1-2-2003
AR6 LXD55 6" refractor review
By George Papachristou

I received my LXD55 6" refractor at the end of November.
I was so thrilled at taking it home removing it from the 2 boxes it arrived in(one box for the tripod assembly &
one for the OTA).
Assembly was fairly straightforward thanks mostly to the well documented
manual. It took roughly 30 minutes to assemble and is quite imposing to look at.
It's larger than it seems in pictures. I found the tripod adequate for my needs as a casual observer.

The equatorial mount will take some getting used to since I'm used to Alt-azumith mounts.
Upon further inspection I discovered some minor problems.
The dew shield had a hairline crack in it.
And the rear of the objective lens had one of the foil spacers out towards the middle of the lens; not at the edge where it belongs.
I also noticed what appeared to be foggy streaks on the secondary lens. Even though everything seemed clear and sharp when viewing.
I found the foil spacer issue disturbing. I checked the box it came in and found the protective styrofoam
for the front of the OTA was cracked in half. This leads me to believe this OTA took some serious
abuse during transit.
On the plus side Meade has offered to either repair or replace the OTA
entirely at their expense including shipment back to them. So far customer support has been
tremendous.
Whether or not these problems are quality control issues or shipping problems remains to be resolved.
I still feel that this scope is quite a bargain. I believe Meade will resolve the issues with my OTA to my satisfaction and I'll be able to spend many summer evenings enjoying the night sky.
All in all I think you're getting a lot of bang for the buck with this beautiful telescope!.

George Papachristou