The Meade Lawsuit
Comments(13)
Meade (and 14 distributors) are being sued. The law suit contends the Meade scopes are not Ritchey-Chretien telescopes incorporating Ritchey-Chretien optics and the distributors are advertising the same.
Near as I can figure out from the suit, Star-instruments and RC Optical are claiming Meade scopes do not use Ritchey-Chretien optics and therefore are interfering with their niche market and have thereby been injured.
In a statement on their website:
An attorney for the Plaintiffs, Russell K. Statman, stated: “Amateur astronomy enthusiasts have a right to know what type of telescope they are being offered. They have a right to know the integrity of the images displayed by their telescopes. We just want them to be told the truth.â€
This one will be worth watching, personally I’d love to own either scope. If Meade is guilty then they should pay, but after reading Mr. Statman’s statement I am reminded of an old saying: when somebody says it isn’t the money it’s the principle, it’s the money.
It also kind of seems wrong that Star Instruments to have a page up claiming to enlighten us of the “factsâ€. I would point out, they “may be†the “facts†or they “may be†the “facts†as they want us to know them. I don’t think anything has been ruled on at this point — They kind of have the cart out in front of the horse a little.
Here’s another link to the Star Instruments law suit page.
The Proposed Settlement Agreement to Dealers (PDF) 18 K
Amended Complaint (PDF) 139 K
A hat tip to Richard Henry for this – thanks!
As near as i can tell, the Meede isn’t a Ritchey-Chretien design, but is inovative, with many Ritchey-Chretien features.
What i want is a Newtonian reflector where the secondary does not cast a shadow on the primary. Sometimes called a Schiefspiegler, sometimes called an offset Newtonian – it appears these names are wrong. Let’s say you want a 6 inch scope with a three inch offset (the center of focus is 9 inches from the center of the primary mirror). First grind an 18 inch mirror. Then, cut a 6 inch circular mirror from an edge. There’s no need for a secondary mirror. Just put an eyepiece at the offset focus area. You get: no chromatic aberation, no astigmatism, no diffraction spikes, brighter than Newtonian images (no loss at the secondary) but normal Newtonian coma. Coma can be reduced by using a longer focal length or corrected with a comma corrector.
There are commercial telescopes of this design, though they tend to sport a secondary mirror anyway.
The HST is supposed to be a Ritchey-Chretien design. Spherical abberatin is not part of the design.
You don’t have to take Star instruments word for it, there are various resources online that describe the RC design. The key features are that both the primary and the secondary are hyperbolic and there are *no* refractive elements. Meade’s RCX has a corrector plate (refractive) and the primary is parabolic (like any other SCT). It’s very expensive to figure a hyperbolic mirror, which is why real RC’s cost so much.
I’m a “wanna be” where having a telescope is concerned and would appreciate anyones help in figuring out which would be the best for a beginner like myself. I have to use a wheel chair and am handicaped as to how much weight I can handle. I’ve always wanted a telescope and have looked at catalogs and etc. but it’s rather confusing to someone who doesn’t have a clue about the whole thing. Any one got suggestions?? Would be appreciated. Tina
Don’t get me wrong, as I said in post if it is true then Meade should pay, simple as that, but the matter hasn’t been adjudicated yet and Star Instruments is getting ahead of themselves. They do make some excellent scopes sure enough.
Now for a scope for someone in a wheel chair..it does seem that weight is going to be the issue, but there are quite a few choices, Meade ETX series (only because I have one and it is light with great optics), Celestron and Orion scopes would be worth looking into.
I’ll edit this with the links in a bit, if I have power.
It’s going to be very interesting to see how this comes our. My view of the commercial astronomy community is that it is not uncommon to see instances where someone has played fast and loose with classic optics definitions and Meade has just taken a little poetic license here. In this case Meade is offering an R-C or R-C like scope at a significant cost reduction and it has hurt the plaintiff’s market so they must take some action. I agree that a true R-C has two hyperbolic surfaces and no lens but there is a t least one precedent for Meade’s claim. ESA claims R-C status for their OGS scope (http://www.iac.es/telescopes/ogs/OGSE.html)with a spherical secondary and focal reducer(lens) which must provide some wavefront correction probably like meades front corrector lens.
Just learned of this lawsuit from my Meade Dealer, who is a named defendant. I should disclose I have a business relationship with him and occasionally benefit from the sale of Meade products. Personally, I prefer Celestron….
While the RCX line has clearly improved optics over earlier Meade products and on the whole is very innovative, given my experience with Meade product reliability and lousey service, all the electronic gizmos scare the hell out of me.
As a retired attorney, I think that the plaintiffs are going to have a tough time with their case. As has been mentioned the definition of a RC is a little fuzzy and Meade doesn’t claim they are selling an RC, but an “Advanced RC.” It’s not like there’s a National Bureau of Telescope Design writing legally binding design standrds. Just look at all the refractors that claim to be aprochromatic when they really aren’t.
To sell to their market Meade couldn’t price these things in the $20-40K range, so they came up with a way to get good optical performance by merging Schmidt and RC technologies. This is the “advance” they claim. Now I’d hate to bet a half million dollars in legal fees that I can convince a jury that Meade has falsely characterized their technology as an improvement on the RC design. Americans usually equate cheaper with better. And I can see the jurors’ eyes glaze over now as the plaintiffs march their optical experts to the stand.
Scientists and technicians can be a bit arrogant and juries will pick up on this and punish litigants who come across as petty. I’m an avid amateur, but the scopes made by Star-instruments and RC Optical are well beyond my means and the means of all but a few very well healed amateurs, institutions and professionals. Meade is playing to a different market and I can’t imagine that they are stealing any customers from Star and RCO. I mean, would an insurance underwriter who stumbles into a Meade dealer’s shop and drops $6K on a 10″ RCX 400 even be aware of Star or RCO? Hell, this customer didn’t even know he’d need a few more eyepieces to get full use from his scope.
If Star and RCO are coming into court with the attitude that the hoi polli shouldn’t have access to these “RC” scopes because only their elite customers should have such bragging rights, their case is doomed.
The case is very simple. Is the optical design featured in the telescopes an RC or not.
If the design does not consist of hyperbolic primary and secondary mirrors it is clearly not an RC telescope.
Having looked at one at a local store, It is basically a SC with a hyperbolic secondary. I’d call it an Advanced Schmidt-Cassegrain personally.
And for Tina -
I work with the Girl Scouts and one of my scouts is in a wheelchair.
She has no problem using my Celestron C-5 telescope. It is fairly light, and because of the design it is easy for her to reach the controls.
My best advice is to check for a local astronomy club and find out when they meet and arrange to go observing with them. They will have an assortment of telescopes and you will be able to see what works well for you.
I personally think the lawsuit is silly. What if a RC has a Coude focus or a field flattener? Does that mean you can’t call it an RC? Just as there are “classical” Cassegrains, and Schmidt-Cassegrains, Meade can call theirs a Meade-RC and the plaintiffs can call theirs a classical RC.
It’s my opinion that a telescope should be treated like a “black box.” If an optical designer could not tell the “black box” apart from a known design, by examination of its optical properties only, then I see no reason why shouldn’t be called an RC or whatever it is optically equivalent to.
I have heard nothing about this lately, anybody know what is going on with it?
I found the following on Yahoo dated March 29th:
RVINE, Calif.–(BUSINESS WIRE)–Meade Instruments Corp. (Nasdaq:MEAD – News) today announced that a U.S. federal court has dismissed without leave to amend the majority of the eleven claims filed by Star Instruments and RC Optical Systems against the Company and its dealers.
Thanks Ron!
A Ritchie-Chretien is a two hiperbolic mirrors Telescope and thats all about it.
From what I’ve read, the judge did not dismiss all of the claims. He did ask for additional comments from both plaintifs and defendants on the remaining claims. We probably should have heard something by now.
Are the new Meade scopes Ritchey-Chretien? I personally don’t think so, but it is interesting that no one seems to have filed suit against Takahashi for marketing a Baker-Ritchey-Chretien which has two elements of refractive optics.