Interesting results , and I have to ask , what was the night ( seeing , as you say ) like ? if it was good I will say that the C11's collumnation was out , because I have looked thru many C11's over the years and they all have thrown up excellent images , especially lunar/planetary .
I will happily put my C9.25 against your 8 inch f6 dob any night of the week , me using my 16mm Nagler giving 146x and your Newtonion using my 9mm Nagler ( both T2's and the best high power eyepieces made ) giving 133x on any object .
Not to put yours down Shaun , as Simmo's 10 inch GSO Dob here in Perth has a very special mirror , perhaps you lucked out and ended up with a sweet one as well
, sounds like it and when these mirrors are good ,, they are very , very GOOD ! no Q's asked .
Yes my C9.25 is a very good one as well .
.
Its only when we hit 300x plus that a SCT on its driven mount really shines , as Simmo's easily took 300x on mars , but it took a deft hand to keep it in the FOV , done but it got old fast
. Your 8 inch will be exactly the same , sorry to say and at 2 am after hours of driving ,,,, well ???
Great report tho , please report back after a few more sessions , we do the same thing here in Perth and one night Peters 16 inch would not even split A Crux at 150x WTF ?
but 20 miniutes later .even a sweet 110 triplet APO failed at 150x as well ,,, yes the seeing went to 'Custard ' , I will place my money on that being the difference you guys seen .
ps. Dunk is right on the quality of these chinese optics of today , they are way better than 10-15 years ago , great value today .
Brian.