Televue tv-102

Is the televue TV-102 a good scope foe deep sky viewing? Rowland

Rowland Hamly said:

Is the televue TV-102 a good scope foe deep sky viewing? Rowland

Rowland, What type of deep sky observing are you interested in? IIRC, Walter Scott Houston had a column in S&T for many years(Deep Sky Wonders?) and I believe he used a 4".

You will be limited in what you can see by the rather small 4" aperture & with much detail beyond capability, but under a dark sky site and as a low-power wide-field scanner of the Milky Way is should be thrilling; *Scotty* Houston also viewed with a 10" reflector, mentioning same often in his former S&T column. Under dark rural Kansas skies of limiting magnitude 6 (dimmest star readily seen with the un-aided eye) where the Milky Way is a prominant lane across the sky, IMO 6" aperture is minimum for viewing brighter DSO's in some detail, but an 8" provides double the light grasp & it is under these skies that Scotty used his 10" reflector. Under urban Kansas skies of about limiting magnitude 3 (still a smallish 10K-20K population city surrounded by rural land & at least 75 or more miles distant from larger metro areas) & where the milky way can barely be detected as a sky-haze, a 6" is un-suitable for DSO's other than to claim you found it. But here, an 8" begins to showcase the brightest DSO's. So it comes down to what you actually want to see (in all their visual glory or merely/barely found) and where you intend to observe from. Perhaps post the limiting magnitude from your primary observing spot? I'd think your location in Minnisota should be similar to or even better than mine in Kansas, at least that is how I recall the skies of Northern Wisconsin when I visited in younger days. As a recomendation for what I imagine your sky is like, an 8" f/6 Dob gathers a lot of light yet is also easily portable. Such as instrument could compliment the low-power DSO capability of the TV, or supplant it. BTW, my 1st scope was a 2.4" (60mm) f/8 achromat and it thrilled me.