Zhumell Z114 Portable Altazimuth Reflector Telescope

Seems like a good quality telescope. I purchased this for my niece after a tripod mounted scope from a different company proved to be too hard for her to handle.The build quality was excellent and it was fairly well collimated out of the box, but the three locking screws for the primary mirror were barely screwed in and could have easily fallen out I think.I also purchased her an 8-24mm Celestron Zoom and a Celestron X-Cel LX 3x Barlow to use instead of the included eyepieces.Aligning the red dot finder was easy and she loved how the dot hovers in place no matter the angle you look through it. The finder was much higher quality than the other similar priced scope that we replaced.After balancing the scope with the upgraded eyepieces we found some trees over a hundred yards away to use to align the finder we literally were able to count seeds on a seed pod and observe insects crawling on the branches.Later that night we got awesome views of the moon, zooming in about 170x with the upgraded eyepieces. The scope was very easy for her to handle (she is 8) while set up on a patio table. She absolutely loved it and I was frankly a little jealous.I would strongly recommend the eyepieces I purchased as well, but you would get roughly the same range of magnification with the included eyepieces and a Barlow or two. I just wanted her to have the flexibility and ease of use that comes with a zoom.People shouldn’t overly obsess about maximum zooms. The difference between the 24mm and 8mm is only about a 3x increase.Going between 8mm and 4mm is only a 2x increase, so there is clearly diminishing returns the smaller you make the focal length in the eyepiece, and you often do so at a substantial increase in difficulty to use the eyepiece.Wide fields of view and plenty of eye relief are much more important than focal length when shopping for eyepieces.

Pretty nice for the cost. Right out of the box I was able to see the rings of Saturn and some nebulae. I have been using it for about a month and have not had to adjust the lens. I had zero expectations for the lazer and it actually functions very well and makes finding things very easy. The packaging seemed very secure. Perfect for an entry level affordable unit, i look forward to buying one of their premium models.

I bought this Like New, and boy was it not. One of the lenses was still attached to the telescope, its box was just thrown into the box with the scope. Various pieces were just thrown in the box. The screw that holds the telescope to its stand was just thrown in there, so the telescope was scraping up against the stand the whole time between when it was returned and when it was shipped to me. There may also be a piece missing bc there was a box I haven’t identified that was empty and just thrown in with the rest. Mind blowing to me that this was sold for $200 in such a condition.

This is a great telescope for my kids. I got this scope to teach my 5-year-old about astronomy and this scope has exceeded my expectations. At first glance, it is a small aperture, but includes a very nice red dot finder scope and an alt-azimuth "Dobsonian" style mount. This is great for my kids as we will mostly be looking at bright objects in the sky and won't need the aperture for distant objects or the full field correction for doing astro-photography.As for the quality, the mount and telescope are well constructed and the primary mirror was perfectly collimated upon arrival and required no adjustment to get up and going. One of the screws for the elevation stage had fallen out during shipment, but it was very easy to put it back and holds well. The kit includes two eyepieces, one for wide-field viewing (17mm) and a short focal length (10mm) for distance viewing. The wide-field looks to be of great quality and I plan to use that as the main power-house... the short eyepieces in kits like these will work for distance viewing, but they have a very narrow field, and are uncomfortable to use in my opinion, that said, the optical quality of the one included in this kit was pretty impressive, I was able to clearly see the rings of Saturn and it's brightest moon, Titan.It also has a modular lens cap that is able to stop down your entrance aperture for viewing very bright objects like the moon and Venus. i find this feature very nice, as the full aperture tended to be a little too bright for the moon in my opinion.Overall I'm very happy with this purchase and would happily recommend this scope for anyone looking to get into astronomy or as an educational gift for a child.If you're a discerning amateur astronomer, stay tuned, as I am planning to get this mounted on my tracker and use it for some photography with my DSLR in a few weeks, I'll post some pictures when I get them.

I researched and read many articles, spent a lot of time trying to figure out what would be the best beginner telescope and decided to go with the Zhumell Z114. it's very easy to use and has many features. My 10-year-old son has quickly learned how to use it. Although we're new at this, we have been able to find almost all planets. Just a few days ago we were able to find Uranus. For the price we paid, ease of use and The quality of the unit, so far it it seems to be better than what we would have expected. Again this is the first telescope I have ever owned or used. I uploaded a picture of Uranus which is the second furthest planet from Earth. It is not perfect but we were able to find it and with the right eye pieces I'm sure we'll get it focused in a lot better. Do your research, compare, and make sure you consider this telescope I hope I have helped.