Review: Orion Short Tube 80

[iceman]

Hi all.

Darren Wong (dhumpie) has kindly submitted a review of the Orion Short Tube 80.

If you'd like to read the review, go to the IceInSpace Reviews (http://www.iceinspace.com.au/?reviews) page, or directly by clicking on the link below:

Orion Short Tube 80 (http://www.iceinspace.com.au/index.php?id=41,282,0,0,1,0)

Thanks to Darren for submitting the review! Much appreciated.

If you'd like to submit a review, how-to or DIY article, or any other content for the site, please contact me.

[ving]

thanks for the review darren, oft thought of getting a st80.... you can get them pretty cheap 2nd hand on astromart :)

[dhumpie]

Hey David,

They are a great throw in the back of your boot scope and you never have to worry about collimation. And there is no cooldown issues as well. They are surprisingly good for the price if you are willing to do some of the mods (as with all chinese and taiwanese scopes) and if you are not too particular about color fringing (quite minimal actually).

Darren

[ving]

just looking at your scope list in your signature Darren.... they are all F/5! :)

how did it compare to the 102st?

[dhumpie]

Yeah I just realised as well :) The only scope I have that has a long focal length is my firstscope, my Celestron Cometron 40mm f/20. Anyway the 102 did go a little bit deeper, but not by much (i.e. for example 47 Tuc had a few more stars resolved, but not a very big difference in comparison to say my C6 and the 80ST). On M42, views were almost the same. The only difference is I could see the 5th star in the trap a little bit easier than in the 80ST. On fant fuzzies it only did slightly better than the 80ST!

Planetary views were markedly worse due to chromatic abberation (the 80ST could be pushed to about 133x and still gave nice views...by contrast the 102 could not go beyond 100x) and spherical abberation. Maybe I just got a good example of an 80ST. Weight wise was the major issue as well with this scope as it was not light enough to qualify as a grab and go for quick views with my Optex tripod. It had to be used with my EQ3 in alt-az mode. If that were the case I rather break out my C6 which is light years ahead of both those scopes in terms of seeing deep and planetary views. In the end I decided to keep my humble 80ST and part with the 102 which was just sitting there.

Hope that helps......these Synta 80ST scopes are remarkable value for their price. Just remember to get the originals (and not those cheap knock off's you get on e Bay with the plastic everything!!!)..

Darren