[vader42]

Sorry, couldn't help the title - a follow on from my first post. Firstly, a big thanks to those who made suggestions for targets, and also a big thanks to Bigjoe for his double star guide.

Quick introduction - I have used dobs for many years, and entered the mak world a few weeks ago. It was very different. I have quite a a few eyepieces but they were better suited to my fast, much shorter dobs. I quite enjoy using a zoom EP to maximise the image quality, but my cheap zoom was quite poor with the mak (get what you pay for). I was considering the bader and did lots of research on different zooms. After reading about maks and the kindness to simpler eyepieces, I ended up choosing the celestron 8-24 zoom (I can hear the groans in the background). I can tell you it is supurb in the mak. Introduction done....

So, the seeing was reasonably good last night, so I started with my usuals Jupiter and Saturn. OMG (and I rarely say this). Jupiter looked like a textbook at 337x - the full zoom of the celestron. GRS with whorls out the back, waves in the opposite main band, and for the first time ever, I could see bands north and south of the main central bands. There was also detail between the main bands. It was amazing. As a bonus, the moons appeared as spheres, not dots of light. Simply stunning.

Next up Saturn. O...M...G (did I mention I never really say this). There was no cassini division, there were 2 separate rings! The planetary disc had fine banding and the whole image looked 3D as the rings dissapeared behind the planet. Again, simply stunning. After I realised 2 1/2 hours had gone, I decided to try to split antares again (it failed miserably with the old seben clone zoom). Wow. The main star was a perfect diffraction pattern, and the secondary nestled beautiflly between maximas as a stunning blue/cyan orb. Split so easily with the new eyepeice - thanks Bigjoe for the advice. The 4 element zoom probably lets more light in than the 7 element bader, and I don't really care about the FOV. In a slow scope, a simpler lens can perform just as well as the "better" eyepieces.

Anyway, I also tried a few more targets with equally good results until the bitterly cold 10 degree Brisbane night drove me inside.

So thanks again all who offered advice, I took it and am gald I did. The mak is a keeper.