TheSkySearchers

jrkirkham wrote: ↑Wed Aug 05, 2020 1:40 pm My worst ever scope was not my first scope. In fact I was middle age when I bought it. It also turned out to be my most expensive scope.

I've enjoyed astronomy since I was in grade school. When I graduated from college and started my family I confined my observing to binoculars, which totally satisfied me. One day, after my children were grown and gone I followed my wife to a yard sale where I saw a small off brand reflector on a wobbly tripod for only $20. How could I go wrong? I hadn't had a telescope since college.

The thing was so wobbly I could barely view the moon. My wife eventually sold it at another yard sale for much less that $20. It was so frustrating that I had to replace it with a 6" used dob, which I replaced with an 8" dob, which I replaced with a 10" dob, etc. etc. etc. That's how it also became my most expensive telescope.

Worst scope: Celestron 130EQ reflector. First of all, just not right for me on many grounds beginning with the need for collimation. Aside from that, every screw is an absolute minimum length. I lost many in the backyard starting with the second time I took it outside. Now, I have a full array of metric hex screws. The Equatorial mount is OK if you are photographing, but a pain in the neck (literally) for anything not on the ecliptic. The control rods were always in each other's way. Because of the geometry of the equatorial mount, the altitude (declination) control is not intended to be active, so if I wanted to adjust the alignment I eventually kept a wrench for backing off the spring so that I could move the up-down. And then there was the collimation. For years, nothing was ever sharp. Then, I got a collimation lens to set the mirrors. A long afternoon indoors in perfect conditions convinced me to box it all up and give it to the Goodwill.

Second worst: Meade Classic LX 200 10-inch Schmidt Cassegrain computerized controls on loan from the local club. Heavy. Not just in lifting it out of the box at 65 lbs (30 kg) but putting it back without dropping it was even harder. I pulled muscles. The computer software was vintage 1995. I aligned it for practice indoors twice knowing pretty much where the stars are in the daytime. Of course, the telescope fought me over that, insisting that I not be allowed to use it while the Sun was up. Navigating the vintage software at night was even harder. I just used it in passive mode and aligned manually.

Tie for Second: Meade Classic LX200 8-inch "improved" (fake) Ritchey-Chretien on loan from the local club. The computer had failed so that was not a problem. And I used it well enough for splitting doubles like Castor. But I never got down to the Airy disks. When I turned it on Mars, there were no features. I tried Mars over two nights to make sure that it and Earth had both rotated. Nope: no features, just an orange circle. OK... So, it needed collimation and a catadioptric is even harder to collimate. I returned it to the club equipment chair and he said that he was surprised that I was able to use it all. "When I used it," he said, "I got two Jupiters." I did not say anything. But why did he give it to me in the first place if he knew that it was so far out of collimation?

Mine was not the first, I went through a phase where I purchase and sold ( some I gave away) scopes I keep a record of it and its 46! just to see what they are like the worst was a Meade DS 114 it would just not focus properly I thought that perhaps the Barlow/ corrective lens in this BJ scope was reversed , but not , the go to was ok but you could not make out the rings of Saturn just a blur , even the moon was not good , the Primary mirror was ok as was the secondary so just a bad scope I think the original owner never used it as it looked like new ( and he purchased it New)