| Observer: | Tom Campbell |
| Location: | College Station, Texas (Long: 101°56'W Lat: 33°47'N) |
| Telescope: | Zhumell 12" f/5 Dobsonian |
| Eyepieces: | 1.25" Plössls - 25mm (60x), 20mm (75x), 15mm (100x), 10mm (150x), 9mm (167x), 6mm (250x), 4mm (375x) 2.0" 51.5mm (29x), 30mm (50x) |
| Seeing: | Stable (9/10) |
| Transparency: | Mostly clear (8/10) |
| Temperature: | 80s |
I had a bit of money burning a hole in my pocket and saw some great prices on dobs lately, and my wife gave me the go-ahead to upgrade my 8" Discovery. You don't have to tell me twice (at least for things like that), so I began searching reviews online. To make a long story a bit less wordy, I'll just say that I finally decided on a Zhumell Z12. I ordered it on October 5 from telescopes.com (Hayneedle), along with a few accessories. The OTA (Optical Tube Assembly) arrived via FedEx Friday (Oct. 9), but I had to wait until Saturday to get the base (how they ended up on different trucks, I won't even contemplate). You won't believe how hard it was, seeing the large OTA box in my living room and not being able to do anything with it!
Opening the boxes revealed that FedEx had been kind. The telescope and base were packed in standard plastic wrap and shipping styrofoam. No damage or scratches were noted. Everything looked pristine:
No instructions were included with the telescope. Indeed, there was no documentation at all, save for a packing slip on the outside of one of the boxes. Luckily, while reading reviews, I came across a video put out by Zhumell that gives step-by-step instructions. I played it Friday night and Saturday morning when the base actually arrived, I felt I was ready to go. Assembly went smoothly and quickly. No missing parts, and everything fit well. Soon, I had a behemoth in my living room:
While waiting for night to fall, I decided to park it next to my previous main telescope: my 8" Discovery DHQ for a size comparison. I'm still the biggest (but not by much)!
Compared to my Discovery, the Zhumell certainly *looks* like a more professional scope. The glossy aluminum tube, although more prone to dents and scratches, looks a lot more impressive than a painted sonotube. Time will tell how durable the aluminum frame is. The handle on the rocker box is a Godsend. With it, it makes lifting the large rocker box even easier than for the smaller Discovery version.
The included laser collimator is very handy. I've always eyeballed my collimation with sight tubes, etc. After again turning to YouTube to see how to use one, I was able to get the scope decently collimated in a matter of a few minutes.
THE BADJust a couple of minor nitpicks that won't bother most people. The focuser is on the opposite side of the tube than it was in my Discovery. Worse, the focuser is tilted up at a 45 degree angle (approximately). This means you need a decent height chair to be able to see anything, even when pointing at something near the horizon. I can get a new chair, and I can get used to sitting on the other side of the telescope, however.
Also, there is no place to store the battery pack. I will probably just tuck it in under the OTA at the bottom of the rocker box, but with such attention to detail on everything else, it would have been nice to have this little detail taken care of.
THE UGLYAre you kidding me? This thing is a work of art. No ugly here. Move along.
The only thing that might be considered ugly is the picture of me lugging this beasty into the back yard. The OTA is NOT for the weak. I can manage okay with it, but I may opt for a hand truck to carry it in the future.
As amazing as it sounds, Saturday night was mostly clear. The seeing was a bit soft due to humidity, but that wasn't going to stop me. I took both scopes out to my back yard, turned on the cooling fan on the Z12, and waited for nightfall.
Finding objects was a bit difficult for me. I'm used to my Telrad on the 8". I have one ordered for the Z12, but it isn't scheduled to arrive until next week. I suppose I will get the hang of the RACI over time, and I will probably keep it mounted on the scope, but I like to point and shoot when using a dob, and nothing beats a Telrad for that.
That being said, when I did happen to land on my target, the view was stunning. I visited some well-known friends, such as M11, M15, M57, NGC 457, Albireo, and the Double Cluster. I looked through the 8" first. The views were crisp and sharp. Very nice. I turned to the 12". O. M. G. Wow! The sheer number of stars visible in M11 blew me away. M15 looked like a fuzzy ball in the 8", with a few stars resolved at the edges. In the 12" it truly looked like a globular cluster with hundreds of stars resolved most of the way to the core. M57 was amazing in the Z12, taking on an almost 3D appearance, and it felt like I was on the verge of seeing a bit of color in the smoke ring. Also, with averted vision (or was it averted imagination), I thought I could almost see the central star.
Speaking of color, it was great to actually see some stars with color, especially in the open clusters. Going back to the 8", I could see the stars were a little different shade than the other stars, but in the Z12, the color was obvious.
Overall, this seems to be a great little scope at an outstanding price.