Celestron C6-R

5.0 C6R OTA

Super sharp images. Unbelievable low price. 6" REFRACTOR, Come on!

Focuser, Finder, Nose heavy.

I bought this scope because I wanted a large refractor, and had heard good things about this one. This is a review of the OTA only.

First impression, WOW! Really large, impressive looking scope. No wonder it's called "the yard cannon". But the view is what's important. And in a word, OUTSTANDING. On anything less bright than 1st magnitude, this may well have the sharpest image I have ever seen. There is a violet fringe around brighter objects, but there are filters to take care of this. The Baader Semi-Apo Filter is highly recommended, as is their Fringe Killer. The violet color is not that bad, though, and I find it easy to ignore. And as I said, on dimmer objects color fringing is not a problem. This is one refractor that does DSOs justice. M42 and M31 never looked better. I can see all 6 trapezium stars in it at 120x through my Pentax XW 10mm. This is outstanding performance.

The only problems to address were the focuser and the finder. The stock focuser is okay, but an upgrade, such as the Moonlight CR2, makes a really good scope a great scope. And the finder, while a good one, is a straight through type, and hard to use alone with this scope. I recommend a RACI type to replace it, plus either a multi reticle finder or Telrad to supplement it. The scope is very nose heavy, due that big glass up front, so these extra items add some much needed weight to the eyepiece end.

Simply put, this may be the best buy of best buys there is, and I know I will own this one for a long time, maybe till I'm gone. It's that good, especially at $499 for the OTA.