First off, I am still very much a beginner even after one year with the Z8 which, by the way, I greatly enjoy. In this time I've learned to star hop from my
The second reason is simply that I am curious about refractors. Their ease of use, portability and quick setup is appealing. Simple as that. Caveat is that while my pockets are deep, they are also empty so fancy equipment is entirely out of the question here.
When I learned recently about Celestron's new DX StarSense Explorer line aimed at beginners, I was intrigued. The idea of coupling a mobile phone
How does it work? Plainly put, your mobile phone sits on a cradle specially designed for the telescope and uses its camera to plate solve the direction it's pointed at in the sky. This is done on your phone and on the spot, in seconds. No polar or two star alignment, no leveling, no WiFi, no Bluetooth, no wires, no batteries, and no fuss.
It's not perfect, of course, not every phone works on it and you have to align your telescope initially with an object much like you would a red dot finder. Find a distant street light or a bright planet like Venus, center it in your eyepiece and drag the image to the center of the phone screen. Takes less than ten seconds. After that you can check the list of suggested targets for your location and time, and it's off to the races.
Within minutes of alignment I was looking at objects that eluded me completely this past year. The Whirlpool, Sunflower and Pinwheel galaxies, Bodes nebulae and so on. The catalogue is relatively small at this time. It includes the
You can move the entire rig to a different part of your yard for a better angle and you'll quickly be back in business. You may have to realign but that takes seconds to accomplish.
The StarSense
As mentioned earlier, it has it's limitations. It only works at night and is not compatible with some mobile phones. I use an iPhone 8 and it works very smoothly. In fact, I was surprised it worked around partly cloudy skies the first night I took it out but one has to be patient while it platesolves here and there as you push the
The optical train and mount deserve a separate review and at this point I haven't used it enough to draw conclusions. Assembly took ten minutes and the instructions are well written. My set up is a 102az f6.5 refractor with a single speed focuser, manual altazimuth mount and dual-axis slow-motion controls. The focuser and azimuth knob work smoothly but the alt control feels sloppy on mine so I'll have to adjust it. It came with 26mm (25x) and 10mm (66x) Kellner eyepieces and a 1.25" erect image diagonal. The 26mm Kellner and diagonal are functional but the 10mm seems dim and foggy. I added a 1.25" Astro-Tech dielectric diagonal and a Celestron 32mm (21x) Ploessl to round out the system. If you don't already own one, a better 10-12mm eyepiece would be a nice addition.
Goes without saying that while the lenses are multicoated, this is no high end glass triplet and a quick glance at Venus reveals purple and green chromatic aberration (
Celestron has come up with a ingenious system and it is impressive. Pairing it with an affordable telescope is ideal for anyone starting out or as a second telescope. It is great fun to use, easily portable, and complements my Z8 nicely. I have not been to a dark site yet nor used it on the moon or tricky double stars, so there is much more to learn but my first impression is very positive.
Celestron has four DX StarSense Explorer telescope variants on their website -though I've seen pictures of a fifth version somewhere- and in the US they are priced between $180-$400. At this point the cradle is specifically designed for these telescopes exclusively but I'm sure people are already adapting it to different telescopes.