There is no single answer to this question.
The Cassegrain has a paraboloidal shaped main mirror.
The Ritchey-Chrétian has a hyperboloidal main mirror.
I have a Schmidt-Cassegrain which has a spherical main mirror.
Dall-Kirkham telescopes have an ellipsoidal main mirror.
The secondary mirror can have different shapes as well but I won;t get into hose. That's a separate issue.
Not necessarily. Refracting telescopes can be large, but reflecting telescopes can also be quite large and often have larger apertures due to their design. The size of a telescope depends on its purpose and design specifications rather than whether it is refracting or reflecting.
the reflecting telescope was!!
"Optical", in this case, simply means that they work with light.
Most modern telescopes are reflecting telescopes because reflecting telescopes are generally more cost-effective and easier to build at larger sizes compared to refracting telescopes. Reflecting telescopes also suffer less from chromatic aberration and can have a simpler design with fewer optical elements.
Isaac Newton improved the first refracting telescope by designing a reflecting telescope, known as the Newtonian telescope. He replaced the eyepiece of the refracting telescope with a curved mirror to eliminate chromatic aberration, resulting in a sharper image with less distortion. This design laid the foundation for future advancements in telescope technology.
A reflecting telescope uses mirrors while refracting telescopes uses lens. The refracting telescope also had chromatic aberration and bad resolution while the reflecting telescope had none of these.
A refracting telescope is a type of telescope that has a large thin lense at the front and a smaller thicker lense at the end where the eyepiece is. Refracting telescopes use lenses unlike reflecting telescopes that use mirrors to reflect the light. This is a good image of a refracting and reflecting telescope: [See related link]
A reflecting telescope is different from a refracting telescope because a reflecting telescope uses a concave lens, a plane mirror, and a convex lens. While a refracting telescope uses two lens.
Not necessarily. Refracting telescopes can be large, but reflecting telescopes can also be quite large and often have larger apertures due to their design. The size of a telescope depends on its purpose and design specifications rather than whether it is refracting or reflecting.
no
"To build a large refracting telescope would require very strong supports to hold large enough lenses. These supports would tend to block out important light. So the refracting telescope is limited in its use. Today most large telescopes are reflecting telescopes." ~ BYU Home Study Astronomy course
A reflecting telescope uses mirrors while refracting telescopes uses lens. The refracting telescope also had chromatic aberration and bad resolution while the reflecting telescope had none of these.
the reflecting telescope was!!
Refracting
"Optical", in this case, simply means that they work with light.
Size... a reflecting telescope with the same power as a refracting telescope is much shorter. This is because, in the reflecting telescope, the incoming light is bounced off mirrors (often more than once) which means the physical length is much shorter than an equivalent refracting model.
The image in a refracting telescope appears bigger by the magnification factor provided by the telescope's eyepiece. This is typically around 50-100 times for most amateur telescopes.