It is a great looking scope, and obviously well made however at f15 I just don't have the time or mount to image with it. Probably a very nice visual scope for someone local.
I doubt there is much to gain over a C8HD visually. Every time I get a massive itch to buy the 7" SW Mak for instance I remind myself. "If you just throw a bit more money in you can get the C8HD".
~$4500 for a used 7" Mak. That thing better be able to make me a coffee in the middle of the night for that price.
Yeah I think you're right...the C8 is a bit more versatile, but might just lose the edge at the highest magnification. To be fair, I've used mine at 400x on all of one occasion...
Well... last Sunday night I spent a couple of hours with my Skywatcher 7" f/15. Most of that time I spent tinkering with collimation in very good seeing.
While it had looked close to being right before, I had always thought it was a tad less than perfect.
What I didn't realise is that actually these SW Maks really are VERY sensitive to collimation. After tinkering with push-pull screws for over an hour it is now spot-on and star images are what they should be - with a near perfect diffraction pattern - and distinctly better than any C8 I've looked through in 35 years.
One thing I noticed is that even when the inside-focus and outside-focus rings appear concentric in say a 13mm eyepiece at 200X, you have to be careful to make sure the test star really is in the centre of the field view. If its off to one side - even by a little bit - the result is the Mak will actually be slightly misaligned and the image less than perfect when it comes to focus.
So no I won't swap mine for an Intes Micro at 3X the price.
