4 replies to this topic

[12BH7]

Finally one of the good ones.  The entire Aristarchus plateau was perfectly illuminated to show off all it's features.  I had plenty of time to finally check out the rille Vallis Shroteri and Montes Harbinger mountains with it's ghost crater Prinz to the east. The plateau was really showing it's all tonight.

 

I pulled out all the EP's tonight. My 8" SCT was effortlessly going up to 266x using a 15mm Televue DeLite and 2x Barlow. The scope just wasn't running out of gas. At one point I even tried 500x using a 8mm Burgess with Barlow. The image wasn't the sharpest, but it was useable. Not that I ever care to go that high anyway.

 

I never really used my 8" SCT for lunar as it was mainly a travel scope. Only recently have I been using this scope and to be honest, WOW. This scope is a very capable work horse. 

[Napp]

Sounds like a great night.  An SCT is a very capable lunar scope.   The long focal length makes high magnification easy with very comfortable longer focal length eyepieces.

[gstrumol]

None of my scopes beats my C8 for amazing views of the moon, Jupiter and Saturn. And of course DSOs.

 

SCTs somehow get a bad rap, but a well collimated C8 under above average or better seeing skies will take on any 4" refractor, APO or not, on the planets and easily best them on the faint fuzzies.

[Sebastian_Sajaroff]

Aristarchus is one of my favorite lunar regions to explore. Amazing area !

[12BH7]

None of my scopes beats my C8 for amazing views of the moon, Jupiter and Saturn. And of course DSOs.

 

SCTs somehow get a bad rap, but a well collimated C8 under above average or better seeing skies will take on any 4" refractor, APO or not, on the planets and easily best them on the faint fuzzies.

I'm going to out on a flaming limb here and say what I feel. Those that give a bad rap to SCT's either don't know how to use them or don't know how to collimate them. And collimation is part of astronomy - no matter what scope you're using.

 

I believe each design has something special to offer - the trick is to know what it is before you trash talk it.