Another Cassegrain variety, the Maksutov Cassegrain
telescope shares the advantage of being able to look into one end of the telescope
to see out the other end of the telescope. These use a thick spherical
corrector lens within the primary mirror's radius of curvature. A small spot
at the center of this lens, facing the primary mirror is silvered or aluminized
to reflect the image back through the hole in the primary mirror.
This secondary mirror is significanly smaller than the
convex mirror sported by the Schmidt Cassegrain telescope, making the Maksutov
brighter than the Schmidt, and giving it better resolution as well.
These telescopes are heavier than the Schmidt Cassegrains are, because of the
heavier corrector lens, but they have the shortest tube length of all telescope
designs. Pictured in the background of this page, is a Maksutov Cassegrain
type telescope.