ALDI have a telescope on Special on Sunday

I have to disagree with your comment on mounts. Equatorial mounts are too confusing for small children. Alt/Az mounts are fine - every Dobsonian is an alt/az mounted scope and they are so simple to operate.

And I disagree with you on that Gordon! When I got the Skylux 2 years ago, my niece-to-be was 8 years old. She grasped the concept of the equatorial mount, image reversal, and how to use the hand controls quite well. Give kids some credit! If they are interested, they will learn.

What I wouldn't have given to have had my little Tasco 3" on an equatorial mount way back... (granted, I was 10...)

Seanie.

Wow, someone really loves themselves...

looks like it :lol:

12" LX200.
6" Intes Mak
4" Celestron Refractor
ETX70
60mm refractor
10x50 binos
7x50 binos
carpets
wooden floor
kitchen sink.

Doesn't quite match Denton's amount of stuff - which I wonder why he lists all that stuff... not like he uses them anyway, probably most are exhibit pieces for when David Moore comes round for tea.

I think I prefer my list anyway.
The wooden floor comes in quite usefull.

Guys,

Do yourselves a favour, and spend your €49 on a goat for an african village or something else useful. Please do not buy that scope. I have seen one of these exact scopes in action. A neighbour of mine bought one for her son last christmas. I'm pretty sure its exactly the same one. (99% certain)

If it's the same one then, quite frankly it is absolute and total rubbish, cheap plastic thrash. Only fit for the bin, (thats where my neighbours one ended up). The kid was so dissapointed. He sees me with my gear and wanted to have a cool telescope too. I wished his mum had come to me before she bought that rubbish for him. The 'mount' (you could only loosly call it that) is rickety. The scope had a sealed in piece of plastic for a lens with a huge field stop behind it making the aperture only about 35mm. The eyepieces look worse still. It was not possible to get a sharp focus on the moon with any of the eyepieces. The best I could get was a shaky image of the moon with some albedo features on it.

Please do not inflict that on any child!

To me, Aldi's description is outrageous. They dont even know the name of the discipline that the scope is supposed to be used for. Their claims are false and as such they could have a case to answer under the trade descriptions act. I'm thinking of writing to them to complain.

Dave I strongly suggest you get your neice a copy of patmoores book and a pair of binos. Just think of the fun you will have showing her how to find stuff in the sky.

Wow, it's like the thread I should have never started

Anyway, for €50, if I could see some detail of the moon and the rings of saturn and maybe a few nebula, i'd be a very happy camper.

If I could more detail than this for the cost of buying 2 DVDs, I'll be very happy.
static.flickr.com/32/62163503_284dc51171_o.jpg

(This was done with Conon 350D plus Sigma 300mm lens)
(albertw: fixing links...)

But I am still going to buy the Meade ETX-90PE as I want to do some astro-photography.

But for 50 quid, if a kid gets to see the rings of saturn that they can't see with their naked eye, it will give kids encouragement to get into astronomy.

Regards

But for 50 quid, if a kid gets to see the rings of saturn that they can't see with their naked eye, it will give kids encouragement to get into astronomy.

Thats exactly the point Darragh, with scopes like this, they wont get to see those things. Even if they're lucky enough to manage to get Saturn centered and steady enough (and thats a big if), all they will see is a mushy indistinct blob. They then go away with the impression that this astronomy lark is a waste of their time. Thats the sad bit.