Stellarvue 152 APO

Stellarvue 152mm Apo

I will start of by saying I have been looking through astronomical telescopes for 38 years. I built my first mirror in 1967 at the Adler Planetarium under the supervision of Ken Wolf. The mirror was a 6" f8 Newtonian . The final figure turned out to about 1/8 wave or better thanks to Ken Wolf completing the figure. Viewing with the 6 has always been a pleasure. My next investment was a 4" televue f5.6 refractor . I use it for solar viewing. That scope along with a Daystar university H-Alpha filter has been stunning. My next investment was a 3.5" Questar of 1/10 wave accuracy. It's a good all around scope for quick setup. My 4th scope is an 11" Celestron GPS. A lot of aperture ,however Images are soft over 120x. The reason I mentioned these scopes is because none of them can excel like my new Stellarvue. I'm a lunar, planetary & double star observer . Nothing that I have can compare to the Stellarvue 152.

When I observe the eye piece I start with is a 5mm Nagler type 6. This gives me 245x . This is not even a challenge with the 152. the contrast & resolution is every thing I have wanted for 38years. Vic Maris the owner of Stellarvue is a perfectionist in the work of this scope & will not settle for less. You owe it to your self to look through one & see for your self. A word about what I have seen.

Looking at the crater Plato under moderate seeing shows 3 small craters on the floor. This is a challenge for most scopes but not the 152. The Crater Clavius shows dozens of tiny craters on the floor. Alpine valley is stunning with the ridge showing up in the center. Mars has been a beautiful site. The polar cap & surface features pop out. Saturn is the best I have ever seen. The contrast is too hard to explain. It is like 3 D.

A word about the Feather Touch focuser. It is a jewel. Nothing on the market can compare. Werner Schmidt & his wife Brigette take the same kind of pride that Vic Maris takes in perfection. I had a chance to look at the Orion Nebula last night. It was quite low in the sky; however the seeing was very good. On a scale of one to ten it was an 8. The trapezium split perfectly. The Nebula was Blue green. The baffling system in the tube assembly is so well made the contrast is too hard to explain with the Orion Nebula. My Celestron 11 may shed more light to the Nebula but the contrast in the SV 152 rules.

From there I went to the double cluster in Cassiopeia. I pulled out my Televue 17mm Nagler 2" type 4 . What impressed me the most as compared to my other scopes is how a refractor can turn stars into pinpoint dots. It was a beautiful site. The night before I looked at the double double in Lyra. I started at 245X . I have never seen them split like that. I went up to 300X to see how the doubles would look & for some reason they showed up better. I'm not a power crazy observer. I like to stay at 40x per inch under very good seeing, however this scope is a monster with power.

As far as the star test is concerned Vic Maris will not let a scope out like this unless he would want to own it himself. Sorry Vic this one is mine. A word about the Losmandy mount. After getting the counter weights to balance the system you can leave the clutches off and move the scope with one finger. Now that's a mount. The drive runs like a Cartier watch. The weight of the scope is approximately 37 lbs. the Losmandy G11 welcomes weight of that size.

Well as you can see I'm happy at 58yrs old & it is the last & only scope I really want. Well folks its time to view. If you're in the Palm Springs area give me a ring. I would be happy to share this wonderful scope with you.

Sincerely Ross Salomone