Orion ShortTube 90mm

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Orion ShortTube 90mm
Simply put, this scope delivers. Because it is a short-focue achromat, it is not very good with planets. It IS good with the Moon (as most well made scopes are)

However it shines as a womderful wide-field scope. If you do get this scope in dark skies, you will love the views it gives.

In short, at low power a wonderful scope for the money.

Overall Rating: 10
Weight: 3 (Unreliable Vote)
Date:
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Link to this vote: http://www.excelsis.com/1.0/displayvote.php?voteid=39601

Orion ShortTube 90mm
Scope arrived with two problems: flecks of stuff (tube paint?) on interior side of lens, and the 1/4"-20 mounting hole wasn't 1/4"-20 (although this may have been remedied by now - I got it summer '99). Construction was good and solid. Viewing was reasonable, except for very noticeable chromatic abberation (blue halos around bright objects). Not good for photography - performed poorly even on daytime terrestrial objects. A decent beginner scope for casual observing.

Overall Rating: 7
Weight: 1 (Unreliable Vote)
Date:
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Link to this vote: http://www.excelsis.com/1.0/displayvote.php?voteid=39602

Orion ShortTube 90mm
This scope has been a surprise. It performs very well for wide field star sweeping. Yet with the addition of a higher quality diagonal and eyepieces does surprising well on the planets. The chromatic aberration is not as prevalent as I would have thought. Portability is great.

Overall Rating: 8
Weight: 1 (Unreliable Vote)
Date:
By:
Link to this vote: http://www.excelsis.com/1.0/displayvote.php?voteid=39603

Orion ShortTube 90mm
The scope is a great wide field performer. After changing the diagonal with a high-quality one, even the planets are surprisingly nice. A nice travel companion.
This scope is a great surprise considering its price!

Overall Rating: 9
Weight: 1 (Unreliable Vote)
Date:
By:
Link to this vote: http://www.excelsis.com/1.0/displayvote.php?voteid=39604

Orion ShortTube 90mm
A very nice second scope or backup scope. I have not changed out the diagonal, but I do use Naglers, Panoptics, and Radians with it which greatly enhances the performance of this little scope. The chromatic aberration is noticable on Jupiter in particular, but much less so on Saturn. The views of the planets are remarkedly good for such a wide field scope. I have used a Televue 3x barlow combined with a Nagler 7 for approx 214x with good effect on Saturn. The wide field views of star clusters are truly awesome when using a Nagler 12 type 4 with this scope. Recommended.

Overall Rating: 9
Weight: 1 (Unreliable Vote)
Date:
By:
Link to this vote: http://www.excelsis.com/1.0/displayvote.php?voteid=39605

Orion ShortTube 90mm
Always in the back of my car! Truely transportable! (The cheap diagonal replaced with a high quality one.)

Overall Rating: 10
Weight: 3 (Unreliable Vote)
Date:
By:
Link to this vote: http://www.excelsis.com/1.0/displayvote.php?voteid=39606

Orion ShortTube 90mm
Very good optics out to about 120x ...Surprisingly good to 150x..breaks down rapidly after that. needs a mirror diagonal for full performance. Great portability. A solid second scope finder or guidescope offering great value for the dollar. Almost impossible to find used, but worth the hunt.

Overall Rating: 9
Weight: 1 (Unreliable Vote)
Date:
By:
Link to this vote: http://www.excelsis.com/1.0/displayvote.php?voteid=39607

Orion ShortTube 90mm
THIS LITTLE SCOPE REALLY SURPRIZED ME. I HAVE A 8" SCT THAT RESOLVES FAINTER OBJECTS BUT THE EASE OF USE HAS ME GRABING FOR THE SHORTUBE A LOT MORE THAN I THOUGHT I WOULD. IT'S NOT AN APO BUT FOR THE PRICE, I REALLY THINK IT IS A FANTASTIC SCOPE. I RATE IT HIGH BECAUSE IT OUT-PERFORMS IT'S PRICE TAG AND IS VERY SO EASY TO TRANSPORT AND SETUP. I USE A MIRROR DIAGONAL AND MEADE 4000 PLOSSLS. IT STAR TESTS WELL AS LONG AS I DON'T PUSH THE MAGNIFICATION TO FAR. THERE IS A HALO AROUND BRIGHTER OBJECTS BUT IT ISN'T BAD ENOUGH TO BOTHER ME MUCH. WOULD RECOMEND IT AS A GREAT BEGINNER SCOPE.

Overall Rating: 10
Weight: 3 (Unreliable Vote)
Date:
By:
Link to this vote: http://www.excelsis.com/1.0/displayvote.php?voteid=39609

Orion ShortTube 90mm

It´s cheap, but it´s a very good telescope. The stars looks bright and clear, the moon have some color on the edge, but the craters and the rest of the landscape looks great, even at 100 X - 150 X. The image of the planets is clear at high power, but are surrounded by a bluish halo, especially in Jupiter. Finally, this scope is great to observe the Sun (with a filter, of course) and the sunspots: very good detail in umbra and penumbra and faculas. It´s compact and powerfull.

Overall Rating: 9
Weight: 1 (Unreliable Vote)
Date:
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Link to this vote: http://www.excelsis.com/1.0/displayvote.php?voteid=39610

Orion ShortTube 90mm
I bought the same scope from Discovery. The OTA is identical to Orion's, but the accessories are different. See my review under Discovery 90 RFT.

rah4@hotmail.com

Overall Rating: No Vote
Weight: <none>
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Link to this vote: http://www.excelsis.com/1.0/displayvote.php?voteid=39611

Orion ShortTube 90mm
When I received this scope I discovered, that the mounting block wasn`t inline
with the focuser. The focuser wasn`t straight simply. When taking the lens out,
I discovered that the o.t.a wasn`t completely sealed in the rear, there was a small gap, light could get inside the tube from the rear. Also the scope is VERY
difficult to collimate. If possible at all. The ring which is locking the lens
in the cell doesn`t have a rubbering attached to it. As opposed to Celestrons refractors which have a rubberring atteched to the ring which is locking the lens. The Celestron versions seems so much better with that rubberring. Overall
the scope seems to be rather carelessly manufactured. And can not be considered
to be manufactured with any greater precision. Lots of flaws... As it is now it
can NOT be recommended, unless they IMPROVE it. This scope indeed needs improve
ment. It`s rather low price is NOT an excuse for it`s rather low quality.

Overall Rating: No Vote
Weight: <none>
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Link to this vote: http://www.excelsis.com/1.0/displayvote.php?voteid=39612

Orion ShortTube 90mm
I got a great deal on this used, LNIB. It IS a great wide field telescope at lower magnifications. With a surprisingly smooth focuser, and a decent finder. However, at first look at anything bright or with even moderate powers, it was just bad. More chromatic abberration than I have ever seen in any scope. But I liked using it so much I decided to try and make it better. First I replaced the diagonal, and of course used better quality eyepieces, but without very much improvement. So I decided to go for the extreme, I stopped the aperture down to 70mm which made it a f/7.14 scope. And OMG, incredible improvement in contrast and around 80% of the color went away. It was so good in fact I invited my neighbor to bring his Pronto over. We compared the two side by side
for 4 straight nights and both came to the conclusion that it was at least 80% as good as the Pronto. Not too bad for $200.00, or even the $300.00 new. I don't necessarily recommend that anyone buy this scope with the intention of stopping it down, but if you already have one, try it. The aperture loss is well worth the gains in contrast and color correction. Then e-mail me at marknjuli@aol.com to thank me :-) I would have given this scope a 9, but I had to do the work to make it that way, so it only gets an 8.

Overall Rating: 8
Weight: 1 (Unreliable Vote)
Date:
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Link to this vote: http://www.excelsis.com/1.0/displayvote.php?voteid=39613

Orion ShortTube 90mm
Nicely packaged but optics exhibit too much color for me on bright objects. Good only as a rich field telescope. Forget the planets.

Overall Rating: 6
Weight: 1 (Unreliable Vote)
Date:
By:
Link to this vote: http://www.excelsis.com/1.0/displayvote.php?voteid=39614

Orion ShortTube 90mm
I hope you like color abberations. I found bright objects show purple halos - Moon & Jupiter mostly. Stars were pinpoints and contrast was medium. Most offensive was the Orion Alt-Az tripod. Tracking any celestial object was frustrating. Some hint of internal reflection. On the plus side, it is small and portable. It works well for terestrial viewing and birding given the price. But forget these Chinese Achros for night time viewing. I did not invest in a mirror diagonal upgrade. It would probably help. Pushing the ST90 to 192X the contrast fell off dramatically. That is 52X per inch of aperature. Jupiter revealed banding but not impressive. Wide field is OK in the darkest skies. Solar viewing is decent with a solar filter. I gave it to a child as a starter scope. She loves it. I would suggest buying an Orion 6" to 8" Dob for Celestial viewing. For the same price you will get a true rich field scope that can reach out to DSO's and the mount is perfect for manual tracking. They are just not as portable. For birding, the ST90 is fine.

Overall Rating: 6
Weight: 1 (Unreliable Vote)
Date:
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Link to this vote: http://www.excelsis.com/1.0/displayvote.php?voteid=39615

Orion ShortTube 90mm
Very small with a larger objective than the 80mm.

Seemed pretty well put together and had nice crisp images, however the secondary colour on bright objects was very annoying on high powers. With an 8mm Radian the view was distinctly coloured, however on the 18mm it was fine.

If you want a portable rich field scope this should fit the bill, just go easy on the power and avoid bright objects like the planets and moon. Of course you could stop it down to 60mm ;-)

Overall Rating: 7
Weight: 1 (Unreliable Vote)
Date:
By:
Link to this vote: http://www.excelsis.com/1.0/displayvote.php?voteid=39616

Orion ShortTube 90mm
After having to make a slight adjustment in collimation of the optics, the scope has a nearly textbook perfect star test at high mags. The optics in this scope are extremely impressive with acceptable color. Did I get lucky? The optics alone are worthy of the 10 rating considering the price.

Overall Rating: No Vote
Weight: <none>
Date:
By:
Link to this vote: http://www.excelsis.com/1.0/displayvote.php?voteid=39617

Orion ShortTube 90mm
After having to make a slight adjustment in collimation of the optics, the scope has a nearly textbook perfect star test at high mags. The optics in this scope are extremely impressive with acceptable color. Did I get lucky? The optics alone are worthy of the 10 rating considering the price.

Overall Rating: 10
Weight: 3 (Unreliable Vote)
Date:
By:
Link to this vote: http://www.excelsis.com/1.0/displayvote.php?voteid=39618 

>After having to make a slight adjustment in collimation of the optics, the scope has a nearly textbook perfect star test at high mags.  The optics in this scope are extremely impressive with acceptable color.  Did I get lucky?  The optics alone are worthy of the 10 rating considering the price.


How did you collimate it?
Orion ShortTube 90mm
Not bad. I bought this for my son about a couple of years ago.
I just wanted to see what he could do without Televues and Vixens and low aperture (He's 14 now). A test you could say. Nice travel scope. I placed a
piece of ED glass on top of the dew cap with some of that ultra-strong glue
(the one they put aircraft pieces together with!), so it corrected some of
the enormous color flaw. I give it an 8 for portability and reasonable optics.

daSentinel

Overall Rating: 8
Weight: 1 (Unreliable Vote)
Date:
By:
Link to this vote: http://www.excelsis.com/1.0/displayvote.php?voteid=39619

Orion ShortTube 90mm
I have a ball with this little tube. I use a MV1 filter with it to cut down on the purple at higher mags and have mounted it on an eq3 mount and tripod. Solid as a rock. I like to see how far the seeing will let me push it as well as the fantastic views of open clusters. With a barlow, it does fairly well on Jupiter too.

Overall Rating: 8
Optics:7 Ease of Use:10 Value:8
Weight: 3 (Unreliable Vote)
Date:
By:
Link to this vote: http://www.excelsis.com/1.0/displayvote.php?voteid=83169

Orion ShortTube 90mm
I purchased my scope as a tube assembly and mounted it on a russian alt-az pedestal from a Tal Alcor newtonian.
After star testing I was disapointed, but soon discovered the cause. The lens retaining ring was loose causing the scope to be badly out of collimation. After tightening it performed really well, giving a nice set of diffraction rings on both sides of focus.
With the suplied 26mm plossl giving 19x magnifcation it gives breathtaking views. I have tried up to 166x on Jupiter and Saturn and it performs quite well for such a fast scope.
There is quite a bit of false colour when viewing the moon, but this can be overcome by stopping the scope down to f11 by drilling a 45mm hole in a suitably sized sweet jar lid and placing it over the lens hood. The blue fringe around the moon then all but disappears.
I use a good mirror diagonal and a Tele Vue 11mm plossl and have just tried a Baader contrast boosting filter which eliminates most of the false colour found in most budget priced achromats.
I have removed the original finder as I found it very difficult to use and fitted a Celestron Star Finder, but really a finder is not needed on a scope of this type as it is easier to use a low magnification to find your subject and then change eyepieces for a better view.
I think this is a brilliant little scope for the money and it has given me many hours of pleasure.

Overall Rating: 9
Optics:8 Ease of Use:9 Value:10
Weight: 5 (Veritable Vote)
Date:
By:
Link to this vote: http://www.excelsis.com/1.0/displayvote.php?voteid=179039

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