Quote:
Originally Posted by lazjen
Given the wide variety of gear that's out there for the astro community, I'm wondering why I haven't seen scopes that are more integrated.
By integration, I mean the things we tend to add on to the scope - dew heaters, electronic focuser, controllable flats device, controllable cover, etc.
Imagine being able to buy a nice refractor with these items that takes power + USB connection. Then with mounts with nice cabling choices, plug in the refractor to it, and off you go. Reduce those cables everywhere.
Ok, it would take some interesting design and engineering work to pull off, but wouldn't it be amazing?  |
Some manufacturers include neatly incorporated mirror heaters as standard and will install whichever focuser you desire, including dedicated field corrector mounted at the right position with adapters made for the camera. So if one has an integrated camera/FW/OAG/AO unit, then it is pretty much plug and play. It's even easier with a mount allowing for cable management (through the mount cabling and/or USB/power ports).
Other than that, there already is a water-proof all-integrated smart-phone controlled 80mm aperture imaging solution for $6kUS (from memory) discussed in another thread on IIS, but the feedback from fellow members has been less than positive about such fully integrated solution.