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This 8” Newtonian reflector optical tube comes standard with a 7x50mm finderscope with a wide 6.8° field, a tube carry handle, 232mm tube rings, and a dovetail tube plate that lets you use it with any Vixen equatorial mount, including the Sphinx and Sphinx-D go-to mounts. The scope is compact at only 27.5” in length, and super-light at only 11.7 lbs.

It has a new T-ring-ready focuser design with added focus travel to allow the use of a wide variety of photographic equipment. The 2" rack and pinion focuser’s large 60mm diameter drawtube allows for a whopping 2.6° x 1.7° field-of-view on 35mm format film and CCD imagers. The use of an optional coma corrector (#CC3746) allows for a sharp coma-free image from edge-to-edge. The focuser accepts 1.25” eyepieces and will handle 2” eyepieces by using the EA3725 adapter.

Reviews have been uniformly positive. Here are a few examples:
• “Wonderful photography”
• “Better than a 4-in. fluorite when seeing permits.”
• “Great contrast, widest field.”
• “Great Instrument for all purposes. Worth every $$.”
• “Great telescope for astrophotography … It reduces exposure time!! Also provide sharp image, rich-field ... It’s [the] best multi-purpose telescope.”
• “Great fast Newtonian. Very bright images. Wonderful for astrophotography”
• “Great optics for an RFT. Views of Jupiter and Saturn up to 178X did not degrade.”
• “I tried coupling a 9mm eyepiece to a 3X Barlow lens, yielding 267X magnification on this scope (800mm focal length). I was rewarded with exceptional views of Jupiter and Saturn during periods of clear seeing conditions. Lots of cloud bands and festoons visible on the surface of Jupiter and I could see Saturn with its myriad of moons (I counted about 5, or was it 6?) Saturn looked 3D, like a floating ball with a ring around it.”
• “This is the best medium sized reflector you can get for astrophotography. Extremely fast, especially for CCD work. The best features are: optics very well corrected that show uniformly distributed diffraction rings both in and out of focus; very sturdy and precise focuser; rock solid tube and secondary holder that are not prone to flexure.”
• “ . . . mine can handle 400x plus if needed on planets. Better than a friend’s 114mm refractor (at twice the price for tube assembly).”
• “This is a keeper and a lifetime scope.”
• “Using this scope with a 30mm, 60degree AFOV eyepiece, the views are spectacular!! . . . This scope splits the Double Double (Epsilon Lyra) cleanly.”
• “It handles very easily X200 on planets and you can push to X300 and X400 on the Moon.”
• Excelsis.com Telescope Reviews said: “A traveler’s dream . . . After being subjected to several weeks of rigorous handling, the optics stayed in collimation . . . In star tests using the 7m Nagler eyepiece coupled to a 2.5x TeleVue Barlow (230x), the mirror displayed virtually identical diffraction rings on either side of focus . . . My evaluations coincided with the impact of Comet Shoemaker-Levy 9 on Jupiter. Under the scrutiny of 230x, the planet’s belts, zones, ovals, and festoons appeared distinct, as did the numerous comet impact sites. This level of planetary image fidelity impressed me . . . I used this accessory [Tele-Extender R200SS] and a 7mm Nagler (212x) to split clearly Lyra’s famous ‘double double,’ Epsilon Lyrae. I was quite satisfied with the results . . . offers the astrophotographer and visual observer plenty of room to roam through their respective areas of interest.”