With the dawn of 2005, I am inspired to reflect on the amazing progress in apochromatic refractors. Jusy when you thought it couldn't get any better:
In 2004 Orion brought us the very affordable 80ED and 100ED, and hopefully will continue this aperture trend in 2005. With little fanfare Stellarvue extended their line of apo's all the way to 152/7.9, many of which have a waiting list. Speaking of which, the wait for the rich-field TeleVue NP127/5.2 is reported to be at least a year.
Also in 2004 William Optics introduced their highly rated FLT110/6.5 (with optics by TEC) and hopefully have larger apertures in the pipeline. Borg also updated their very popular modular series with the new 101ED.
On a somewhat sad note, Roland Christen announced the end of the legendary Astro-Physics oil-spaced triplet family (can you say "collector"?) but is starting to ship just-as-high quality AP160's with smaller versions coming soon. Takahashi is also set to ship their TOA150, and can the TOA170 be far behind? And if you are in the market for an observatory class scope, TMB will be more than happy to build you a 254/9 - or larger!!!
Telescope Engineering continues to sell every 140/7 they can build and Yuri Petrunin quietly announced on New Year's eve that TEC will ship 3 oil-spaced fluorite 200/8 triplets this month that (my conjecture) could set a new benchmark for optical quality. It's nice to see TEC following in the footsteps of the famous Zeiss APQ series.
Oh, and not to forget Feather Touch, who is cornering the market on focusers for high-end apo's. I apologize if I have left out any manufacturers! These are exciting times for refractor fanatics and I wish you all the refractor of your dreams in 2005.
May you waiting time be short,
Milt
In 2004 Orion brought us the very affordable 80ED and 100ED, and hopefully will continue this aperture trend in 2005. With little fanfare Stellarvue extended their line of apo's all the way to 152/7.9, many of which have a waiting list. Speaking of which, the wait for the rich-field TeleVue NP127/5.2 is reported to be at least a year.
Also in 2004 William Optics introduced their highly rated FLT110/6.5 (with optics by TEC) and hopefully have larger apertures in the pipeline. Borg also updated their very popular modular series with the new 101ED.
On a somewhat sad note, Roland Christen announced the end of the legendary Astro-Physics oil-spaced triplet family (can you say "collector"?) but is starting to ship just-as-high quality AP160's with smaller versions coming soon. Takahashi is also set to ship their TOA150, and can the TOA170 be far behind? And if you are in the market for an observatory class scope, TMB will be more than happy to build you a 254/9 - or larger!!!
Telescope Engineering continues to sell every 140/7 they can build and Yuri Petrunin quietly announced on New Year's eve that TEC will ship 3 oil-spaced fluorite 200/8 triplets this month that (my conjecture) could set a new benchmark for optical quality. It's nice to see TEC following in the footsteps of the famous Zeiss APQ series.
Oh, and not to forget Feather Touch, who is cornering the market on focusers for high-end apo's. I apologize if I have left out any manufacturers! These are exciting times for refractor fanatics and I wish you all the refractor of your dreams in 2005.
May you waiting time be short,
Milt
