TAL telescopes and Tokina lenses

[JohnH]

I would value any opinions out there for and against these optics, they seem to be good value, the Tokina Lens 80-400mm Mk 2 f4.5-5.6 lens in particular seems to be highly rated (in non astro circles anyway) and good value comapred to sigma/canon etc equivalents.

Are the TAL scopes available in Australia (ie is there a dealer)? Are they any good?

[asimov]

http://www.aoe.com.au/tal.html NO idea about the quality, sorry.

[acropolite]

I bought a second hand fixed focus Tokina lens for my canon film SLR years ago and it was excellent quality even then. I have read reviews of some of the Tokina lenses and they are compared favourably with the Canon L series lenses.

[slice of heaven]

Tal scopes are also available from telescopes and astronomy in SA
http://www.telescopes-astronomy.com.au/telescopes066.htm
Astroman states he has a Tal scope in his signature.

[janoskiss]

I enquired about TAL scopes at AOE some time ago. This is the response I got, 17/02/05:

"We unfortunately are no longer supplying the TAL's due to the very long
waiting periods, we need to remove the info from our site."

What the TAL pages are doing still there I don't know.

[Astroman]

TAL scopes are quite good, although some points, the Mounts arn't that good, I get considerable dancing times with the 4" on a TAL GEM. As for the optics if you can fit them with better eyepieces than the Kellner that comes with it, then it would be a nice scope. I observed M104 from the inner suburbs of Adelaide with the TAL, mind you though a 4" in those conditions it was faint but THERE. I also observed Comet Hyakutake when it was 8 days after it was discovered, it was only a mere faint blob. Not sure what TAL you are thinking of but the mirrors in the 4" were top class very nice. I would think the 250K and 200K would be the same sort of perfection, Although I would update the mount to something a little beefier. Oh the extruded Aluminium tubes are a little on the weighty side, (2.5mm thickness on my 4")

Otherwise nice scope but I would look for an alternative, there would be better optically in theyre price range somewhere. (TAL-1 $695 Back when I got mine)

hope this helps a little