Celestron CR150-HD

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Celestron CR150-HD
The Celestron CR150-HD is an incredible value for this size of scope. My first target was Jupiter and not expecting what I was going to see, the view was absolutely breathtaking! I started out at 120x and pushed up to 240x with a barlow. I saw the Red spot with several cloud bands and at the same time one of the moons was shadowed on the planet. The details regarding the moon transit were stunning clearly defining the shadow and the disk of the moon. The Red Spot was a true salmon color. There was a faint purple halo (false color) around the planet, but it was not bothersome at all. This night must have been a good night for seeing because I have not seen Jupiter the same since then, but close. Saturn clearly defined the Cassini division along with the disk and some cloud bands. The optics are excellent, however, the tripod is something less to be desired for this size of telescope. Also, the dove tail bracket is the cause of additional vibration on the CG5 mount largely because it is too long 12-13 inches and is hollow on the inside. After reviewing many web sites on how to improve these features, I am in the process of upgrading my tripod to a solid wooden tripod and replacing the dovetail bar with a shorter 7 inch solid aluminum milled dovetail bar with a top bracket to hold the tube rings in place. In the interim I did fill the aluminum tripod legs with cement and have added a tripod stabilizer from Lymax astronomy. These improvements alone have made the tripod rock solid. However, the tripod is still too short especially if you want to view through the telescope near the zenith and that is why I plan to upgrade to a wood tripod that will add 12+ inches to the height.

All in all I would have rated this scope a 10, but instead I went with an 8 in order to accomodate for the inferior tripod and dovetail bar. I got my scope for $699! which is an excellent deal for this scope. At this price you cannot go wrong with what you get as long as you are prepared to replace the tripod legs with wooden ones and a solid and shorter dovetail bracket.

Overall Rating: 8
Weight: 3 (Unreliable Vote)
Date:
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Link to this vote: http://excelsis.com/1.0/displayvote.php?voteid=39972

Celestron CR150-HD
Our CR150 arrived highly contaminated in the front tube area
behind the lens cell, on the back of the lens assembly inside the
tube, and just possibly in between the elements!, and was unusable.
Ive never seen anything like it! A post to SAA quickly revealed
others have had the same problem. No dealer responded to our posts
but several speculated these are metal savings, grease, and dirt
from the tube and cell threading and assembly process. Several emailed
saying they has seen cr150's where actually damage had been done to
the lenses from epople trying to clean up this mess and abbraiding the
lenses in the process. I had to return my cr150 to the seller and as
of this date have lost all my money with the seller saying he 'might'
refunded some of my money .... the cr150 has been a total loss to us!
WARNING: CR150 MAY BE HAZARDOUS TO YOUR HOBBY AND BANK ACCOUNT!
I find it very curious nobody has mentioned any of these problems
in the posts above ... evidently these people lucked out! I also
examined the tube rings and they are cheap and too thin to support
the weight of this scope. Plan on replacing them also -
J. Warner (et al)

Overall Rating: 4
Weight: 3 (Unreliable Vote)
Date:
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Link to this vote: http://excelsis.com/1.0/displayvote.php?voteid=39976

Celestron CR150-HD
I don't own one of these scopes, but I'm impressed enough with the near-consensus over the good optics to consider buying one. For anyone else out there contemplating purchasing this scope, you may be interested to know that APM Telescopes in Germany are selling them with the Chromacor already installed. They hand-select the best OTA's and adds a 2" self-centering focus-assembly adapter, a 2" APM 1/15-wave diagonal, a matched Chromacor, tube rings, finderscope and bracket for $1,690 plus $110 shipping. That's $1,800 for a 6-inch apochromat! If you don't want to spend that much, the new Sirius Optics Minus-Violet Filter is a less expensive alternative that eliminates much of the false color. They also offer the new EQ6 mount for $995, a perfect match for this scope. Their website is http://apm-us.com/ And no, I don't work for APM!

Overall Rating: No Vote
Weight: <none>
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Link to this vote: http://excelsis.com/1.0/displayvote.php?voteid=39977

Celestron CR150-HD
I have a bad feeling the gentleman two posts down with the contamination problem probably purchased his unit from an on-line auction. A reputable dealer would never stiff a customer like that. Best of luck to you Sir, I hope you do get a refund.

Overall Rating: No Vote
Weight: 2 (Unreliable Vote)
Date:
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Link to this vote: http://excelsis.com/1.0/displayvote.php?voteid=63131

Celestron CR150-HD
Optics had some abraision on jupiter and moon. Viewing objects was in a word... wow...
This is a big scope, not to portable. The CG-5 is a good mount but not for this 20lb refractor. The CR150HD was my 4th scope and I loved it. I will buy another when Im rich and famous.
I was only able to photograph the moon but the samples I have are wonderful. Someday I will buy another when I finially have a G-11.

Overall Rating: 8
Optics:8 Mount:7 Ease of Use:3 Value:10
Weight: 1 (Unreliable Vote)
Date:
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Link to this vote: http://excelsis.com/1.0/displayvote.php?voteid=67291

Celestron CR150-HD
Optics: greath value for the $
Mount: satisfactory
Tripod: demands instant upgrate, totaly unadequate.

Overall Rating: 8
Optics:7 Mount:6 Ease of Use:10 Value:10
Weight: 1 (Unreliable Vote)
Date:
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Link to this vote: http://excelsis.com/1.0/displayvote.php?voteid=73401

Celestron CR150-HD
Got this big scpoe two weeks ago-and it has rained almost every night since. The CG-5 mount needed to be regreased and took the advice of the previous comments and replaced the tripod with a Mead LX200. It's big and heavy but for under a thousand bucks it's worth it.

Overall Rating: 8
Optics:7 Mount:5 Ease of Use:6 Value:9
Weight: 1 (Unreliable Vote)
Date:
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Link to this vote: http://excelsis.com/1.0/displayvote.php?voteid=105887

Celestron CR150-HD
Great celestron optics! mount is way to light. great star images. this is a really great value for the money. Dont hesitate to buy this one!

Overall Rating: 9
Optics:10 Mount:6 Ease of Use:9 Value:9
Weight: 10 (Trustworthy Vote)
Date:
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Link to this vote: http://excelsis.com/1.0/displayvote.php?voteid=109138

Celestron CR150-HD
Hi folks just ME the Photon Buster Have wrote reviews on the CG9.25 and the Skywatcher 120mm Refractor and now Got a new toy the 150mm Celestron Refractor. First the thing is BIG and a workout to move the hole thing set up but not to bad if you get the right hold and lug it outdoors. The optics on this unit seem to be very very good but I have not had a steady night to test it. So far have fixed the problem with the mounting of the tube so far foward. Was easy first I moved the rear mounting ring foward as there are holes in the mounting arm. Now the rings are 7"apart and the 13"rail has 6"to the rear and I mounted a 3.5lb weight that I wasnt useing on the 120mm flat under the rail. Balanced the tube with the Diag and EPs in place and it moved the tube up alot and can reach the slow motion controls much more easy. Rebuilt the focuser and started to collimat the lenses which were way off. As for the optics I think they are going to prove to be very good as I got this scope that was being held for me because the optics were so good and was not for sale to the public. Lucky me! As far as I can tell the optics are quite good with NO astigmatism which my 120mm has a tad. but still works very good because they are free of any other problems other than chromatic aberation which is normal for a non APO.That little 120mm resolves M13 to sparkling ground sugar on black velvet. As for the 150mm more testing and a steady night will be needed to realy put it to the test. So far I was looking at the moon at 380X with slight haze and windy the view was very detailed concidering the somewhat poor conditions. More to come as I put it through it paces on better nights. All in all I am pleased at this point but time will tell.It is big next to the 120mm makes it look like a 4". For the money and if you get a good one I mean the glass it is a great bargin. I was worried about to much purple halos befor I got the scope as I have read many reviews and some people say it very bad and others say not bad at all. I guess that depends on how well corrected the optics are as poor optics will show more color. I was suprised to say the least it has about the same or less than my 120mm. Untill I set up both at the same time and compare can't say for shure but its not bad at all,the moon at 380X had a slight purple fringe and vega had a bit more seems about the same as the 120mm. Hope I got a keeper here. Will be doing some deep sky work with OXYIII filters and Ultrablock filters and post my findings on this scopes performance. If you have room and don't mind a large scope these are very capable and much cheaper than APOs.But I would get a large APO if I could afford one. Overall less the tripod I rate this a solid 9 Thanks and happy photon busting.
Well it been a few days and the beast has proven to be a very good unit with no astigmatism and slightly overcorrected optics about 1/6 wave I would estimate and very smooth with no zones and near perfect alike image on both sides of focus.As for the views and performance well I am impressed on moments of steady skys the views on the moon pull through crisp at 400X which is the max at 460x the images crumble and loose contrast. For a nonAPO and 150mm not bad at all. Got some very helpful imformation from a company that makes lenses for Nasa and Goverment. They were helpful teaching me how to test for over correction or under.One of the engineers sat down with me and explained the Physics and how toos. What great guys spending time with little old me. Well if you want a large refractor and don't have the $$ for APOs the 150mm is very capable of deep sky with O111 filter or UHC and medium power EPs 12mm to 35mm work very well.The only drawback to the 150 over my 120 is the extra 200mm Fratio as the 120 is 1000mm and the 150 is 1200mm which means a narrower field. I had both scopes out and on the same objetcs the 120 shows a bit more sky than the 150 at the same powers. But the 150mm does get out there deeper than the 120mm and takes power better. It collects much more light 56% but the trade off is size and weight. Looks like a cannon ready to shoot the sky. Well it a nice scope and if you get a good one you will like it alot but get a better tripod the mount works fine when properly adjusted and slop taken out. The legs are junk for this size scope. Heavy wooden legs are next on my list I rate this scope a 9 and the mount a 7 and the tripod a 5. The CG5 is a very capable mount for a lighter scope in the 15 to 17lb range when set up right. Thanks and happy photon busting HEY its 7/10/02 and have a big update on the 150mm after star testing and haveing a problem with a slight flare/coma to one side just off extra focus I found the problem. Spent many days and much time collimating and could not get rid of it. So I took the lenses out and saw the factory mark where the lenses are suposed to be aligned. Well they goofed up big time. The marks and numbers on the lens edge are wrong and after rotateing the outer lens at various point and leaveing the second lens where it was I found the error in their indexing the lenses. Now the lenses are perfect and star test perfect as can be exspected. No flare and the images are nuch more crisp and the defocused image is the same on both sides as it was not before. WOW this 150mm has very good optics better than I thougt.Now I can see the ring neb and central star much more clear at high power. Befor only medium power was useful on deep sky nebulas. Of course I use a Lumicon UHC filter. Check those optics.

Overall Rating: 8
Optics:9 Mount:8 Ease of Use:6 Value:10
Weight: 15 (Trustworthy Vote)
Date:
By:
Link to this vote: http://excelsis.com/1.0/displayvote.php?voteid=103516

Celestron CR150-HD
Don't own one of these, but got a chance to look through one. Optics are good for an achromat, but there is alot of color as you increase the power. Jupiter was purple across the disk when using enough power to discern any detail (MV-1 filter did help - it reduced the false color but also made detail more crisp). Likewise, the moon was completely purple across its surface at anything around 200X or higher. Star test looked good, don't recall exact details but alignment looked good and I didn't see any astigmatism or zones.

The tube was mounted on CI-1700, so I can't comment on the mount.

Overall not bad for an achroomat, but I think you could do better with a 8" dob for less. No color and better light grasp. In addition, the false color indicates that all the light is not focusing to a singular point, so the image is not as crisp as it could be.

But for those who really want a large refractor this is a reasonably priced entry into that market with decent quality.

Many of the reviews I read about this scope say things like color on the "limb" of the moon. So I would look before you buy because the star test on the one I looked through was quite good, but the color was certainly more prevalent than many seem to indicate. Hard to imagine how such disparity could exist, especially as it regards color correction.

Take care,
john

Overall Rating: 7
Optics:7 Ease of Use:7 Value:8
Weight: 3 (Unreliable Vote)
Date:
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Link to this vote: http://excelsis.com/1.0/displayvote.php?voteid=114038

Celestron CR150-HD
I've had 2 of these now. not for use on a whimpy mount! focuser sucks, well, its the typical stiff, course focuser i've seen on many scopes. the one on my st80 and vx120 are pretty much the same. my current synta has a burgess focuser and a 3n1 bracket on it. that makes it much more usable. i've bought one new and one used. both had optics I feel are suprisingly good. i use the aperture mask on planets. stops it down to about 4 1/2 inches, which gives like f10.7. What little color is left is, IMHO, nothin to worry about. a great value, especially if you can get a cheap used one! plus with the 3n1 bracket one there it feels like your swinging a canon around! If you have the mount to hold it, go for it!

Overall Rating: 9
Optics:8 Ease of Use:5 Value:10
Weight: 1 (Unreliable Vote)
Date:
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Link to this vote: http://excelsis.com/1.0/displayvote.php?voteid=143798

Celestron CR150-HD
Had my Ebay-Bought Cr150 out in good skies for the first time last night. Found M81/82, M108, M109, M51, M64, M94, M101, NGC 3184, NGC 2841, NGC 4490/4495(cocoon and companion easily seen) and a few other unknowns in Ursa Major and Canes Venatici. I also had my 8" Lx-10 out for comparison. The Celestron gives it a run for it's money every time I compare them, but the SCT wins out majorly in stability.Hints of Structure were seen with the cr150 in M82, M51, 4490 and 2841! I either have good eyesight or a really good scope, but I think it's a combination of both. Images are tack-sharp and bright, and in certain aspects almost always had an edge over the SCT. As far as earlier posts regarding 16 CnC go, I'm happy to say to the person with the Argonaut that I clearly, cleanly split all components with my cr150. No image breakdown even at 375x. Overall it's a great scope, but with a sub-standard(at best) tripod.

Overall Rating: 9
Optics:8 Mount:3 Ease of Use:7 Value:9
Weight: 5 (Veritable Vote)
Date:
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Link to this vote: http://excelsis.com/1.0/displayvote.php?voteid=197419

Celestron CR150-HD
This scope is a tough one to rate. It is a large, imposing scope and can be a bit awkward to use. However, the optics are pretty good. This scope provided decent images of Jupiter and Saturn although there was false color around the planets and some along the edge of the moon. The false color was not that bad but it was always present regardless of seeing conditions. The other issue with this scope is that it is front heavy due to the weight of the objective lens. Due to this, the scope ends up very low to the ground when pointed straight up. I used this scope with CG-5 mount which was not really solid enough to support a scope of this scope. It tracked accurately but the dampening time was poor.

Overall, I enjoyed using this scope and it is a good value for the price.

Jeff

Overall Rating: 7
Optics:8 Mount:5 Ease of Use:6 Value:8
Weight: 10 (Trustworthy Vote)
Date:
By:
Link to this vote: http://excelsis.com/1.0/displayvote.php?voteid=351247

Celestron CR150-HD
This is a comment on the OTA only. Basically everything has already been said about this scope and I guess it's getting a little old especially since Synta caused/is causing a shock wave in "cheap" refractor land with their 80 and 100 ED refractors. Frankly I'm not suprised as they already knew how to build very well performing medium length achromats like the C102 and this CR150. I sincerely doubt that a 6" achromat at this focal length could perform much better than these babies. Of course there is colour AROUND very bright objects (Venus, Jupiter and mag 1 stars) and although the haze while not visible in front of Jup's disk nor the moon will rob some low level contrast, planetary/lunar detail is excellent. Furthermore the images are very pleasing to the eye due to its contrast. In fair seeing it always throws up a decent image at 180x on the gas giants (no additional tube currents to deal with) and when seeing permits 240-260x is not pushing it. On good nights higher mags are possible without really degrading the images but without adding more detail either. I'm still using the 1.25" stock diagonal and Skywatcher Super plossls borrowed from my 4"F10 so with a better diagonal (WO 2" f.i.) results at higher mags could be better but I'm not complaining :-)

After I was surprised with the deep sky performance of my 4" refractor under moderately dark skies (mag 5, sometimes 5.5), and charmed with the pinpoint stars and awesome contrast, I decided to purchase the CR150 as my prime deep sky instrument and lemme tell ya, here it really shines. Scanning the sky with a 32mm eyepiece is a delight. With a 20mm eyepiece deep sky treasures stand out in stark relief. The 20mm (60x) is especially useful for hunting fainter galaxies, the darker sky background and contrast make them stand out, riding the Markarian chain in Virgo for example is really cool this way. On open clusters it is simply awesome, period. It does extremly well on double stars (takes high mags very well) and brighter globulars come alive. Planetary nebulae are particularly pleasing too as the optics take high mags (300+) on these without any problem. Nebulae like M17 (summer fave) and M42(winter fave) look awesome and in nights of good transparency E and F pop out in the Trapezium. Planned upgrades: 2" diagonal, OIII-filter. I've also looked through other designs of (much) bigger aperture on DSO too and while they beat this 6" by brutal aperture there's something about the crispness and contrast in refractors that I simply don't want to miss out on. Every design has its place in astronomy and there's no scope that is the best in everything. The CR150 is no more and no less than a darn good all round instrument without excelling in one particular area, that's a compromise that I can easily live with. Some might be bothered by the colour on very bright objects, so if you're considering one, check it out first.

Beyond the raving in the early days and after the thrill of owning a big refactor has been cooled, I think that it still holds its own, the more I gain experience, the more I love it. These are really exciting times to get started in astronomy as good quality gets more and more affordable. Clear skies!

Overall Rating: 9
Optics:9 Ease of Use:8 Value:9
Weight: 1 (Unreliable Vote)
Date:
By:
Link to this vote: http://excelsis.com/1.0/displayvote.php?voteid=375048

Celestron CR150-HD
With Chromacor: 10. Without Chromacor: 8. I have a sample with VG optics and moderate aberrations. The tripod and mount are out of this rating.

Overall Rating: 10
Optics:10 Mount:8 Ease of Use:10 Value:10
Weight: 1 (Unreliable Vote)
Date:
By:
Link to this vote: http://excelsis.com/1.0/displayvote.php?voteid=420100

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