Portability and speed are the scope’s strong points. The ideal solution is to get to a dark location, although I realize that isn’t an option for everyone.įinally – and I admit this falls under the category of nit-picking – I found one of the plastic truss knobs to be awfully close to the base of the finder, making it difficult to locate in the dark. Any stray light from your home, garage, a passing car, or even your red light can temporarily “wipe out” the views. Of the two factors, I found the susceptibility to glare to be the more serious. Second, the scope’s open design leaves the secondary mirror exposed to moisture and glare. The Sky-Watcher 150p has a screw-type helical focuser. The supplied helical focuser was of decent quality, but there is some side-to-side play in the mechanism, and it can also be completely unscrewed if you’re not careful. I am guessing Sky-Watcher included it due to cost and weight considerations. First, some observers don’t like helical focusers, where the entire focuser screws in and out, finding them less convenient than traditional rack and pinion focusers. Its imperfections fall under the category of “quality of life” rather than any outright flaws. You can’t expect a $280 telescope to be perfect.
The SkyWatcher Heritage 15op 6-inch Dobsonian telescope open for observing (left) and closed for transport and storage (right). Also, its 13 lb (nearly 6 kg) weight is far less than that of a typical 6” reflector. It is small enough to fit in even the smallest of spaces, yet it contains a 6” mirror. The package is so small, some local club members who first saw it assumed it was a 4.5”. It’s difficult to convey just how compact the telescope is when fully retracted, which is one of its main assets, as it is easy to tote to remote locations. Here it is aboard the author’s Celestron AVX mount. In a pinch, you can set the scope on the ground and kneel down, but this can quickly get uncomfortable (hint: if you do this, get one of those foam kneeling pads from the gardening center of your local store – your knees will thank you!) The optical tube can be removed from the tabletop mount and placed on a tracking mount via a Vixen-style plate. I have used everything from a specially-braced plastic tub to a small reinforced end table. Any flexure or instability will magnify the jiggles and shakes in the eyepiece. Many beginners are unprepared for how steady the telescope needs to be while observing. Whatever you use, it should be something you can walk around, and it must be sturdy. The main challenge with any tabletop telescope is finding a suitable platform to set it on. It’s a more purist telescope viewing experience, freeing the observer from fussing with batteries or computers. You could be observing in less than five minutes after pulling the scope out of the shipping carton (the scope comes fully assembled) sliding on the red dot finder, inserting an eyepiece, and extending the truss poles. Sky-Watcher’s Heritage 150p is a collapsible 6” f/5 truss Dobsonian reflector telescope. SkyWatcher Heritage 150p 6-inch tabletop Dobsonian telescope.
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