractor with which I use a Tak Twin View binocular viewer, but this is a real beast to set up. I was looking for something very portable for use in my suburban Phoenix back yard for lunar, double stars and low power planet viewing.

I think that I have the following options:
1) Go for the 71mm Mayauchi's with the interchangeable eyepieces. This would make my Tak's redundant, and I am not sure that I would get the same high quality images.

2) Go for a Borg 102mm ED to use with my Twin View, with perhaps shaving a few inches off the OTA to get to focus. I can then use my existing eyepiece pairs. But I don't know if this would give good quality images, and I worry about the weight of the Twin View binding on the helical focusser.

3) I did try to push the primary mirror on my 6" f/6.6 reflector forward 5" to get the Twin View into focus but my secondary mirror is about half the diameter now required to accomodate the light cone. The images look horrible and I am not sure if I want to experiment any further (read "mess up") with a perfectly good 6" reflector.

4) Buy a dedicated 35x high quality binocular. If so, what's out there that is top quality?

5) Go after a Binoscope set up. I may be tempted to go this route but I think it'd have to be with a pair of 80mm achromats, because I don't think that I want to spend the $7K on a pair of 4" APO's and associated hardware.

6) Reconcile myself to the fact that I am chasing rainbows and just give up the ghost. I would then use the 6" reflector for quickie views, but then I'd be viewing in mono mode :-(.

This is all you guys' fault for getting me hooked on binoculars :-)

Can someone out there please put me out of my misery.....

Thx,
Silvio.

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TMB 115 LW Refractor
APM 80/480 CNC Refractor
8" F7 Reflector
Kowa 32x82 Highlander Fluorite Binoculars
Canon 18x50 IS Binoculars
Canon 12x36 IS Binoculars
Tasco 7x35 Widefield Binoculars

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