Inexpensive 70mm f/5 Fraunhofer refractor
that comes with an alt/az-table tripod, two Huygens eyepieces, a
small finder-scope, an Amici prism and a bag to carry all this in.
All the stuff together is very portable. The scope is also known from
TS, it's just green in southern Germany, here in Holland the scope is
soled with a silver-metallic finish.
The telescope is so
lightweight and can easily be mounted on a medium-duty photo tripod.
Mechanics: The tube and the dew-shield are made from aluminum, the rest from plastics. The focuser is quiet smooth, if it is too stiff or too loose, there are two Phillips screws to adjust friction.
The tripod has got fine adjustment for both axis, it does not allow observations in the zenith. Also it is not stable enough when using the higher power eyepiece (I guess it was 6mm), stability is no issue with the 20mm Huygens.
Optically the scope is quiet ok, M45 fits in the FOV when using the 20mm eyepiece. A diagonal mirror or Amici prism is required to reach focus condition. Forget about the short focal-length eyepiece, the resulting view is disappointing, and, as mentioned above, the tripod is too shaky.
Some dealers sell the scope as a finder to larger setups, fair enough, it's small, lightweight and quiet fast...
Last modified March 4th 2005