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#Reflecting telescope pros and cons professional

The front mirror’s coating needs to be replaced every few years.

This is called collimation and takes between 5 minutes to 1 hour depending on the type of reflector you have and your level of experience.

Speaking of maintenance, the mirrors need to be aligned occasionally.Newtonians have open tube designs, which means they need to be cleaned occasionally and you need to be more careful about keeping them away from smoke and humidity.The exception to this rule are Cassegrains. The larger bodies make them less portable, so they are harder to travel with.Reflectors have some minor limitations when it comes to contrast and brightness.They pack a lot of power for a low price.ĭisadvantages (cons) of reflecting telescopes.Here’s a complete article on the pros and cons of Schmidt-Cassegrain telescopes. The sophisticated compound design offers superior optics.Because of their design, they have very long focal lengths for their size, making them ideal for planetary viewing.Cassegrain reflectors have compact tubes.Thanks to the above, the mirrors in reflectors can be replaced if something happens to them.Reflectors tend to have longer lifespans if they are properly taken care of. Mirrors are generally more durable than lenses.There is a whole community built around DIY telescopes. The mirrors are easy to manufacture so there are many places where you can get them. This gives them a longer lifespan as your first telescope and you will not feel like they are limiting your learning process. Even though reflectors are slightly more complicated for beginners, they will grow with you.They have a much better price-to-size ratio.This allows them to be produced in larger sizes that make more powerful scopes. The mirrors in reflecting telescopes are cheaper to manufacture than lenses, especially in large sizes.Chromatic aberrations (color rings and false colors) and spherical aberrations (blurry edges). Reflectors fix both of the major optical limitations of refractors.Advantages (pros) of reflecting telescopes There are multiple types of reflectors They are compact in size, but extremely powerful.

They increase the focal length by bouncing the light multiple times inside the tube. Cassegrain telescopes, also known as compounds, are the most modern telescope design on the market. They are easy to build so they are extremely popular in the DIY telescope community.Ĭassegrain telescopes. Dobsonians are reflectors so large they can’t be put on top of a tripod and instead are put on top of a “dob mount”, which is in essence an alt-azimuth mount that only moves on two axes. It consists of large tubes on top of a tripod.ĭobsonian telescopes. This is the traditional reflector design. This makes reflector telescopes more versatile and has derived into multiple sub-designs. This lets them capture significantly more light and reach higher magnification levels. The design of reflectors allows for larger apertures. However, this change also comes with some trade-offs that are discussed below in the cons section. This fixes one of the most notable limitations of refracting scopes which is chromatic (color) errors.

Reflecting telescopes use mirrors instead of lenses.

These reflect the light to the eyepiece that is located at in the middle of the tube instead of the backside.

As their name implies, reflectors add a secondary mirror at the end of the tube and a smaller one in the middle.

The most notable changes in reflecting telescopes are: This is why they are also referred to as Newtonian telescopes. The reflecting telescope – also known as reflectors – is a type of telescope that was invented by Isaac Newton as an improvement to the existing designs of the time like refractors. What is a reflecting telescope? Newtonian (reflecting) telescope This is why this article will guide you through the pros and cons of reflecting telescopes so you can decide if one is a good option for you.įirst things first. If you are new to the world of telescopes, it can be difficult to decide which type is the best fit for your needs. Even the Hubble space telescope is a variant of one called a Cassegrain reflector. In fact, most of the giant telescopes used in observatories are, in essence, reflecting telescopes.

#Reflecting telescope pros and cons professional

The design is still used to this day and is one of the most popular amongst amateur and professional astronomers. The reflecting telescope was invented over 2 centuries ago.