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About Us
Based out of Springdale, Arkansas, Explore Scientific is an optics company committed to designing, building and selling high-quality observation instruments and accessories for all skill levels. Since 2008!
DC Rees
Reviewed in the United States on July 10, 2024
Excellent true Apochromatic Refractor. Tried it out on the moon and deep space with ZERO chromatic Aberration. This scope shows up every 6 months or so on sale for 799. Buy it then and it is an UNBEATABLE value. The only less than perfect aspect is the focuser, which is not great. It is usable, but I will eventually replace it for a different focuser. That said, this is still an EXCELLENT scope with its sale price it is a great buy. UPDATE: The focuser has really started to grow on me. Making this even better. I have changed my rating to 5 stars. ZERO REGRET.
M. Gentry
Reviewed in the United States on June 11, 2024
This scope was my first step up from a Celestron 5SE I have which I've used for visual and tried for some astrophotography and I learned fast the SEs have limitations. I started with a Celestron AVX mount but have since switched to a ZWO AM3 mount along with all of the other ZWO equipment, camera, focuser, filter holder etc.. I've also went ahead and put the Explorer Scientific flattener on this although I'm not sure how much that's needed. I've always felt like the stars were tack sharp edge to edge on this scope, very impressive really.Finding the focal length is a little tricky on this scope I assume because it's a triplet but it's doable. Use the 2 included spacers, the flattener and another 55mm worth of extensions. I added a photo to show what it took to get there.Great sized scope for travel too, with the AM3 mount it's a breeze to break down and take you with anywhere you go. I also have the Seestar S50 thinking that would be my travel goto setup but I honestly find I don't use that as much as I thought. Setting this rig up and getting going only takes just a few more minutes and the images are just so much better compared to the Seestar it's not worth the slightly faster setup for me.Overall, considering I do most of my astrophotography from a very heavily light polluted backyard.. at least Bortle 9 and I like to carry my setup with me I find this to be the perfect scope for me. The M42 image I took from my backyard and wasn't more than an hour and a half of data without any light pollution filters processed in PI. Even though this isn't the latest and greatest, trendy scope I see no reason to upgrade.
JAM
Reviewed in the United States on August 8, 2023
Sti hav us it, been busy
Russell H. Cashin
Reviewed in the United States on June 10, 2023
I purchased this APO refractor when it was on sale. It was the best price I could find anywhere and it is a nice telescope.
Heath
Reviewed in the United States on May 2, 2023
I have several types of scopes. Several of those are refractor telescopes. This triplet is not the best on the market, however for the price this thing is exactly what you want. I have absolutely no chromatic aberration in stars and moon. The galaxies are crisp, the nebulas have full color range inside your prime focus. THE ONLY things that sets this scope a small amount lower in rank, in my opinion, is the #1 the focuser isn’t incredibly easy to hit the fine tune you may need. There is a bit of slop at the finest focus point causing me to have to back and forth a little to hit the spot. #2 the tube at the focused is mounted with three screw type fasteners. The tube itself is the type with an angled surface that is supposed to pull in right when tightening the screws to mount it. This does not seat properly and causes a slight out of shape star. This is fixed by loosening and pressing in until flush while tightening. Not a big deal but a little annoying to have to figure it out. #3 even with everything perfect in the image train, the airy disc pattern has a little misshape on one edge. Maybe 20degrees at bottom of circle. I think the collimation and or glass isn’t exactly perfect which is kind of expected at this price range and ultimately does not effect the overall image at all that is noticeable. Well worth every dime and quite good compared to others of the same design.
MSL
Reviewed in the United States on October 16, 2016
I bought the ES 102 triplet apo primarily for a planned venture into astrophotography with the thought of eventually purchasing a larger scope. I also wanted the experience of enjoying some visual observations.I have a lifetime of photographic experience but zero with telescopes. I wanted a high quality, full featured instrument that I could use to learn the basics of astrophotography. Along with the ES 102, I purchased a Celestron AVX mount.The ES arrived quickly and was well packaged. It was considerably more substantial than what I expected from reading reviews and viewing a few on-line videos. There are also quite few initial items that are required but not included with the telescope itself. These include a finder scope, at least one eyepiece, T-adapter and T-ring, neutral density “moon filter” and extension tube.The ES 102 comes with a 1.5” long extension ring which must be installed otherwise even with the included 2” diagonal, the optical path is too short for even visual observing. The ring was also necessary to achieve enough back focus with a T-adapter and extension tube to enable focus at my camera’s sensor plane.It took a day or so of experimenting through a window just to achieve proof of concept both visually and photographically.I was lucky that we had a few clear nights so I took the plunge and brought the scope outside to view a beautiful fall full moon. My crude attempt at aligning the finder scope with the main scope was surprisingly successful, enough so that the moon dramatically appeared in the near center of my 32 mm eyepiece.I removed the diagonal and attached my camera, a Canon 5DSR. After a few camera adjustments I was able to acquire some images and upload them into Bridge, Camera Raw and Photoshop.I’ve attached an image that I acquired after about an hour of camera fiddling.What I didn’t notice were any of the issues that I had anticipated such as difficulty focusing or instability of the image even with a somewhat heavy camera. However, I did notice some backlash with the fine focus knob of the two speed focuser. I improved things a bit by tightening the focuser tension thumbscrew.Overall, I was very satisfied with the results with the ES 102 on my first night out and without even completely reading through manuals for both the telescope and mount. However, with my truly zero telescope background, I’m not in a position to offer any technical pronouncements. All I can say is so far, so good.
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