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Indeed, they use the same piece of glass and same quantity of lenses, but it foolish to think that this equates to an “apples to apples” comparison. Similarly, I don’t think it is feasible to compare the FLT-132 or TOA-130 with an Astro-physics 130EDFS simply because it’s a triplet APO using identical glass.
You need to look at the statistics such as spot diagrams, colour correction charts etc (similar to those provided by rsbfoto and RocketBoy) to appreciate the optical differences/controls.
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That's pretty much my point, in the absence of comparable data like that you have mentioned I don't have any basis for detailed comparison or reason to assume that two refractors of the same objective configuration and glass type would have significantly different performance.
If you have any comparative data of that type I would love to see it. Absent that all you can do is star test them ruthlessly (which I plan to do on my FLT-132 when it arrives), read comparisons done by other people or set them up next to each other and compare the views.
The AP scopes might be superior to every other brand of APO but I think that is largely because they are basically hand-made and then individually tested and refined to a point of almost perfection, but the seven year plus waiting list for one rules them out (from what I read on CN people who put their names down in 1999 are now being contacted for the latest production run!).