Portable Telescope
I have been looking for a portable telescope that I can take on trips that involve air travel. This is no easy task, especially with increased airport security measures. Although there are certainly hard cases that can protect telescope optics from a certain amount of trauma, are they up to the challenge of protecting a telescope through checked baggage? Especially if one of the workers is having a bad day and is being a little rough on things.
Yesterday I went to a local telescope shop and discovered the Celestron NexStar line of Cassegrain telescopes. These telescopes have a great little feature: you can take the optical tube assembly right off the telescope and transport it separately. The tripod and base go through checked luggage, since they can deal with the bumps, and you can pack the optical tube - the most fragile part of the telescope - into your carry-on luggage. Sweet.
I have never been a Celestron fan; my first telescope was a Meade LX200, so I’m a bit beholden. (It’s not dissimilar to the Canon vs. Nikon debate.) But, the manager of the telescope shop assured me that Celestron was well known for quality and reliability, so I decided to give it a chance. As far as I know, Meade doesn’t have anything like this. Its ETX line of Maksutov Cassegrain telescopes are nice and portable too, but they have a few drawbacks:
- They aren’t quite as portable as the Celestron NexStar telescopes because you can’t detach the optical tube assembly from the motor mount.
- They are Maksutov-Cassegrain instead of Schmidt-Cassegrain; this means the optics have a slightly different shape. The main impact of this is that Maks tend to have larger focal ratios and are therefore less suitable for astrophotography than Schmidts.
- The largest aperture on an ETX telescope is 5″, but with the NexStar you can get as large as an 8″ aperture.
Of course, once you have this nice portable telescope alternative, the next question is which size telescope to purchase??! That’s the hard one. I stewed over that question for quite a while. It turns out that the 8″ NexStar tube is actually just small enough to fit within the carry-on luggage dimensions. Wrap it with some ½”-thick foam to protect it and put it into a snug case, and you should have little trouble taking it onto an airplane. Of course, if that were the only thing I carry on then it would be great, but I also have all my silly cameras, so I felt more comfortable going with something smaller.
One other consideration is that the 4″ and 5″ aperture NexStar telescopes have a “wedge plate” built into the tripod, so you can easily use them in an altitude-azimuth configuration or in an equatorial-mount configuration. This is pretty critical if you are hoping to do any astrophotography; if you try to take a long exposure through a telescope on an alt-az mount, the field of view rotates as the scope tracks the object! This is clearly unacceptable, and it shows up pretty quickly when you take exposures of more than 30 seconds or so.
With the 6″ and 8″ aperture telescopes there is a separate wedge-mount accessory you can purchase; that allows you to put the telescope on an equatorial mount. But, wedges are oddly shaped and annoying to pack. Plus, it is always really frightening to hang this very expensive and very fragile optical instrument at some odd angle off of this wedge mount, and hope you tightened everything correctly. That’s stress I just don’t need.
So, in the end I went with the 5″ aperture NexStar telescope, and hopefully it will be a great little telescope for when I’m going on trips to see friends. The sales person said that my Meade optics should work well with the Celestron, but I need to verify this - I’m a bit dubious, but maybe he’s right. The most important piece of optics is the focal-reducer; that takes an f/10 telescope down to f/6.3, and broadens the field of view so that you can take photos of even larger objects. This is pretty important for large galaxies and nebulae.
And, besides that, I got the ever-useful piggyback mount so that I can get some nice pictures of the Milky Way with my fisheye lens. Piggyback mounts rock.
January 3rd, 2008 at 11:38 am
Hi Donnie,
I am going to purchase a Celestron NexStar telescope in the United States and want to take it to India. But I am very afraid to take it by plane. Your suggestion on keeping the tripod and the base in the check-in luggage is nice. As far as the optical tube is concerned, if I keep it in my carry on luggage, I still think it is very dangerous to do so. This is because during security checkup, the TSA will open my carry on luggage. When they will see the optical tube, they will remove it and put it in a ordinary plastic tray and pass it under the scanner. I dont know whether the scanner will harm the optical tube or not. If it does, then it is too dangerous. Also, once the plastic tray containing the optical tube comes out on the other side (of the security gate), it will pass over a very bumpy surface (consisting of evenly placed rods). As a result, the tray will rock and the optical tube may be damaged.
One option is to specifically tell TSA that the optical tube is a very fragile item and ask them not to place it under the scanner or atleast be gentle. But I have experienced that these guys are very rude and just dont care a damn. What is your experience? How did you do it?
Thanks,
Ganesh
January 3rd, 2008 at 12:01 pm
When I took my telescope through security, the TSA person said that the optical tube shows up as a large void in the bag. I wrapped my optical tube with bubble-wrap and secured it with a couple of rubber bands. This way it was easy to get off. When the TSA person wanted to investigate it, I told them that they could look inside the tube if they wanted to, and told them how to do that. If you are courteous, helpful and open to them, they will be more predisposed to not give you trouble.
I was also lucky in that I ended up with a relatively young guy screening my baggage, and he thought it was pretty cool to be taking a telescope with me. That can have an impact.
The X-rays will not harm the optical tube in any way. It’s just glass, metal and plastic; lots of glass, metal, and plastic goes through X-ray scanners all the time. The ride through in the plastic container certainly has the potential to scratch the outside of the tube, but if you tell the TSA that it’s fragile, they might help you there too. That is something you should probably accept if you are going to have a travel-scope; it’s going to get a bit of abuse.
As far as being jarred and shaken by the rollers, simply traveling on the airplane will be at least as likely to give the optical tube a few bumps. The main impact will be to put the telescope’s optics out of alignment. You should always take the necessary tools to collimate your telescope’s optics when you travel. (Probably in your checked luggage, since taking screwdrivers etc. in your carry-on luggage would probably be inadvisable.) Don’t think you can ignore the importance of aligning your optics; it’s good to practice this procedure and to regularly check your telescope’s alignment at the start of each observing session.
One other thing — I have heard it recommended that you should take the receipt for your telescope with you, so that you don’t run into duty charges when coming back into the USA. I didn’t have any trouble with that, but it’s always better to be prepared.
Anyway, each person is different, and you will have to decide for yourself if the risk is worth the reward. It is a bit of a gamble, but for me it was more than worth it, and a lot smoother than I initially expected.
January 3rd, 2008 at 2:00 pm
Hi Donnie,
Thanks so much for your advice. I am going to purchase Jims Mobile Telescope Case for Celestron NexStar SE 4 and will keep the optical tube in that. I can only hope that the TSA guys will handle it with care.
Ganesh
January 3rd, 2008 at 4:38 pm
Hi Dobbie,
I am thinking of keeping eyepieces in the checking luggage? Did you keep them in the carry on luggage or in the check in luggage?
Thanks,
Ganesh
January 3rd, 2008 at 4:40 pm
Sorry I misspelled your name
January 4th, 2008 at 11:49 am
I put my eyepieces and other non-fragile optical components into checked luggage. I left the eyepieces in their individual cases, put them all into a zip-top bag, and then put the whole bag in the center of a bundle of clothes. You just need to make sure they can’t push up against something hard, so that they can’t be smashed when your checked bag is thrown around. Which it will be.
In general, when you pack a telescope, think about how the contents of your bag might move when it lands on a particular side or corner.
The laser viewfinder from the NexStar is a bit more fragile, so I wrapped that in a small piece of foam, put a couple of rubber bands around it, then put it in between the tripod’s legs. They form a decent cage for protecting small, long things. The viewfinder looks “scary” enough that I wouldn’t put it in carry-on luggage. I only take the optical-tube in carry-on luggage.
I wrapped the arm-mount of the telescope with some foam as well. I got some 2″-thick foam from a local fabric store that carries upholstering supplies. I cut one piece to go along the arm itself, and another piece to go under the base. I tied them on with string, to hold the foam to the shape of the arm. It takes some time to pack it all, but it seemed to protect everything quite well.
I should write up a special page about how I pack my telescope, along with pictures. At least so I can remember how I did it, for next time…
January 7th, 2008 at 10:10 am
Hi Donnie,
With respect to the eye piece accessories kit, all online vendors offer a case as part of the kit, which I think simply adds to the cost of the kit. Are there any vendors who sell all the requisite eye pieces without the case?
Also, I want to purchase other telescope accessories for photography. There are so many accessories that are offered in the market. For me as a beginner, it is difficult to decide which ones I should purchase. For instance, is the ‘reducer-corrector’ a must? I am pretty much confused on what to buy and what not to. Can you give me some advice on the accessories that I should buy?
Thanks,
Ganesh
January 10th, 2008 at 12:07 pm
I don’t know much about where to get telescope eyepieces. I got a set of eyepieces with with my first telescope, as part of a package deal. I just use them with my other telescopes.
What you should do for astrophotography is to get a piggyback camera mount. It’s easier to mount a camera on the back of the telescope and then take some long exposures through a good, fast lens. Taking photos through the telescope itself is much more challenging and frustrating, because small errors have a big impact. However, piggyback astrophotography is much simpler. JMI Telescopes has piggyback adapters for the NexStar telescope series. I got one of those for my trip, and have been happiest with those photos. (I used a 100mm f/2.8 lens for my wide-field photos. Maybe not the best lens, but it is fast.)
You might also invest in a remote shutter-release for your camera so that you aren’t touching your camera when you take the photo. Any little vibration will affect the crispness of your photos. I use a remote shutter-release, and also use the camera’s timer and mirror pre-fire features, so that as little moves as possible when the photo is finally taken.
At this point, Ganesh, you should invest your money in books about astrophotography rather than attachments. Michael Covington has written some fantastic books about astrophotography.
January 14th, 2008 at 9:35 am
Thanks so much for your advice Donnie. I will save lots of money now.
February 15th, 2008 at 10:55 pm
Hi Donnie,
Greetings from Singapore.
I bumped into your blog while searching for a Portable Equatorial mount. guess google just used the word Portable and threw up your blog in Page 7 of its hit list
anyways…
i have a Celestron 6SE which I bought with the alt-az mount. I took it to Australia last August to shoot the Total lunar eclipse on 28th Aug. Transporting the entire setup in an aeroplane is a real big nightmare. first of all, Celestron doesn’t provide any carryon case for the OTA unlike Orion. I really hated that part when I spent US$999 and they didn’t even ship a basic 20 dollar carrying case. whatever. the main problem was with the tripod. its too big to fit into a 30 inch suitcase. I had to dismantle the legs and the base plate and finally barely managed to squeeze the entire thing into a suitcase.
I wonder if you use an equatorial mount and how you transport your entire setup in an aeroplane. I am mainly into eclipse photography and I am currently looking into the Orion table-top equatorial mount. I believe it can be mounted onto a sturdy camera tripod. what i am not able to figure out is if the Orion min-EQ mount can take on the weight of the OTA + the Canon 30D.
You’ve got a good blog going. looking forward to seeing some photographs of your astrophotography setup.
Cheers
Asterix