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First off I think I should say, what a pleasure it is to deal with Moonfish Group, friendly and helpful, couldn't be better.
I am writing this little review now from a beginners perspective that I hope it may help others like myself (and my mother, an older beginner lol)
We recently purchased a Nexstar 130 SLT because this is a nice size beginner scope with GoTo, to make our life and viewing a little easier, one of the main reviews for this scope mentioned the Moonfish 30mm, and so we bought one to replace the rather weak standard 1 1/4" 25mm (believe it's a Kelner type).
Fistly, the size and weight. The review of the scope suggested that the Nexstar could carry the weight of this eyepiece, and I can confirm that it carries it well. One thing you should do though is calibrate the GoTo mount when using this eyepiece because the tracking will drift otherwise, this is a simple thing through the handset and takes litteraly seconds. Once done, tracking and goto functions are as good if not better than before due the the very wide field of view given to us by the Moonfish.
I do know that the Nexstar is a little too "fast" for the Moonfish 30mm, exactly what is meant by this though I cant honestly say! LOL What I can tell you is through my scope stars start to "flare" towards the edges of the moonfish and are slightly out of focus, but for a large central region the view is sharp, bright and clear. If I switch from the Moonfish to the stansard 25mm the difference is quiet remarkable, the moonfish having a much clearer and much larger usable viewing area, and really shows you why you bought the Moonfish (not withstanding it's excellent value!)
Views of M31 Andromeda Galaxy were bright and easily encomassed to whole of the disk (although with only visual viewing this is ofcourse a large grey mass rather than what you may see from astrophotogray). The moonfish will also show complete views of M42 Orion Nebula (first viewed last night under not so great conditions at 3:20am) and I was even able to find the M33 Triangulum Galaxy for the first time (although extremely faint)
So, if you're wondering if the Moonfish is a good buy for you being in a similar situation to myself, smallish fast reflector that can handle 2" eyepieces (and even if not in a similar situation!), I would honestly say that you should NOT got for highly priced eyepieces and go for the Moonfish, I dont think you could do much better without spending £200+, and then there's no garuntee that it will be better.
If I may give a couple of little tips about the Nexstar using heavier eyepieces to finish, DO use tube rings and dovetail to attach the OTA to the mount, the tube wasn't designed to carry alot of weight and will vibrate alot with large eyepieces, the tube rings take away most of this vibration. and remember to calibrate the GoTo when using 2" eyepieces like the Moonfish, you wont be disappointed.
After our experiences so far, we now plan to buy a Skyliner 250PX Auto next year and feel more than happy and look forward to using the moonfish with that light bucket, we see no reason to replace it with anything else at all!
So, once again, Thank you Moonfish, and congratulations to Daniel!
Rating:  [4 of 5 Stars!] |
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