Recommended Planetary OTA Scopes

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Geoff Currey avatar
I want to do some planetary astrophotography and would like some suggestions for OTA (scopes) to use with smaller non-cooled astro cameras like the ASI662MC. Will the 62ED EVOLUX REFRACTOR OTA with a flattener be too wide for this sort of imaging? I have a Sky-Watcher Sky Adventured GTI EQ mount so the scope needs to be light.

What are your suggestions?
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Ed Dixon avatar
I use a Celestron 8SE which has good magnification with it's 2000+ focal length.  Smaller aperture scopes have lower magnification and shorter focal lengths.

I use a ASI662MC as the camera and add a 2.5X barlow to that combo for planetary.
Stephan Linhart avatar
Hi Geoff,

with your current setup you will be reaching the limit quiet quickly with results that may leave something to be desired for.
If you really want to step into planetary imaging, I recommend using a scope with 8" aperture.

A used fork mounted SCT comes to mind, these can be found reasonably priced second hand. Can be older, as you don't need goto or other things for planets.

BR,

Stephan
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Guillermo (Guy) Yanez avatar
Hello Geoff. Indeed, the SW GTI will constrain the size of your OTA to something small and less than ideal for planetary imaging. You may want to look on astromart or elsewhere and see if you can find a vintage Meade ETX 90 (provided you can find an OTA only without the fork mount). That may be a good pick for your GTI mount. The planets have extremely small angular sizes and require long focal length OTAs in order to get any decent surface resolution.
In the long run, you will want to switch to a beefier mount and pick a large SC but in the meantime the old and fairly trusty ETX should work. That said, in case you buy it with the entire Meade fork mount, see if it is operational and works that way for you (and secure it to whatever tripod you own). Otherwise, just take the OTA off the fork and fix a vixen style dovetail on it .
Another alternative is to use a small refractor but taking the reducer off and switching to the visual adapters on the back (either 1.25 or 2''), then get a decent barlow 2x to 4x and see how it goes from there. First thing to check is if you can achieve focus. If you do not have enough travel, you will have to add a diagonal , then the barlow and then the camera but at that point  you will be pushing the weight to the limit on your mount (especially if it is windy in your area). You rig will also look a bit messy too but it might do the trick.
Good luck
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andrea tasselli avatar
Geoff Currey:
I want to do some planetary astrophotography and would like some suggestions for OTA (scopes) to use with smaller non-cooled astro cameras like the ASI662MC. Will the 62ED EVOLUX REFRACTOR OTA with a flattener be too wide for this sort of imaging? I have a Sky-Watcher Sky Adventured GTI EQ mount so the scope needs to be light.

What are your suggestions?

It all depends on your expectations; if they are quite modest (small disk with not many features) then you present scope will suffice by adding a barlow 2x or even 3x. If you want to see the swirls in the wake of the GRS than a 14" is a  must and maybe more. I could say a 4" APO would do better (and it would) but then the money would be better spent on a 8"/10" newtonian on a decent mount.
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