South Celestial Pole Equipment Reviews

ED100 refractor and HEQ5-Pro mount - by Dennis

The things I like about this unit are: It is a neat package, no external bits to get knocked about. It is light and easy to move about. It cools down quickly and gives sharp clear images in the eyepiece. Once fixed the focuser will hold the image centred while changing oculars. It will also hold my 200mm f6 reflector. more...

Tele Vue 11mm Plossl vs 9mm and 7mm Orthoscopic Eyepieces - by stu

The Ortho's don't come with eye cups so I thought it was going to make viewing more awkward, but it actually made viewing easier. In comparison, the TV plossls eye cup kind of felt odd. But, I would still probably prefer an eye cup on the Ortho's because it helps block out stray light from around the sides of your eye. I don't think either eye piece type wins or loses here. more...

JMI EV-3CM motorised focuser - by John Earl

I love the simplicity of the motor engagement/disengagement system, allowing both manual and electronic focusing at the turn of a screw. Fantastic. Theres only one thing I think could be improved upon; the options are fast and slow speed on the handcontroller, the fast speed is good to get to focus quickly but the slow speed is not slow enough for my liking. It's quite easy to over run critical focus again and again. I'd love a 3 speed please JMI ;-) more...

Celestron 11" f/10 Carbon fibre SCT - by John Earl

I am very happy with the optical tube assembly build quality and optical performance. I leave nothing to chance & built my own Ronchi tester to test the optics for myself. The only problem I feel worth commenting on is the age old problem of mirror flop and image shift in a telescope of this design. I read before the purchase that Celestron has supposedly addressed this problem with the lastest batch of SCT's. more...

Paul Rini 2 inch 4x barlow - by David Hall

the box arrived last Friday to my door and I ripped it open as soon as I got home from work. it was fairly well packaged and wrapped in plenty of bubble wrap. the barlow its self arrive in pretty good condition but the ring holding the lens elements in had worked loose a bit and I pulled it apart and tightened it by finger (quite easy). the item had 2 huge end caps to seal against dust and seemed to be rather over engineered or rather overly robust, I guess in this day of rough n' tumble astronomy gear needs to be tough? more...

Teleview 24mm Panoptic - by Paul Haese

A friend who has a large range of eyepieces has this in his collection. I viewed with it one night and knew instantly I had to have one. I made sure I would not be waiting all that long to have one in my hands. Now this is unusual in that up until then I only owned three eyepieces. I have never been a collector in that regard, but this was different. I like to view things in high, medium or low power. That says a lot about what this eyepiece is like in the flesh. more...

Snyta EQ6 German Equatorial Mount - by Paul Haese

The EQ6 is a German equatorial mount and the heaviest mount that Synta makes. It is designed to support a maximum payload of 40lbs. The mount breaks down into two main parts, that being the tripod and the mount itself. The head weighs just 17kg and comes standard with two counterweights weighing 5.4kgs each. It is easily moved around without being too heavy or awkward. The scope also comes with an illuminated polar scope which has both Southern and Northern hemisphere orientations for quick alignment. Setting circles are also incorporated into the mount. more...

Takahashi FS-102 fluorite doublet refractor - by stu

The rich, deep, 3 degree wide view of thousands of teeny weenie pin pick stars, set a wonderful back drop for the most intensely bright and beautiful jewel. It's hard to describe why this view was so awesome but Sirius appears EXACTLY the same size as the background stars around it, but a million billion times brighter. I can't understand how such a tiny point can be so bright. It's as if one lone light sensor at the back of my eye is getting completely overwhelmed while the other ones right next to it received absolutely nothing. more...

ED-2 9.5mm Eyepiece - by John Earl

I found the eye relief to be sufficient for me. IE: I did not have to roll the eye-cup back. If I had to guess, I would say it was between 10-15mm. If you wear glasses this EP may not be suitable, although rolling the cap back may be successful. This eyepiece does have a slight kidney bean problem. But I would say it was not overly annoying. Takes all of 30 seconds to learn where to position your eye for optimal results. more...

AOE152L F8 Achromatic Refractor and EQ5 mount - by John Earl

I went straight for a 15mm GS-5 Parks EP. The word spectacular is an understatement. The 2 main bands you normally see on the planets "surface" had separate bands in them... The detail I was seeing was pretty outstanding for this scope. A tiny little bit of violet fringing at this mag. Using a 5mm LV EP I received a pretty good view. more...

Orion ED80 doublet APO Refractor - by Paul Haese

On the night that I actually first used the scope I turned it toward the setting constellation of Orion and focusing in on its great nebula. I began to focus the image and noted that it immediately snapped into focus. I have not owned a refractor for a long time and had forgotten how refractors do this. The star images were pinpoint and the nebula was crisp in appearance. more...

Celestron C9.25 XLT - by John Earl

My first light target was some obscure star near Saturn to check the collimation. It was out at 626X (not including the 75mm extension tube I used) but not by much. A quick tweaking on 2 screws was enough to get it perfect. This was all done without the diagonal as I don't use one when imaging. I decided to fit the diagonal to see if that needed collimation like 'some' diagonals do. Nope, still perfect collimation with it fitted. more...

DMK 21AF04 & Supaslim Filter Wheel - by Paul Haese

Furthermore I like the fact that the camera is very small. Its dimensions are roughly 50x50x50mm. This might not seem much of an issue, but when you add up the combined weight the imaging train, it becomes a factor. In addition the ease of use is impressive. The camera comes with the IC capture software, which is the best capture software I have used. more...

Lymax SCT cooler - by Paul Haese

The tube inserts into the rear of the scope and slides all the way up the baffle until it just protrudes into open space. The design of the angled holes forces air back across and down onto the mirror. This air then is forced out of the tube and the mirror cools at a rapid rate. more...

Meade Field Derotator - by Paul Haese

In fact I have found that when used to its full potential,the derotator performs extremely well. Images are generally free of field rotation and it is a breeze to fit and remove during any time of the evening after set up. And; I can see that it would be even better suited to that large LX200 systems which weigh a considerable amount more than the 10". more...