SkyWatcher Esprit 150mm Super Apo OTA

[LewisM]

Looks elongation is bottom left and bottom right only. That's tilt.

[that_guy (Tony)]

thanks for the images but could you post an image of your actual imaging train?

[Camelopardalis (Dunk)]

Originally Posted by FrancoRodriguez

I'd be very happy if I got an answer to this. It annoys me no end. I've tried a variable spacer between the supplied flattener and camera. Even after very careful manipulation of the distance, it seems to go from star trek warp speed distortion to circular distortion without going through pinpoint stars. Unfortunately it seems to be astigmatised, or an unfortunate hotchpotch of these two types of distortion. Could I PM you? You might end up saving me $10k with a few quick suggestions!

For sure - and/or start a fresh help thread so we don't swamp the OP's inquiry with Esprit 100 talk

[Star Catcher (Ted Dobosz)]

Agree with Brian in his post. I have the Espirit 150. It has become my favourite scope

Heavier than I expected though and bit of a handful getting it onto my mount , have to be careful with the back. I run it on a Losmandy G11GT. I had to get a very long dovetail to comfortably support the very heavy front end as I was sliding it into the saddle.

I don't really do visual any longer but have had the occasional look and it looks pretty sharp on planets and moon.

I am pleased with its imaging performance and the field flattener easily covers stars to the edges on APS-C sensors like my ASI2600MC, STL6303 and QHY16200A. Just wish I lived outside my city location

Ted

[FrancoRodriguez (Franco)]

Sorry once again for making it all about esprit 100's, but I just wanted to quickly say that I've spent a lot of time making microadjustments to my backfocal length and I'm actually very surprised at the flatness I ended up getting. I was actually out by a couple of mm. It's not perfect but a LOT better than I had it before. That's on an APS-C sized ASI071MC.
So, yeah, everyone's right...the esprit's flatter than I gave it credit for.

https://imgur.com/a/zA4LWtd

[PKay (Peter)]

All's well that ends well Franco!

You might need to give the lens a clean now...

PK

[PKay (Peter)]

And here it is!

A big thanks to all for advice and encouragement.

Experience so far:

Setting up was straight forward.
Just follow the instructions...

Balancing the rig required only one of the supplied weights and I custom made a small lead weight.

I can easily lift each component separately ie: the tripod base, mount (counterweight removed) and scope.
So for me, this is a portable rig, mind you I have a Combivan :-)

I leave the scope fully assembled and have made a custom stand (with lots of cushioning) for inside the van.

Last night I found first focus on Jupiter and all the little moons lined up in a row...

[Camelopardalis (Dunk)]

Nice one Peter

The scary thing with the 150 is that even looks big on an EQ8