Quote:
Originally Posted by dannat
Binos don't really provide great views of the planets..even binocular telescope don't do as well as scopes in this department
Of the two you mention the saxon are average grade - just an expensive version of the standard 25x100 sold by either AOE or Andrews Comm (check links section on this site)
The garrett's are in a different league (i have the 15x70's) - they are excellent but weigh a lot(>7 kg), you need a very serious mount. THey would be excellent for honing in on dso's, their contrast is terrific and let you see about 1.4x as you would with one eye (eg 110 binos = 150 scope). The fov is just under 3 deg which is terrific for the size aperture.
On the US forum cloudy nights which has a bino section - most mount it on a manfrotto 501 head (check the price it is substantial), a few also use a parallelogram or p-mount which can be bought at bintel for ~$400 if i remember.
IMO the garretts are far superior, i had cheaper binos before in 20x80 but premium ones give fantastic views. Think about the mounting options, nebulae & dso are fine but for planets i would stick with a scope.
If you want planets/dso in one package the binocular telescopeBT is the way to go - with mount included the 45 or 90deg viewing will be far more comfortable, you can really only push the magnification to about 50x, as most of the BT focal lengths are about 500mm, so 500/10 equates to good 10mm ep's.
As for pointing the binos you can easily fit a laser pointer/red dot finder. If it were me i would keep the 5" for planetary & buy a good ep to go with it.
I truly enjoy binos though and spend 80% of my viewing time with them
I am happy to bring my binos for you to look thru to a place - also show you the basic tripods i use for both -PM if you want to arrange something
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Thanks heaps Dannat.........I will look into BT's now..........any suggestions to brand and price??
I might even take you up on your offer if you did not live on the opposite end of the earth to me.......
(although i do work in Collins Street)...