3 of my 7 Refractors .

Discuss your refractor type scopes here.
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beanerds
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3 of my 7 Refractors .

#1

Post by beanerds »


Thought I would show 3 of my Refractors .

#1 , Long Perng 60mm f7 triplet , this is a very sharp small telescope . I use up to 150x with ease with this scope .
Its home is a SW EQ2 mount and its a great little grab and go scope .
It's such a performer I sold my Takahashi FS60C after 6 months of side by side between the 2 , could not justify keeping the Takahashi so sold it for a profit , these Task's are the best performing 60mm class scope out there and this little LP is 95% of the performance at 1/5th the cost .

#2 , Long Perng 110mm f6 APO , this is a carbon fiber tube with lovely 2 inch focuser , This is my main used scope that live on a lovely driven Vixen super polaris mount on Meade HD tripod so it's super solid and runs sweet and smooth with excellent Vixen mechanicals .
It gives great wide field views at 15x all the way to over 250x on the planets and moon with very well controlled CA , it's a great scope , light and powerful .

#5 , My biggest refractor . Many years ago I grabbed a ' Saxon ' 127mm f9 OTA minus its lens set for next to nothing .
I looked at iStar Optical in the USA and grabbed a 127mm f8 Achromat lens in cell for $630aud . It took about 4 weeks to arrive and well waiting I machined up the aluminum lens ' Counter Cell ' that works very well ( solid ) .
It came with a certificate and test results that prove the reason that this is a very good piece of glass , yes it has a little CA in the bright objects at over 300x , but is very well controlled . I use this as a luna , planetary scope on the best nights.
Focuser is a Sky Watcher 127mm Esprit unit I grabbed for a steal after the owner could not get it to work properly so went Feather Touch , yes it was fiddly and frustrating to get right , but it is all good now and a beautiful focuser .
The mount for this bad boy is an older Celestron CI700 mount , this is basically a Losmandy G11 , so solid and tracks very , very well , fun to use .
This is my star party scope as it draws lots of people ,, you know ' It looks like a real telescope' .

Enjoy and I will post photos of these 3 mounted up and in use in follow up posts .

Thank you.
MVIMG_20190202_100210 (2).jpg
MVIMG_20190202_100137 (2).jpg
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Thefatkitty Canada
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Re: 3 of my 7 Refractors .

#2

Post by Thefatkitty »


Great write up and great scopes; nice mods too! Thanks for that :D
Mark

"The Hankmeister" Celestron 8SE, orange tube Vixen made C80, CG4 & AZ-EQ5 mounts.
Too much Towa glass/mirrors.

H/A - PST stage 2 mod with a Baader 90mm ERF on a Celestron XLT 102 (thanks Mike!)
Ca-K - W/O 61mm, Antares 1.6 barlow, Baader 3.8 OD and Ca-K filters with a ZWO ASI174mm.
W/L - C80-HD with Baader 5.0 & 3.8 Solar film, Solar Continuum 7.5nm and UV/IR filters with a Canon EOS 550D.

Oh yeah, and Solar Cycle 25 :D
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messier 111 Canada
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Re: 3 of my 7 Refractors .

#3

Post by messier 111 »


Very nice trio, thx .
I LOVE REFRACTORS , :Astronomer1: :sprefac:

REFRACTOR , TS-Optics Doublet SD-APO 125 mm f/7.8 . Lunt 80mm MT Ha Doublet Refractor .

EYEPIECES, Delos , Delite and 26mm Nagler t5 , 2 zoom Svbony 7-21 , Orion Premium Linear BinoViewer .

FILTER , Nebustar 2 tele vue . Apm solar wedge . contrast booster 2 inches .

Mounts , berno mack 3 with telepod , cg-4 motorized , eq6 pro belt drive .

“Your assumptions are your windows on the world. Scrub them off every once in a while, or the light won't come in.”
― Isaac Asimov

Jean-Yves :flags-canada:
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Re: 3 of my 7 Refractors .

#4

Post by Solsearcher »


Nice collection , I selected the Istar 150mm F10 for my large solar scope , I have to agree they do produce very nice "glass"
Solar scopes (Coronado Ha) 60mm double stack , 90mm double stack , 150mm single stack .
W/L scope Williams Optic Megrez 110mm / Lunt herschel wedge .
Night scope Celestron 9.25 XLT
Mounts HEQ6 , HEQ5 , Losmandy G8
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beanerds
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Re: 3 of my 7 Refractors .

#5

Post by beanerds »


MVIMG_20180122_170016 (2).jpg
As promised , some set up photos .
The 60mm Triplet on EQ2 first .
[/attachment]
MVIMG_20180122_165837 (1).jpg
Fitting Vixen dovetail clamp to EQ2 .
20230503_103233.jpg
And the money shot , its so dark in there it's very hard to get a photo of the lens , but a lovely bit of glass .
20230503_103414.jpg
Did I mention it's tiny !

Enjoy , the other 2 will follow
Thank you .
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beanerds
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Re: 3 of my 7 Refractors .

#6

Post by beanerds »


Forgot this , it came with a nice case , the 2 inch diagonal seen here in the case is a screw on Celestron Schmidt Cassegrain type , that's the visual back connection this scope has .
20230503_103455.jpg
And if you don't know , as beautiful this little scope is to look at ,, being all shiny/glossy powder coat ,, its a terrible ' Finger Print Magnet ' !!
20230503_142559.jpg
Enjoy , comments more than welcome .
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beanerds
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Re: 3 of my 7 Refractors .

#7

Post by beanerds »


One more on the 60mm triplet .
Found a small folder hidden away with about 10 photos taken with this scope . Note the lack of any CA .
MVIMG_20181119_221826 (1).jpg
This one is my phone hand held over a TelVue 5mm Radian giving 84x , these Radian eyepieces are excellent for a-focal Luna photography , large field of view with long eye relief , awesome eyepieces ,
I an so lucky to have a full set 3mm - 18mm picked up 2nd hand over a decade or so , my most used eyepieces in HIGH !! to medium magnifications ,
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Unitron48 United States of America
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Re: 3 of my 7 Refractors .

#8

Post by Unitron48 »


Nice trio of scopes!! Once a Frac, you never go back :sprefac:

Dave
Unitron (60mm, 102mm), Brandon 94
Stellarvue SVX127D
http://www.unitronhistory.com

"Look deep into nature, and then you will understand everything better." Albert Einstein
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Re: 3 of my 7 Refractors .

#9

Post by helicon »


I'm starting to get acclimated to smaller refractors where I was just a Dob guy for awhile.

I started down the slope with an AR 152 from Explore Scientific which to be honest, is not as portable as it could be.

A couple of months ago I got a Celestron 102mm Achro as I wanted a tube assembly I could sling up on the dovetail using one arm while using the other to tighten the knobs. This was a bit of a challenge with the 152.

I'm also enjoying the crisp views offered up by an f/ 9.8 scope.
-Michael
Refractors: ES AR152 f/6.5 Achromat on Twilight II, Celestron 102mm XLT f/9.8 on Celestron Heavy Duty Alt Az mount, KOWA 90mm spotting scope
Binoculars: Celestron SkyMaster 15x70, Bushnell 10x50
Eyepieces: Various, GSO Superview, 9mm Plossl, Celestron 25mm Plossl
Camera: ZWO ASI 120
Naked Eye: Two Eyeballs
Latitude: 48.7229° N
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beanerds
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Re: 3 of my 7 Refractors .

#10

Post by beanerds »


Ok , Another day another Refractor so here is my Long Perng 110mm f6 APO in carbon fiber .
IMG_20181006_155749 (2).jpg
This is my most used scope as it perform's excellent and is fast to set up .
IMG_20181006_155814.jpg
The focuser is smooth , rotatable and holds heavy eyepieces well , my Celestron Axoim 32mm weighs 1kg and this is easily up to the task lifting this bad boy .
The money shot , nice bit of glass !
IMG_20181006_155918 (2).jpg
.

And an overall view of the whole set up , very nice .
IMG_20181006_155830 (2).jpg
.

Enjoy as I do this set up .
Last edited by beanerds on Thu May 04, 2023 7:50 am, edited 2 times in total.
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Re: 3 of my 7 Refractors .

#11

Post by beanerds »


Here is the moon taken with my phones camera held up to a 10mm TelVue Radian at 66x .
IMG_20181116_190329 (1).jpg
, just a tiny bit of colour , it's better controlled than this photo shows .

Nice .
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Re: 3 of my 7 Refractors .

#12

Post by beanerds »


127mm f8 Istar lens in Saxon tube with Esprit 120 focuser all on a Celestron CI700 mount .
WP_20170106_19_34_49_Pro (3).jpg
Close up of the 3D printed adaptor to fit focuser to tube .
WP_20170721_23_36_52_Pro (2).jpg
The mighty CI700 mount , this thing is a beast , so solid it don't feel this OTA . The Aluminum tube seen here is one I made up , it is 150mm in dia. and 300mm long it is unpainted in this photo .
WP_20170707_22_40_00_Pro.jpg
.
Extension tube painted black .
20230503_100653.jpg
And , the money shot , this is a very good lens set !
20230503_103058.jpg
Last one , the moon taken with this set up , TeleVue 32mm Plossl at 32x .
IMG_20181017_183335 (2).jpg
Enjoy , and comments welcome .
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Re: 3 of my 7 Refractors .

#13

Post by John Baars »


Nice set of refractors you have got!
Although I have owned and observed through dozens of reflectors in all sizes, I always came back to refractors. I suppose @Unitron48 is right.
Refractors in frequency of use : *SW Evostar 120ED F/7.5 (all round ), * Vixen 102ED F/9 (vintage), both on Vixen GPDX.
GrabnGo on Alt/AZ : *SW Startravel 102 F/5 refractor( widefield, Sun, push-to), *OMC140 Maksutov F/14.3 ( planets).
Most used Eyepieces: *Panoptic 24, *Morpheus 14, *Leica ASPH zoom, *Zeiss barlow, *Pentax XO5.
Commonly used bino's : *Jena 10X50 , * Canon 10X30 IS, *Swarovski Habicht 7X42, * Celestron 15X70, *Kasai 2.3X40
Rijswijk Public Observatory: * Astro-Physics Starfire 130 f/8, * 6 inch Newton, * C9.25, * Meade 14 inch LX600 ACF, *Lunt.
Amateur astronomer since 1970.
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