375 replies to this topic

[aztrodog]

Adding another data point, well maybe 2.

 

Bought one new, it was a no go, back it went after a few weeks of fiddling with it. Bad, really bad out of the box, could not even get it collimated. Figured it was bad luck, as I exchanged it for a 152 that despite having a prominent zone did provide nice views without any centering issues. So, many years later I bought a second 178, used and at a bargain price. Gentleman I bought it from agreed to take it back if I could not align it….I would soon find out why. Scope arrived de-centered. I did manage to get it centered, but would not hold collimation more than a few nights. Even with the gentlest of handling. In the end, this one also went back.

 

Glad some people like it and were able to make it work. The two I owned were not even remotely fit for purpose. Without a doubt the worse scope(s) I have ever owned by a long shot. Would not own another even if it was gifted to me. And to think I almost sold my 6” D&G to help pay for the first Meade, was a mistake that would have been! 

[Dave Novoselsky]

I've not seen a six inch non-achro anything sell for under $2k used recently and the last used seven inch scope I was involved with a deal with was cheap at $6000.00.  If a decent seven inch scope can be had for $1200, it's pretty amazing.

It’s not amazing as it’s not decent.  You get what you pay for - if you want something that is impressive to look at rather than through.

[starman876]

I've not seen a six inch non-achro anything sell for under $2k used recently and the last used seven inch scope I was involved with a deal with was cheap at $6000.00.  If a decent seven inch scope can be had for $1200, it's pretty amazing.

It would be amazing a 7" apo for 1200.   You just have to roll the dice.   When I got mine it was shipped a couple thousand miles and I was skeptical with all the things I read.    It got delivered and I decided to try it out without any testing and it was fantastic.   I put it on the bench and tested it and though it was not perfect, there was nothing itried that would improve it so I left it alone and used it. Now why this scope lens did not move I have no clue.  It had the nylon screws to center the lenses.   Maybe everyone who had a bad one did not have the lens fix with nylon screws that kept the lenses aligned. Now I have had a lot of APO's and a lot of them have had the nylon lens alignment screws.

[Dave Novoselsky]

And I drew four aces to a single kicker once.  I should have retired early and joined the Professional Poker Tour.  Thanks for your sage advice.

[Refractor6]

 Speak of the devil   ........here's a 6" just put up for grabs:

 

 

https://www.cloudyni...-apo-refractor/

 

 

 

[starman876]

Awesome

[banatop]

I find it remarkable that a telescope that became legendary as a disaster and was so poorly designed that it’s own manufacture finally gave up trying to fix it and repurchased them from their customers and took them back from their dealers has caused some of you to try to rewrite history.  To me that’s just silly.  However to suggest that Chas and others like myself who bought one and gave Meade every chance to fix a terrible design are delusional  has become personally offensive.

 

Garbage is garbage and the continuing efforts to rewrite history makes this forum look like those for conspiracy theorists. If you want to go and play with one yourself have at it but stop trying to get others to praise you for trying to resurrect an abomination that was buried long ago by its own parents.

 

I've just re-read the last couple of pages and the only offensive terms such as " liar, contempt, delusional, garbage is garbage, lipstick on a pig, abomination" etc, seem to be in your own posts. I don't see anywhere where anyone calls you a liar or delusional or any of the above. Interesting stuff...

[CHASLX200]

Clearly there is a spectrum of experiences, yours being on the far edge of the bad side. But you still represent a single data point, no matter how loud or emphatically you scream it.

 

As a semi-ATM user, a lens cell with poorly machined tolerances that can decenter the lens seems like a minor inconvenience. A fixable flaw. Yes, a $10k scope shouldn't have any flaws, but this was the first model of its type, so was essentially a prototype. They didn't know shipping the scope was going to be the undoing of many of these scopes that left their test bench in good order. But I digress, never having owned one and watching this play out, I have no horse in the race.

I say buy a horse and take on a challenge. You seem to be biting at the bit and enjoy fooling around with scopes and i think if anyone could fix one it would be you.  

[deSitter]

A much, much smaller proportion than those of us that got a bad taste from them and were happy to get rid of them.  I think that’s reflected in the relatively large number that pop up on the market today in comparison to other like aperture and true APOs as well as the ask prices in comparison to less problematic scopes of this type.  People dump garbage and keep what works properly.

Who knows how many people were happy with them and don't compulsively buy and sell?

 

My only direct knowledge comes from my 127ED. It is a fantastic optical design. It should be, the designer was a big-time optical engineer. Whatever the 178ED is, it is guaranteed to be an excellent design, regardless of what mechanical challenges it faced.

 

-drl

[deSitter]

The Meade 152ED was available to me a long time ago so I went to look through it.

It produced some funky triangular shaped stars and a bit of CA on Jupiter.

This was before the cell fix was available and I walked away perplexed by what I saw.

That was pinching. The cell has 6 centering set screws. You center the elements with a set of 3, and the other 3 get tightened down on top of them to keep them from wandering. If you tighten down the inner ones too much, you stress the glass and presto, triangular stars. Oddly you can still test a telescope in this condition. If the triangle pattern is the same in/out of focus, you likely are dealing with good glass. Just relieve the stress and do it right.

 

-drl

[deSitter]

Speaking of party i was on a party boat 40 miles offshore on a 12 hour trip. We died as the water temps are too cold.

That was my first thought - "He fishes with the Swims." The Swims are your fishing pals.

 

-drl

[deSitter]

Clearly there is a spectrum of experiences, yours being on the far edge of the bad side. But you still represent a single data point, no matter how loud or emphatically you scream it.

 

As a semi-ATM user, a lens cell with poorly machined tolerances that can decenter the lens seems like a minor inconvenience. A fixable flaw. Yes, a $10k scope shouldn't have any flaws, but this was the first model of its type, so was essentially a prototype. They didn't know shipping the scope was going to be the undoing of many of these scopes that left their test bench in good order. But I digress, never having owned one and watching this play out, I have no horse in the race.

Last ring plane crossing involved tracking Saturn daily as it set in the west shortly after I got home from work. I realized I didn't have an "instant deploy" telescope to follow the fun. So I bought a new 90/900mm f/10 Meade alt-az refractor for $200. I was annoyed to discover it was badly out of alignment and had no way to adjust it.

 

So I made one. The very heavy dew shield was thick enough to take set screws. This slipped over the lens cell far enough that these screws could not only hold the shield in place, they would push on the equally heavy tube and allow the cell to be tilted just enough to bring it into collimation. I removed the screw that secured the cell and then tapped on the edge of the cell with a paint stirring stick and a tack hammer until collimation was perfect. Tightened down the set screws in the dew shield and it has stayed collimated since. My scope is almost surely the only 90mm achromat in the entire world where the alignment tool is a paint stick and the alignment screws go radially

 

That telescope became a real favorite and now has a 2" focuser. It split Pi Aquilae and showed a small impact event on Jupiter. I could not believe what I was seeing so I took out a big scope to confirm. Illustrates your point. It is very satisfying to solve such problems.

 

The ring-plane crossing was a blast. That scope is a trooper.

 

-drl

[VA3DSO]

I’m not in the market for a big refractor anymore but if I was, putting lipstick and band aids on a pig no matter how good your DIY effort will just leave you with a nicer pig.  And when it’s time to sell it you’ll recover less than zip for your time and costs as nobody really wants to buy someone else’s project or rely on their skill.

I have zero experience with the 178ED, but I have a lot of experience with Meade telescopes, and a similar situation in particular with the Meade Starfinder 10" Dob. Like the 178ED, it had some serious engineering challenges and was fairly useless out of the box. I had to replace the incredibly cheap plastic focuser with a metal GSO unit. I replaced the useless tiny finder with a Telrad. I had to replace the pads on both the Alt and Az axis so the scope would actually move properly. I had to rig up a weight system with Velcro to allow the scope to remain balanced as it's trunions were hopelessly too small. All of this was done to a $900 scope in around the year 2000.

 

But the mirror in that scope was really, really good. After putting all that lipstick and band aids on it, I had a wonderful telescope that I did a Messier Marathon with. It was compact and fit in my small car with no complaints. I really enjoyed my time with that scope and when it came time to part with it, I sold it to a good friend and she still enjoys it.

 

My experience is more like finding a diamond in the rough rather than putting lipstick on a pig (unless the optics themselves are bad, then yeah... it's piggy time!).

Edited by Rick-T137, 09 February 2025 - 09:14 AM.

[jragsdale]

I say buy a horse and take on a challenge. You seem to be biting at the bit and enjoy fooling around with scopes and i think if anyone could fix one it would be you.  

Part of my optimism is that I've overcome other challenged scopes in the past, and I know when I've hit the wall on my skill set and know who to ask for help when I do need more advanced techniques and knowledge than my own. I definitely don't claim to be any sort of optical expert, but I dont let an obstacle stop or discourage me, I keep moving to the next step. I'd love to pick up a 178ED if one was available to me though. But I'm already "frac heavy" with 9 scopes 4" or larger (including a 10" and 12"), so its got to be a good deal.

[deSitter]

I have zero experience with the 178ED, but I have a lot of experience with Meade telescopes, and a similar situation in particular with the Meade Starfinder 10" Dob. Like the 178ED, it had some serious engineering challenges and was fairly useless out of the box. I had to replace the incredibly cheap plastic focuser with a metal GSO unit. I replaced the useless tiny finder with a Telrad. I had to replace the pads on both the Alt and Az axis so the scope would actually move properly. I had to rig up a weight system with Velcro to allow the scope to remain balanced as it's trunions were hopelessly too small. All of this was done to a $900 scope in around the year 2000.

 

But the mirror in that scope was really, really good. After putting all that lipstick and band aids on it, I had a wonderful telescope that I did a Messier Marathon with. It was compact and fit in my small car with no complaints. I really enjoyed my time with that scope and when it came time to part with it, I sold it to a good friend and she still enjoys it.

 

My experience is more like finding a diamond in the rough rather than putting lipstick on a pig (unless the optics themselves are bad, then yeah... it's piggy time!).

This has been my experience time and again - excellent optics, better than expected. This had to have been a prime directive there. It's just a shame that they didn't have enough staff to monitor production and make sure mechanical issues didn't cripple the whole scope. The only Meade scope I've ever looked through or owned that didn't peform to spec was a 90/1000mm "mirror lens" Mak. That was the opposite - made like a fine camera lens, absolutely perfect and beautiful gloss white and anodized black, but the optics are just yuck with too much SA for astronomical use. f/11 is too fast for an all-spherical spot Mak.

 

-drl

[CHASLX200]

Part of my optimism is that I've overcome other challenged scopes in the past, and I know when I've hit the wall on my skill set and know who to ask for help when I do need more advanced techniques and knowledge than my own. I definitely don't claim to be any sort of optical expert, but I dont let an obstacle stop or discourage me, I keep moving to the next step. I'd love to pick up a 178ED if one was available to me though. But I'm already "frac heavy" with 9 scopes 4" or larger (including a 10" and 12"), so its got to be a good deal.

I don't ever fool with a lens. I clammed my first one at age 13.  Plus i don't see anymore to deal with even trying to center a 7" Lens. Well i am Newt heavy and looking for a big gun of some type.

[jragsdale]

I don't ever fool with a lens. I clammed my first one at age 13.  Plus i don't see anymore to deal with even trying to center a 7" Lens. Well i am Newt heavy and looking for a big gun of some type.

It's not as nerve wracking if you plan your steps in advance, take your time, and stay calm. 

 

12" Alvan Clark from 1868:

 

Definitely keep your Zambuto! That should be a lifetime keeper.

[CHASLX200]

It's not as nerve wracking if you plan your steps in advance, take your time, and stay calm. 

 

12" Alvan Clark from 1868:

Screenshot_20250209_074633_Gallery.jpg

 

Definitely keep your Zambuto! That should be a lifetime keeper.

That would make a good saying. Stay calm and don't clam sam. The Zambuto is nuts in this 9 seeing this month and the Ed Stevens is right there with it.

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[skyward_eyes]

I never understand these debate threads. It happens on everything. Some people like it, some people don’t, it goes on and on.

For anyone interested in a 178ED there are just a couple things to consider.

1) There was a high level of sample variation. Look for the ones with the collimation cells for better results.

2) Try before you buy. Make sure you know what you’re getting into. If you don’t like it don’t buy it.

3) Good samples exist and when you find one they are a joy to use.

[Bomber Bob]

I've not seen a six inch non-achro anything sell for under $2k used recently and the last used seven inch scope I was involved with a deal with was cheap at $6000.00.  If a decent seven inch scope can be had for $1200, it's pretty amazing.

[Big Sigh]

 

My Point:  At a low enough Used Price, I'll try to fix a Clunker -- a failure By Design -- IF I think I can.  But, I'm not gonna mess with fixes on a Brand New scope.  I shouldn't be expected to, either.

 

My 2017 APM 152ED cost < $3K.  It was shipped from China to Germany to the USA, yet arrived perfectly collimated, and included a Test Report.  So, Kudos! to Markus for standing behind his product.

 

Meade didn't fess-up until 2002.  That's not satisfactory.  Glad I didn't buy one then; but, I'm glad that others got one w/o the defect.

[CHASLX200]

I never understand these debate threads. It happens on everything. Some people like it, some people don’t, it goes on and on.

For anyone interested in a 178ED there are just a couple things to consider.

1) There was a high level of sample variation. Look for the ones with the collimation cells for better results.

2) Try before you buy. Make sure you know what you’re getting into. If you don’t like it don’t buy it.

3) Good samples exist and when you find one they are a joy to use.

Had much better luck with Sky watcher. The 6" ED was under 2k new when i got mine.Best deal going ever.

[M44]

Have heard so many good things and some  bad things about this scope.  The one I had was a wonderful scope and others have said the same thing,  There were two versions. the first did not allow for centering the optics the second Meade modified so the optics could be aligned,   Would like to hear from those who had a 178ED and what they thought of the scope.  This way we can tell just how good or bad the 178ED was.   Was it a small number that were bad or was it a very high percentage.  would like to get input from folks who actually had one.  

What's the count? Good vs. Bad. 

 

I believe the OP is looking at these numbers. As in voting, one bad scope or good scope will get only one vote.

[MJB87]

Everyone needs to follow our Terms of Service. If you can’t play by the rules, you won’t be allowed to play at all. Off-topic insults and triviality are being removed.  It it continues, sanctions will follow against the responsible individual(s).

[starman876]

What's the count? Good vs. Bad. 

 

I believe the OP is looking at these numbers. As in voting, one bad scope or good scope will get only one vote.

It  has been difficult to get exact numbers.   The number of bad ones do not seem to outnumber the good ones.  I think a lot of people  did not buy these when they first came out because of the bad reviews. Meade made the cell fix, but by then the damage had been done. The one I owned had the cell fix.  I think most of the people with the bad experience did not have the cell fix and I can understand their frustration.  

[Dave Novoselsky]

Since I must be polite when I say this it seems that some are trying to breathe life into a dead horse by beating the subject to death.  If you find a 178 for sale and try to fix what Meade itself admitted in 2002 neither the company nor the engineers who designed and built it could do and went to the very expensive extent of buying back those in the hands of customers upon request and buy back the unsold inventory from dealers then more power to you. You can take that fact, which can be confirmed by a search of the archived and other posts here and throughout the Net, or reject it by accepting the contrary opinions expressed here by those who know more than Meade or its engineers who apparently just gave up and flushed away a lot of money and prestige in the process.

 

That’s inherent in these type of debates. Trust what you hear from pundits on the Net regardless of their expertise as opposed to professionals that had a lot more skin in the game.  
 

Your choice.