MEOPTEXMini 50mm Guide Scope

Was slightly apprehensive when I purchased this guide scope as the reviews mentioned the difficulty of setting it up. I paired this with my C8 SCT and a ASI224MC as the guide camera, pointed it at the moon, aligned the guide scope, got focus without any adapters and was guiding within minutes. Good solid build at an unbeatable price.

This guidescope looks similar the Orion mini guidescope, and a similar Zhumell guidescopes that used to be sold long ago.After trying it for the first time, I captured an image with my IMX224 camera for platesolving, and astrometry.net tells me I'm getting an image scale of 4.09 arcsec per pixel, which would mean (given the IMX224's 3um pixels) that this guidescope's focal length is actually 190mm, and (assuming 50mm aperture is accurate) it would be F3.8Pros: It is lightweight, optically fast, and the accessories make it easy to fit it in most telescopes. For the $59 I paid it's good value.Cons: The focal plane is at the very edge of the "eyepiece" holder, which means many cameras and eyepieces need an extension tube/nose to be able to be placed that far outside and still be secured by the 3 holding screws. For my "bullet" IMX224 camera this means I have to use the "C to 1.25" adapter that came with it (normally meant for filters). For my testing eyepiece I had to use a screw-on Barlow (from which I had removed the lenses). This makes it somewhat uncomfortable to use at first, but once set up it works fine. The most obvious drawback is the lack of proper focuser, which means you have to push-pull the camera to find the focus distance, and then "fine focus" by unscrewing the objective which only has a few mm of travel (<3mm) , which is not ideal, but it's doable.All in all I think 5 stars on build quality, 3 stars on ease of use. If you want a budget 190mmFL guidescope and are willing to put up with a little nuanced setup, it's worth considering this one.

I tried every eyepiece in my arsenal and none of them had long enough barrels to allow me to focus a star to a pinpoint of light. The focal length of the objective is too long. I had to hold an eyepiece behind the guide scope without even touching it to get an image in focus. There is no way to adjust the focus by extending the tube length. Sent it back.

This guidescope is a great bargain. The optics are good and the construction is all metal (including the adjustment screws). I've been very happy with the purchase.

Seems well constructed, but has two flaws:1) the adjustment knobs and scope ring did not allow for accurate alignment with my main scope. I was unable to get the guide scope aligned to be able to use it as a finder scope. The guidescope was just pointing too far out of range to adjust it. I was at the maximum adjustment with the adjustment screws and still had a little bit further to go to get it centered.2) When an eyepiece or camera was inserted, I had to move the EP back almost all the way to achieve proper focus. It was barely hanging on. This could be fixed with an extension tube.. but why should i need one? Design flaw.The optics looked good. The construction and material look good.

The optics on this scope are good enough for auto guiding in PHD2 and polar alignment in SharpCap, which is all I need this scope to do. I use this with a QHY 5R-II-C, and the field of view is pretty small, but that is the fault of the camera, not the scope. This seems to be almost identical to the Orion 50mm Guide Scope. The only complaint I have is the lack of a focuser, but it is easy enough to focus without one. The mounting for this scope if pretty loose, but it is good enough to hold it in place, but I worry about differential flexture with this style on mount.

I wanted an a camera mounted auto guider for my skywatcher adventurer. For the price you can't beat it. I put a ZWO camera in it. Being my first experience putting all this together it was a little challenging without spending more money. I finally figured out the fine tuning since it doesn't really have a designated focus ring and the lack of instructions. Put the camera in as deep as you can go ( so you have a little focus needed in both directions) but still add that extra ring that comes with it for other adjustments. I focused on a distant mountain in the day to get a good start so you can see what you are doing. Then the front lens has a lot of threads to fine tune it. Then turn the other ring up snug to the front lens. Now you are in the ball park and can make any adjustments when it's dark out.

Awesome! Worth every penny! Gives me something to do in my spare time now that I have retired!