Which scope/mount for a beginner

[Guest iatm1976]

Hi everybody, a new member here asking for some guidance in the aquisition of a good entry level scope/mount.  I'm not totally new to astronomy, I've been using (for a couple of years now) a good set of 10x50 Orion binoculars to scan the sky and I'm familiarized with some constellations and stars.  I just wanna go to the next level.

 

I need my new scope capable for both, terrestrial and astronomical use.  I live in a high place, in a mildly light polluted area (so mainly moon and planets from here), but with a nice day view of a great landscape.  Additionaly I have easy access to some really nice dark spots where stargazing sessions will be a success.

 

As a beginner I'm not interested in entering the astro-photography realm from scratch, I think the best course of action would be getting a good scope with a good mount first, then enjoy doing the basics: watching, learning the sky, getting very used to it, and then, in a future start getting the complementary equipment to adapt it to photo/video use, and this means escalability.

 

Searching the Internet and after reading a lot, I concluded that the best type of scope which will serve both (terrestrial and astronomical) uses and will fit my budget would be a 5 or 6 inches catadioptric (MAT or SCT) as I can get more apperture than with a refractor for the same money (reflectors were discarded as they're not suited for terrestrial viewing). I'm not to fussy about if is an OTA with the mount sold separately or a mount included device, I know the first option will be more expensive but still I can evaluate it. 

 

I've checked some models (Celestron's 127SLT, 5&6SE and some Orion's and Meade's), but almost all of them comes with computerized mounts (which I liked at first glance), but then other considerations came and questions started to pop: would a computarized mount be escalable in time? is a good option for terrestrial and astronomical watching? would be easy to adapt to photo/video? can I use a scope which came with one of those mounts with any other mount I could get in the future? How really good are those GoTo functionalities?  I mean, I've read a lot of negative and positive stuff about these mounts, I've read complains about stability (precisely for photo purposes), flimsiness, light weight, lack of maneuverability (as manual adjust is not possible or very limited), fast battery power consumption, etc. 

 

In the positive side, and as I understand (please correct me if I'm mistaken in anything), these computarized mounts are very good for object tracking, and that's precisely another characteristic which is really important to me: the tracking.  I want to track celestial objects easily but without sacrificing the terrestrial watching capabilities. A manual altazimut mount will be great for terrestrial viewing but not so much for tracking objects in the sky, a manual german EQ mount will track anything in the sky perfectly (even can be motorized) but doesn't work good for terrestrial, a fork EQ with a wedge could do the trick, but I've been searching for those and apparently all are computarized and they're sold with telescopes attached to it. At the end, I'm not sure which mount will be better for me considering my purposes.

 

I hope you guys can throw some light in the chasm of questions and doubts in which I'm stuck right now.

 

Thanks in advance.   

[tuckstar]

Hi welcome aboard, if you want it for daytime use I would go for a refractor and get a prism. A good eq mount would be my recommendation some can be used as eq and alt az.

[Doc]

As you have quickly discovered one scope does not suit all. If you mainly want terrestrial and astronomy then I agree with Andy above get a good quality refractor and if you can afford it a prism so you get the correct view image.

 

If it's going to be used a lot in the daytime, you don't need a tracking mount, I would go for a good quality Alt/Az mount. This can be used at night time and it will force you into learning the sky as it has no computer. Only down side is it does not track.

 

You can see why people have more then one scope and a few different mounts as well.

[Brantuk]

Hi Issam and welcome to EMS

 

I agree with the above - a good quality refractor on an alt/az mount will fit the bill nicely for terrestrial and astronomical use. You may prefer a 45^o prism for day time viewing and a 90^o diagonal for night time astro use. What sort of budget do you have?

 

Refractors do tend to be more expensive than other types of scope per aperture inch. I think it would help you to come along to a session and have a chat with a few members. We're having one tomorrow evening at Wymeswold if you check out the EMS Meets section - you'd be very welcome to attend.

Edited August 7, 2015 by Brantuk

[Guest iatm1976]

Thank's a lot for your responses.  As I'm not even near to your location, it won't be possible to reunite, but still any advise you can give me will be extremely useful.

 

I considered first the catadioptric over the refractor mainly because there's a lot of documentation about how good are those for terrestrial and astronomical uses, because they're compact and portable, and most important because of the "cost  per inch of apperture" relation you mentioned, and I'd like to get the best apperture for my buck, because as I understand this is the most valuable feature in a scope (you can always correct me if you think I'm wrong or disoriented in something).  I'm considering your advise about going with the refractor, but still I'd like to know why you think a catadrioptic wouldn't be suitable.

 

Maybe I'm wrong in my concepts about what to expect  from different apperture sizes, and I'm just thinking in the lines of "the bigger the better".  Maybe a 4" scope could be as useful and satisfying as a 5" or 6", and that's precisely why I'm looking for guidance, I just wanna have a good look at Saturn (for example), and see a well defined image of the planet and the ring system, more than a blurry dot with some weird side appendices 

 

I don't have a definitive budget yet, I think I could spend up to USD850 for starters, and I'm considering to get a 45° prism for correction too.  I neither would say that my main interest will be terrestrial use, surely I want to take advantage of my location, but I'm planning to use it A LOT for sky watching too, that's why I liked Andy's recommendation about the EQ convertible to Alt/Az mount, maybe you can give me some known model to look for.

 

Again, thanks in advance for your recommendations.

[tuckstar]

The sct and mak cass all have a large central obstruction which means that a 4" frac will actually have roughly the same light grasp as a 5 or 6" compound system. The frac does not need to be collimated (shouldn't need) and are much happier to be chucked around than a mak/sct. You will get more mag out of an sct but better Contrast with the frac.

Edited August 7, 2015 by tuckstar

[Guest iatm1976]

Thanks Andy.  I finally decide to start gradually with this, as I'd prefer to enjoy the basics first, learn more stuff and then, in some time take the next step.  

 

I finally got an Orion APEX 90mm with an EQ-1 mount. The scope came with a 25mm EP, and I bought an extra zoom 7 to 21mm EP to have some mag capabilities.

 

I already tested the terrestrial viewing this afternoon and I'm very happy with the results, I could use the EQ mount for terrestrial without any complication, and the optical quality of the scope is superb with the 25mm EP, nice FOV and contrast, with the zoom EP, when I bring it to the max the view dims a little but still is very good.

 

The mount is very stable, at least for the weight of this tube, it trembles a little when doing major adjustments to the tube position or when focusing the scope, but when you finally set the objective and use the slow motion knobs to track it, the system remains satisfactorily still.  

 

Its a shame the night turns awfully cludy and rainy, so I'll have to delay the big astronomic debut to another moment.

[BAZ]

I don't know what terrestrial viewing is like, but for night time use, don't forget to let the scope reach ambient temperature for around an hour. This let the air currents in the tube settle down and you get a far better view. Enjoy your new scope.

[tuckstar]

You should get some nice views of the moon and the planets with that.