buddha1

[buddha1 (Alan)]

Hi all

I have been visiting your forum for a couple of months and have decided to join you

I am new to Astronomy and live in Kambalda West WA at the moment I have an old 130mm reflector but am looking to upgrade to a 150mm Maksutov does any body have any knowledge of the Mak's are they a good telescope will it be a good upgrade or not ?????

[raymo]

Hi Alan, The Skywatcher 150 Mak, which is the scope that I assume you
are thinking of upgrading to, is a very good scope. Why have you chosen
a Mak? They are really best suited to viewing planets, galaxies, and other small objects that require plenty of magnification. Having great focal
length, they are a bit "slow" photographically, and are only really suitable for photographing the aforementioned objects.
The occasional one suffers from image shift, so if possible, before handing over the money, look through the scope and move the focuser
backwards and forwards through the point of focus, and see if the image moves from side to side. A tiny bit of movement is acceptable.
raymo

[buddha1 (Alan)]

Hi Raymo

Thank you for your quick response.

Yes it is the skywatcher 150 Maksutov that I am looking at, I mainly want to view the planets at the moment with the possibility at attempting a bit of photography in the near future as I am getting on in years I am looking for a scope that is not to heavy and is portable

[raymo]

Should suit you down to the ground then.
raymo

[buddha1 (Alan)]

Hi raymo

Thank you for your input I think you will agree that it is a bit daunting when you are starting out, because there are so many telescopes to look at and make the right decision on,

I joined your group because I have been looking at your forum and everybody seem to be very eager to help the new stargazers

Once again a big thankyou

[raymo]

I assume that you will be putting it on a motorised equatorial mount, which you will need to do if you want to do photography with it.
raymo

[buddha1 (Alan)]

Hi raymo

Yes it comes on a star discovery pro mount

[raymo]

Sorry Alan, that is not an equatorial mount; it is an altazimuth mount,
and is not suitable for exposures of more than 15-20 secs. If you want
to do proper astrophotography you must have an equatorial mount.
Andrews will put the 150Mak together with an EQ mount. The trouble is that I assume that you want a "Go To" mount, and a suitable "Go To" EQ
mount would be a bit more expensive than the Star Discovery mount.
The EQ3 Pro Go To would be suitable, but is $1000.
raymo

[Camelopardalis (Dunk)]

For imaging planets and the Moon, so long as the mount has motorised tracking you should be OK

As raymo says, other types of objects would be much more challenging. But just understand that there's no single telescope that does everything well and you'll be in the right place.

A decent sized Mak can give excellent views visually as they are well corrected and the longer focal length can make busting open globs nice and easy