SkyWatcher 20" Dob at the Sydney Astrofest

[Adox]

SkyWatcher will participate to the Sydney Astrofest on the 30th of July 2016.

Here the link of the event: http://www.caastro.org/event/2016-sydastrofest16

I will be there with the 20" SkyWatcher Dobson, I hope to have a great weather and seeing to show the potential of this telescope!

[Atmos]

There has been a few discussions about this one on the Cloudy Nights forums, from what I have been able to ascertain, the US version seems to be a completely different animal to the UK version. The UK version seems to have been released a long time before the US version as Sky Watcher USA wanted refine it more.

[AstroJunk]

I have seen one of these beasts in the flesh at Sirius Optics in Brisbane. Whilst I have not had the opportunity to try it out in the field so can't judge its optical quality, I can say that I was pretty impressed buy the build quality. Much better engineered than I expected and certainly looked as though it would make a great "ultra-portable".

One thing that always disappoints me about Skywatcher Dobs though is the lack of secondary dew heater. The 20 inch was no exception and it defies logic why a dob of this cost and open tube nature would come without one!

I have had to eat my metaphoric had since they were announced - I was sure that there would never be a 'mass produced' 20 incher! What I am waiting for is the 14" using the same design, now that will be a fantastic toy to take away on holiday.

[gaseous]

Pardon my ignorance, but does Australia receive the US version or the UK version? Or another version entirely? I was under the impression they all came from the same factory. From memory, what I read on the CN forum suggested the UK version possibly wasn't up to the same quality level as the US version (1-2 years ago at least). And as Astrojunk said, a 14" (or even 16") in this design would sell like hot cakes I would assume.

[Atmos]

I have no idea which one we get, I know the US version was released quite some time after the UK version as they wanted to make it better. This is going by a thread on CN where Sky Watcher USA was discussing why it hadn't been released in the US but it was in the UK.

From what I can gather, they are in some respects different entities.

[AG Hybrid]

"Ultra-Portable". Its made of steel. I think what you meant was ultra compact.