I have been looking for a Coronado PST solar telescope for the last two weeks, and I placed an order with Orion that is scheduled to ship on August 8th. A friend of mine was also looking for one, especially after seeing what the PST can do with the SM40 attached to it.
I have been checking B&H Photo's web site for the last week after hearing that some people have been getting them from there. Last night the site finally listed the PST as being "In Stock". This held true this morning as well, so I called B&H to see if they were in fact in stock. I was told that there were two in stock, and I told them to hold them for me. They gave me an order number and I called my friend. We took the 80 mile drive down to Manhattan, found a parking space and went in to B&H Photo. We went to the counter of the binoculars and telescopes department and gave the order number. The manager said that there none in stock. We were there for fifteen minutes while he fiddled with the computer more and we also found out that they had only reserved one instead of two...but there were no PST's anywhere in the store, so our order could not be filled. No one ever went in the back to check visually that they weren't there. The guy who is their "buyer" was out today (coming back in on Sunday). We were asked to leave our phone numbers and that they would call us back and that they would ship them out to us for free ($11 shipping usually) when they got them in. Completely aggravated, we left B&H and came back home. Apparently someone had called my home machine half an hour after we left to tell us that they had made a mistake and not to come in. 160 miles, tolls and gas later, we are still without PSTs. I am done with B&H Photo as a source for my gear. I will wait for Orion to ship theirs. Now hopefully, they will get their shipment of PST's on time! :)

Overall Rating: 4
Price:9 Service:1
Weight: 10
Date: 07/30/2004 01:51:24 pm PST

Replies: 0

I bought this scope, which I have named Kermit the Light Thimble, from a person who purchased it a few months earlier. It is amazing. I sold my Stellarvue AT1010 (Mr. AT) to buy this scope. There is virtually no color, even on the brightest objects. The sun shows the thinnest ring of blue at the very edge, but that is it. Perfect star test on Vega, nice Airy disk with NO visible diffraction rings. The scope is extremely well-constructed with a lot of thought put into the design. It is built for the long haul and is very, very compact. Combined with the T6 13mm Nagler eyepiece, this is a killer scope. My views tonight of the Lagoon Nebula were nothing short of amazing, the Ring was tiny, yet eerily clear and the Dumbbell was more incredible than I have seen in any other scope. This might be regarded as hyperbole, but it is not. You will be stunned what a 76mmm refractor is capable of with this scope. It performed better on those fuzzies than my C5 has with a 35mm Ultima. My next goal? The Double Cluster with the 13mm Nag. I use this scope primarily for solar work, and it excels. On a Telepod head on a Bogen 3036 tripod, it is rock solid and very easy to use. This scope is used pretty much every single day and will likely be used for the next several decades.

Overall Rating: 10
Optics:10 Ease of Use:10 Value:10
Weight: 10
Date: 09/04/2002 03:51:02 pm PST

Replies: 1