Dear all, maybe you can help me. I am attempting to buy a telescope for my father as a present, and have settled on the NexStar 114GT. Given that this is the age of the internet, I used it as a tool to shop around. Three guesses what I found?

www.amazon.com = EURO 323.00 (plus tax and duty, but even so..)

www.dhinds.co.uk = EURO 566.00 (delivery to the border for £ 17.50)

www.astronomy.ie = EURO 1,014.00 :evil:

My question is this. Hike the prices all you want if you have the monopoly, that's a well known cut-throat business tactic. But subscribe to this ethic whilst you masquerade as "a society to promote Astronomy in Ireland", and I start checking my pocket to see if my wallet is still there. I ask you, is this right?

I had some spare time the other day so I had a look at the Telescope Prices on the back of A&S magazine and almost chocked on my drink!

Telescopes are getting bigger and bigger and more and more advances so you would assume that the price of an 8" would fall as bigger and bigger telescopes like the 11" and 14" came down in price. But no way.

I rember when I first wanted to buy a scope the holy grail to me was a C8. It cost £1,200 from A&S so as a 16 year old I could not afford it so I bought a DTG 6.25" for £350. Now, the DTG 6.25" costs over 700 Euro and an 8" Celestron costs over 2,000 Euro. That is extorsion plain and simple.

A&S will never get my business again because I now think of them as money grabbing SOBs. A&S Ltd is a company making profit, NOT a charity like they like to have people think!

Looking to buy a Celestron scope...have a look at a mesage I posted under "Celestron dealers" in the "Wanted" section. If I were buying a scope again, this is the route I would follow. I'm peeved off at the stupid-high prices for scopes and accessories charged both here in Ireland and in the UK. :twisted: I now buy my accessories from the US...works out cheaper even allowing for the much higher P&P rates. 4.5" goto scope is a nice size scope...should provides many years of enjoyment.
Michael

reptonite wrote:

www.amazon.com = EURO 323.00 (plus tax and duty, but even so..)/quote]

They wont ship it. For that matter neither will dhinds. Celestrons (wierd) sales structure (even more wierd than Meades!) means that you must buy from A&S Ltd. in the Republic since no other dealer are allowed to sell outside their patch.

You could check out North Down Telescopes though who will deliver celestron kit to the Republic. www.mccreaa.freeserve.co.uk/

Needless to say I agree with all comments about AI/A&S, but theres not much you can do about them. Mailing them as a member/subscriber doesnt do much as they stop replying to mails after a while I'm currently waiting on at least three responses from them on various topics.

As I said in an email to David Moore recently "the society seems to me to have become mainly be a marketing tool for A&S Ltd.". Its there to promote A&S Ltd. not astronomy.

Thankfully their monopoly here may have to start defending itself with the likes of North Down telescopes and Andromeda Optics taking off. With their prices I'm surprised they sell anything at all.

Cheers,
~Al

Hi there

I agree with you that amazon won't ship. I was merely drawing attention to the difference in price. DHinds WILL ship to the border in Northern Ireland, but then the whole territorial situation is the fault of (a) Celestron with their 'monopoly making' sales distribution style, and (b) A&S for subsequently taking advantage of it.

As I've said, if they were a bit more honest about the scam, I'd hold a certain grudging admiration for them, but what disturbs me is the "no, honest, we're only there to promote astronomy". I'd give my right arm to see their tax returns, just to see what is submitted under the (almost charitable) 'Organisational allowances', and what goes in tagged as legitimate business returns...

I bet Meade would be interested too. But that's none of my business.

Anyway. There's only two things to do really. Vote with our feet (and wallets), and as a group cry 'foul' whenever the monopoly tries to make out that they are merely there to help astronomy in Ireland......

M

This Topic very much belongs in the "Observing Equipment" forum I was asked to create a few days ago so I have moved it.

Bart B.,
IFAS Webmaster.

Bart

Please forgive this humble newbie. Was anxious to vent and maybe should have researched a better home for the topic before posting. :roll:

M

Bart

Please forgive this humble newbie. Was anxious to vent and maybe should have researched a better home for the topic before posting. :roll:

M

Don't worry about it, I don't expect newbies to be psychic and just know what to do automatically!

Hope you are enjoying the boards and tell all your friends about us!

Bart.

Bart

Believe you me, I intend banging the drum about this one. Specially when I rang A&S, slagged them for their quite obvious mark-up, gave them the comparisons I'd discovered, and they knocked 200 off the price.

A redeeming act you might think?

If so, why do they continue to advertise the NexStar 114GT at 1,014.00??????????

If it were Video's and DVD's we were talking about, there would be a national outcry and general burnings at the stake....

If you know someone in the US, ask then to buy it for you and get it shipped over here. As far as the manufacturer knows, the scope is in the US, any problems, ship it back to your friend and from there to the manufacturer.
It still works out cheaper then buying it here, considering the present dollar/euro rate, it's never been so cheap.
I'm currently working on a plan to get a Meade ETX125 from the US in this manner.
From what I've seen and experianced, its pretty rare for a scope to get shipped back to the manufacturer over a manufacturing fault.
I think its worth the risk.

NexStar 11GPS € 6,728 Astronomy Ireland

and why am I not surprised

NexStar 11GPS - $2999.00
www.handsonoptics.com/nexstar11/nexstar11.html
hee hee hee

I'm probably gonna get in trouble for saying this and causing a flame-war, but I'm just going to call a spade a spade. Astronomy Ireland are nothing but cowboys and rip-off artists.

I'd consider buying a Celestron as they have a reseller based about 2 miles from where I live (that'd the cowboys!), but not at those insane prices. But until they bring their prices down to a sane level, they have no chance of my business. I think I'm going to fire a complaint at Celestron to inform them of this. I think we all should.

I'm probably gonna get in trouble for saying this and causing a flame-war, but I'm just going to call a spade a spade. Astronomy Ireland are nothing but cowboys and rip-off artists.

I'd consider buying a Celestron as they have a reseller based about 2 miles from where I live (that'd the cowboys!), but not at those insane prices. But until they bring their prices down to a sane level, they have no chance of my business. I think I'm going to fire a complaint at Celestron to inform them of this. I think we all should.

I may not quite agree that AI are cowboys but A&S sure seem to be. I completely agree that their prices are rediculous and they don't have a snowballs chance in hell of getting my business. However it is a non-issue really because I have had very good experiences with Meade so I see no need to change to celestron now, expecially with those prices!

However, if we all complain to Celestron things have a better chance of changing.

Bart B.

AI and A&S Ltd.....let's be honest, is there really a difference between the two except for tax purposes of course?? Don't get me wrong, I do not believe there is anything illegal with their approach. I'm more concerned with the manner in which readers of the magazine and the general public are fed information/sales talk.
Read virtually any of David Moore's articles and mid-ways through he'll try and flog you telescope. Is this proper journalistic behaviour/credibility??? Do you see Astronomy Now, or Sky and Telscope do this?...No,you don't. Why? Because they would be flooded with complaints and would lose a lot of readers. On the positive note however, there can be the occassional good article in A&S....it's a pity that they can't be appreciated by more due to the lack of credibility and inethical money-grapping approach that A&S Ltd has because of one individual.
I'm amazed that Celestron wishes to be associated with this approach.
Michael

Perhaps I'm wrong, but they seem to be the same organisation.
It's quite ridiculous, to be honest. I pity those who buy scopes from them for such prices.

I think I am going to complain - I know there's a lot of talk around the place of "Rip-off Ireland", but this is just taking the mickey completely.

I can't balme you for getting confused over this issue.
I do often wonder if the confusion is intentional. (worded carefully so as not to cause trouble!)
The same person as I understand basically runs both the club and the business...nothing essentially wrong with this in itself if it was done in a more honest and open way.
However, the manner in which the business and the club are muddled together does result in people thinking they are purchasing products from a non-profit-making club rather than an all-for-profit-lets-forget-ethics business.
This is only one of the reasons why alot of people feel disgusted on the whole AI issue.
Michael
BTW, I just sent a complaint to Celestron - for what good it'll do I don't know. They might just want to take the money and run also.

It's interesting that David Hinds will not ship to the R of I due to this 'territorial' agreement, yet Astronomy Ireland will ship to the UK. Do David Hinds/Celestron know about this? Just flicking through October's S&T I spotted lots of ads for dealers who claim they will ship worldwide. Somebody somewhere is misleading us!

I was beginning to feel like a bit of a victor meldrew there for a while. But logging back in and seeing people in agreement with me calms me somewhat.

Regards DHinds not shipping over here, but A&S shipping over there? It probably has something to do with that most base of human instincts "when you're completely chancing your arm, and know you're in the wrong, get the law on your side". I've a feeling that A&S have had more than a hand in the creation of the monopoly, and the blame cannot be put solely at Celestron's door. I personally am of the opinion that were being beaten around the head with a large, blunt Service Level Agreement. Or at least threatened with it.

Did anyone attend the Star Party in the park the other day? Did anyone notice how many times David Moore mentioned A&S in his speech?

Bless him. I suppose the least you can do if you're not going to be honest is be bloody blatant.......

Would any one have the URL for Andromeda Optics as I cannot find them using google

Would any one have the URL for Andromeda Optics as I cannot find them using google

www.andromedaoptics.com/

Drop them a mail for prices etc.

Cheers,
~Al

They're at www.andromedaoptics.com/ - I've been talking to Jimmy via mail and he's offered to check out my Helios for free to see what needs doing. I'm going to take him up on that :-)

In case anyone is interested -
I'm still looking for a small scope...almost defintely a refractor, hopefully a 90mm and will probably get it in England as it's quite a bit cheaper to do so.

But holy crap, deciding what you want to get is a very tough job.

As for the optics on the Mak-Cas that I said weren't as good as others, well, I have a nice slice of humble pie here, as reviews I've seen rate them highly - I probably got confused with something else (spot the rookie!).

The big problem as i see it is any time that any astronomical rears its head David Moore gets the call. The result of this is many of the uninitated seem to think that AI is the only association in Ireland. It's usually too late once they find out that there is a world byond AI and A&S.

Oh is it only me or do A&S never supply picture credits in the Mag. And you are pretty sure that a month or two after a good article appears in Astronomy now or Sky and Telescope it will usually appear in an edited form in A&S.

I'm Ranted out at the moment. More to follow.