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Old 06-03-2018, 11:54 AM
Bushy69 (Justin)
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Join Date: Nov 2017
Location: Perth
Posts: 52
Quote:
Originally Posted by WilliamPaolini View Post
I "believe" that the current line of SW Maks use the same standard threading for the back as do Celestron and Meade SCTs. If so then the .63x reducers that are sold for those SCTs will fit. I used to have the Orion Apex 127 Mak and used the .63x Celestron reducer on it but needed special adapters from Scopestuff. At any rate, it worked wonderfully.

If the reducer fits your 180 then it will become f/9.5. The reducer itself cannot take the full field stop of a 2" eyepiece but I find they generally work well visually with field stops as large as about 36mm. Not sure the 35 Pan would work because its field stop is larger at almost 39mm. But if it did it would get you about 50x and 1.3 degrees TFOV, and a 17.5 Morpheus would get you 100x and .78 degree TFOV, and the 11mm ES82 would get you 155x and a .5 degree TFOV. That would be a nice lineup giving you 50x, 100x, 150x. And if the Pan is too expensive then just get the ES68 equivalent as they generally give you 95% or more of the performance of the TV equivalents IMO.
Hi William,

I could not find the threads, but a few have tried the 0.63 focal reducer with mixed results (mostly poor). The issue seems to be related to the fact that the reducer is designed for an SCT and has a field flattener component to the optics. The Mak Cass does not require the flattener, and as a result the Celestron based reducers are not ideal on the Mak.

From what I can tell with my limited use of the Mak Cass 180 and my research on the OTA, the main issue is the F15 nature of the beast (2700mm FL). For those solely into planetary visual... they say "what issue". However, with the growing popularity in Astro Photography, and some seriously amazing DSO images being posted from amateur telescope users, there is the urge to make the Mak try and emulate those DSO images (which it can not). Planetary images... that's another story I hope.

Cheers,

Justin
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