$Askar SQA106 Quintuplet Refractor — image 1$

Askar

Askar SQA106 Quintuplet Refractor

A fast 106mm f/4.8 flat-field quintuplet that pairs a larger aperture with short exposures, a productive full-frame astrograph for imagers who want speed and a wider field than the longer PHQ tubes.

89/ 100

Polaris Score

#2 of 6 fast imaging astrograph

See the breakdown ↓

Aperture

106mm

Focal Length

510mm

Focal Ratio

f/4.8

Mount Type

None (OTA only)

Optical Design

Quintuplet Astrograph

Weight

5 kg

From$3,395

Lowest in 90 days

Price tracked by PolarisObserved 7 timesTracking since Aug 2026

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Where to buy

Agena AstroProductsPartnerBest price$3,395→Starizona$3,395→High Point Scientific$3,395→

Verified 2h ago · prices tracked daily

What it's built forOpen these in the simulator →

This telescope was built for the camera.

A fast f/4.8 astrograph designed to throw a wide, flat, well-corrected field onto a sensor. It is an optical tube first — give it a tracking mount and a camera and it rewards long exposures, not eyepieces.

f/4.8 — built to imageNeeds a tracking mount

The view people remember

The Dumbbell, an hourglass of gas.

The brightest planetary nebula in the sky — a fat, glowing apple-core shape that takes magnification well and only gets richer with aperture.

See The Dumbbell through this telescope →

Where else it shines

Within reach

Orion Nebula

Colorful nebula captured with live stacking — wings and filaments

Open view →

Rewards a dark sky

Andromeda Galaxy

Long-exposure capture revealing galaxy core and outer structure

Open view →

Easy first target

The Pleiades

Field rich with stars — long exposure pulls in fainter members

Open view →

Also excellent on

Saturn

Processed planetary capture with rings or bands clearly visible

Open view →

✦

There is no eyepiece experience here. Its reward shows up on a sensor, after the exposure — not in the moment.

01What it's good at

What it's best at — and the trade-offs.

Best at

✓The five-element design delivers pinpoint stars across a full-frame sensor with the flattener built in

✓At f/4.8 it gathers light fast, cutting exposure times and revealing faint nebulosity quickly

✓106mm at 510mm frames large nebulae and galaxy fields with generous aperture

✓A heavy-duty focuser and rotator make back-focus and framing precise and repeatable

Trade-offs

!Fast f/4.8 optics are demanding on tilt, spacing and focus accuracy

!At 5kg it needs a capable tracking mount, not a small star tracker

!As an OTA it needs a mount, camera and guiding to work

!The large front optics can dew and benefit from a heater

02In plain English

What These Numbers Mean

Aperture

106 mm

Four inches of glass paired with a very fast optical system. That combination gathers enough light to build deep narrowband images in a single night rather than across a week.

Focal length

510 mm

Wide field with real aperture behind it. Large emission nebulae, the Andromeda Galaxy and sprawling star fields all frame well, and mosaics become optional rather than necessary.

Focal ratio

f/4.8

Very fast for a refractor. Signal accumulates roughly two and a half times quicker than at f/7.5, which is the whole point of the design. In exchange, focus, sensor tilt and back-focus spacing all become unforgiving.

Optical design

Super quintuplet astrograph

Five elements correct colour and flatten the field simultaneously at a very fast ratio, which is a difficult thing to do well. There is no flattener to buy and no spacing to calculate, and full-frame corners stay clean.

Weight

5 kg tube

Around 11 lb, light for its aperture. A mid-size strain-wave or equatorial mount carries it with margin, so the whole rig stays transportable.

Mount

OTA only

You supply the mount. The short focal length keeps guiding demands modest, so the mount does not need to be as capable as the aperture might suggest.

02The Polaris Score

How it scores, and why.

89/ 100

Askar SQA106 Quintuplet Refractor

#2 of 6 fast imaging astrograph

Performance

Ease of use

Portability

Upgrade potential

Polaris weighs optical capability, how easy the scope is to live with, how portable it is, and how far it takes you before you outgrow it — not list price or brand.

03Who it's for