Orion 80mm ED star test

[rumples riot]

Hi all,

well in light of the trouble I have had with my LX200 of late with collimation, I thought that I would star test my Orion last night.

I ran the scope through infocus and out of focus and noted that diffraction rings were perfectly centred. This was a pleasant change.

Next I turned onto M42 and focused with a 12mm EP which gave me near 58x mag. The trapesium stars were all crisp and bright, image scale was a lot wider than what I am used to but the nebula was showing quite well. This has given me some ideas about doing some wide field shots with this scope.

I then turned it onto Jupiter. The planet at 58x was small, but I could still make out the bands quite clearly and even a shadow of one of the moons on the face. Now I was really impressed. There were no signs of any colour aberration what so ever. This scope was worth the money.

So if you are in the market for a smaller scope, I can thoroughly recommend the Orion. Really impressed with it so far.

[trufflehunter (Wayne Robinson)]

I'd love one down the track! Paul, have you posted the problems you've been having with your LX200? I'd like to be as prepared as possible for any potential problems I could expect when my LX90 arrives...

Cheers

[Starkler (Geoff)]

I find with mine some colour is visible if I crank the power up to around 100 on Jupiters limb.

The collimation on mine is also spot on as received, and its a new thing for me to actually see an airy disc. When the seeing is good stars look like little targets with a centre dot and one ring around them.

[rumples riot]

Yeah thats refreshing Geoff, nice little airy disk.

Truffle I have posted some of my problems with collimation of my scope on the site, but not to worry too much. The reality is that I bought the wrong type of scope for planetary work. The Lx90 that you bought will come to you well collimated, but when you really push them for high quality planetary magnification it will struggle. I always use a 3x barlow when I image and with the toucam at 6mm that is a huge magnification that I put it under. Don't worry I am sure that your scope will be fine. Normal collimation is easy and will be fine for doing DSO shots and viewing. I am just wanting it to perform like a Tak.

Anyway I am really happy with the Orion and am glad that I made the purchase. It gets five stars from me.

[MiG]

Originally posted by Starkler
I find with mine some colour is visible if I crank the power up to around 100 on Jupiters limb.

The collimation on mine is also spot on as received, and its a new thing for me to actually see an airy disc. When the seeing is good stars look like little targets with a centre dot and one ring around them.

Compared to your 250 mm Dob, you can get the same amount of diffraction at a third of the magnification (1/3.125) due to the smaller aperture. So the effect of atmospheric turbulence isn't as great.
That's not to say that the dob would be as good at showing diffraction rings if the atmosphere weren't present, but it does close the gap.

I haven't considered the fact that the secondary and the spiders are in the way on the dob. Too complicated.