Cheap Vs Expensive

[Moonshane]

I generally use mid priced to expensive eyepieces in my three scopes that range from a 6" f11 dob (1/6 PV optics), to a 12" f4 dob (unknown optics) to a 16" f4 dob (1/8 PV optics); all of them are Orion Optics UK. I'd generally use the last two with a paracorr.

At my school we have a 8" f6 Skywatcher dob and I bought a Meade 15mm Plossl and a generic 2x barlow for use with the standard 10mm and 25mm offering.

I have meant for a long time to compare these very cheap eyepieces with my own more expensive eyepieces and as I brought them home this weekend for a clean (we are due to start Space Club again in the new half term) I had a chance to do so.

The first test last night was on a waxing gibbous moon using my 6" f11 scope. No big test I hear you cry but the results are quite interesting. My comments are quite subjective as I have made observations based upon my views through the eyepieces and not conducted any tests which could be considered scientifically measurable. I used a Baader Neodymium Filter throughout the evening.

25mm Freebie vs 32mm TV Plossl

Unfortunately I don't have a 25mm Plossl to compare it with so the 32mm was the nearest comparable. Both eyepieces showed the full lunar disc (or that part on show at least).

The 25mm ('free') was actually quite disappointing. I had always read that the 25mm that comes with scopes is the better of the two eyepieces and I did not find this to be the case. There was CA visible on the limb and even worse around the craters the images were softened as a result of the same aberration. There was a fair bit of internal scatter too. The view was bearable but disappointing.

By contrast the 32mm TV Plossl (usually cost around £60-70 used) was crisp and clean with very sharp detail and high contrast levels. Eye relief was much better too (in fact I find the 32mm TVP has a little too much eye relief making the positioning tricky the first time you use it.

Even at f11 the difference in quality between these two eyepieces was pronounced.

15mm Meade vs 15mm TV Plossl

I can honestly say that there was virtually no difference between these two eyepieces at this focal ratio. Detail was just as sharp and bright in the Meade (£15 used) and the TVP (around £50 used). The contrast was slightly better on the TVP but there was not much in it. The results in a faster scope will be interesting.

12.5mm BGO vs Barlowed 25mm

As expected given the comments above the differences were marked. There was no comparison between the two set ups with the BGO (if you can get one about £60 used) a clear winner in every way.

10mm Freebie vs 10mm Radian

I had expected this to be a walk over as the 10mm freebie has a bad reputation. Giving 160x it actually gave better views with less CA than the 25mm. Craters were pretty sharp and the view with decent contrast. The Radian (around £100 used) did in fairness produce the sharper, more detailed views but there was not as much in it as expected. The additional field and adjustable eye relief made it a much more comfortable experience.

5mm Skywatcher Cheapie vs Nagler zoom set at 5mm

This was no competition, the image in the SW 5mm (£20 used maybe??) was much dimmer with many internal reflections and difficult eye placement. The Nagler zoom (around £200 used) was and flippin' well ought to be a massive improvement with good detail at this magnification (320x) and even beyond intermittently.

The differences between the eyepieces used were not as massive as I expected but at f11 it's perhaps no surprise. I'll continue this thread when I next get out with my 16" f4 dob (albeit with Paracorr) to see what the results yield. Eventually I'll also do the same with my native 12" f4 with no Paracorr.

I hope this is interesting to other forum members and it confirms that if you get the best quality you do have to spend a lot of money but that the differences in a slow scope are quite slight on a very challenging subject.

[Spec-Chum]

Nice review Shane, I suspect your F4 review will start with "oh dear..."

[nightfisher]

Funny enough i dug out my 20mm revelation plossl last night, i used to have the full set but went more onto ortho`s, this ep gave very nice lunar views and they are not pricey to buy, a definate step up from the standard freebie ep`s but can be picked up for under £20 used.

Good comparison Shane

[Black Knight]

Very interesting. I confess I don't really know much about eyepieces at all, but I shall be following this with interest!

[Damo636]

Nice report Shane. I remember comparing a 25mm Televue plossl with a 26mm Meade 4000 (Japan marked) & couldn't tell the difference, so your 15mm comparison comes as no surprise. I am surprised with your findings with the 10mm supplied ep though. The example I had with my 8" dob was woeful!

[E621Keith]

Nice report. It does go to show one can save a lot of money by choosing a slow scope for visual.

[Moonshane]

Nice report Shane. I remember comparing a 25mm Televue plossl with a 26mm Meade 4000 (Japan marked) & couldn't tell the difference, so your 15mm comparison comes as no surprise. I am surprised with your findings with the 10mm supplied ep though. The example I had with my 8" dob was woeful!

I have just checked again and the 10mm is really not that bad. it shows all the same detail as the Radian which is slightly sharper, more contrasty and comfortable BUT the same detail is there. looked into Aristarchus and the wall pattern was pretty much the same in both. will be interesting to see what a drop in focal ratio does to the views. might also do some observing of star fields then too.

[crazyjedi]

Great report -

I have a fairly fast Newt and so have stuck to relatively expensive EP's. My only comparisons have been my SW cheapy 10mm plossl and 12mm TV Radian a no contest win for the Rad (my 10mm SW is particularly bad), and my 25mm cheapy SW plossl and my ES 68 degree EP. the 25mm SW plossl was far better than the SW 10mm but against the ES 24mm it was not as sharp or crisp and suffered a little CA too. So again an easy win for the pricier ES EP.

I will be watching this thread with much interest!

[Moonshane]

don't get me wrong, I have no intention of selling my TV's! I just wanted to encourage people that cannot afford to buy top end eyepieces that the differences at slow focal ratios are slight. personally I feel it's worth paying for but it's not totally necessary.

I think that I have dropped lucky with the 10mm I have but I'll reserve judgment for the faster newts.

[Ags]

I found the views with my 25mm freebie were very good in my f13. Scope, comparable to my 24mm hyperion but with a narrower field. In my f5 refractor, the 25mm plossl provides vastly better views than the hyperion.

[ollypenrice]

Good review. I generally go to our local town in my Fiat Panda. Thanks to a very generous and likeable guest I went to the same town this year in a Porsche Cayman S and drove it back. Assuming you don't want to get arrested the difference between the two cars is remarkably slight. (At 50 km/hr the Panda is actually slightly faster than the Cayman S travelling at 49 km/hr.) At Silverstone I would rather circulate in the Cayman S. By a long, long way.

Where am I going with this nonsense? Well, when I travel by night in the Universe it is not, in fact, all that expensive to travel in the optical equivalent of the Cayman S and the journey is more interesting than the trip to our local town. Does that make any sense to anyone but me?

Olly

[Moonshane]

Put it this way Olly, I have a 13mm Ethos and a 26mm Nagler and have no intention of selling them! So yes, I get your drift

[ollypenrice]

Put it this way Olly, I have a 13mm Ethos and a 26mm Nagler and have no intention of selling them! So yes, I get your drift

Ah, the 13 Ethos... The greatest EP of all time? But I've just bought a pair of Leica bins. I can't, I can't...

Olly

[kirkster501]

I just posted almost the same findings!! That's an amazing coincidence!

[John]

Interesting and very worthwhile report Shane.

The differences between expensive and low cost eyepieces are often subtle at best. Still desirable though and this is my only serious hobby

Not essential though by any means ...... I enjoyed low cost eyepieces for years before I could afford anything else.

[Spec-Chum]

Feel free to send me your TVs Shane, and I'll compare them to my BST and sterling for you lol

[Bart]

Good review. I generally go to our local town in my Fiat Panda. Thanks to a very generous and likeable guest I went to the same town this year in a Porsche Cayman S and drove it back. Assuming you don't want to get arrested the difference between the two cars is remarkably slight. (At 50 km/hr the Panda is actually slightly faster than the Cayman S travelling at 49 km/hr.) At Silverstone I would rather circulate in the Cayman S. By a long, long way.

Where am I going with this nonsense? Well, when I travel by night in the Universe it is not, in fact, all that expensive to travel in the optical equivalent of the Cayman S and the journey is more interesting than the trip to our local town. Does that make any sense to anyone but me?

Olly

Olly,

I'm thinking of ranking this alongside Cantona's seagulls one, if that's ok with you

Barry

[swamp thing]

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Nice report. It does go to show one can save a lot of money by choosing a slow scope for visual.

Does it work that way in reality though?

Whilst slow scopes do indeed offer cheaper eyepiece options they tend to be more costly to mount, or buy initially.

Shanes 6" f/11 is a bit of a rarity as far as focal ratio and aperture goes. An 8" f/11 would start to become pretty long and a 10" f/11 would be nothing short of enormous. Anything more than a dob mounting would be not only prohibitively expensive, but would need an observatory if we're being realistic. We could go for a folded optical system at these focal lengths but then our initial purchase price goes skywards.

IMO it seems we either bite the bullet and go with a SCT and cheaper eyepieces or we get the fast newt, with expensive ones, either way our wallet is in for a pounding

I'm not sure there is a cheap way. Specially when you see quite a few SCT owners with Naglers and Ethoi in their eyepiece cases.

Do they need such expensive glassware.......probably not, but its not always a need thing is it?

[Mark at Beaufort]

I have a full range of Ethos and Nagler EPs to use in my fast 10" and 6" Newts. However, I was surprised earlier in the year when I bought some binoviewers which came with a pair of 25mm Antares plossls. The view in my 4" APO frac was incredible so I tried them in my f4.7 Dob. I was surprised that stars appeared sharp across the whole FOV albeit slightly dimmer.

I decided I needed a pair of higher mag EPs so I bought some 15mm and 9mm Skywatcher Ultra Wide - link - http://www.green-witch.com/acatalog/Ultra_Wide_Range.html . Again the image was sharp so these have now become my observing tool for observing the Moon and Sun (white filter) in my 4" Frac with the binoviewers. Whether the prism has caused this improvement I don't know but the 15mm Skywatcher is a very good EP in my PST.

Before I am asked the Ethos and Naglers remain the EPs for DSO observing.

[ollypenrice]

Olly,

I'm thinking of ranking this alongside Cantona's seagulls one, if that's ok with you

Barry

Yes, it's a fair cop!!

Olly

[Ags]

Good review. I generally go to our local town in my Fiat Panda. Thanks to a very generous and likeable guest I went to the same town this year in a Porsche Cayman S and drove it back. Assuming you don't want to get arrested the difference between the two cars is remarkably slight. (At 50 km/hr the Panda is actually slightly faster than the Cayman S travelling at 49 km/hr.) At Silverstone I would rather circulate in the Cayman S. By a long, long way.

Where am I going with this nonsense? Well, when I travel by night in the Universe it is not, in fact, all that expensive to travel in the optical equivalent of the Cayman S and the journey is more interesting than the trip to our local town. Does that make any sense to anyone but me?

Olly

It's nice that there is always someone with an even more daft and expensive hobby than our own, so we can tell ourselves our outrageous expenditure is relatively modest :-)

[Stardust]

good review, nice that beginners can see they don't have to spend a fortune to get some good views. Even better that it's done by someone actually using the kit.

[Moonshane]

I think one of the main reasons I wanted to do this is to show that although I definitely prefer the 'luxury' of the expensive eyepieces (and will always keep them), the views offered by them is always likely to be only marginally better. Like many things in life, the top 5-10% of performance comes at a much higher cost than the bottom 95-90%. E.g. the difference between a fast sprinter and an olympic champion is fractions of a second but years of dedicated training.

[michael.h.f.wilkinson]

Great report, Shane. Some very good advice.

[crazyjedi]

don't get me wrong, I have no intention of selling my TV's! I just wanted to encourage people that cannot afford to buy top end eyepieces that the differences at slow focal ratios are slight. personally I feel it's worth paying for but it's not totally necessary.

I think that I have dropped lucky with the 10mm I have but I'll reserve judgment for the faster newts.

Agree mate you've done a bang up job so far - Those 10mm SW EP's are very variable in their quality. Mine was particularly bad but others have had better luck.

Keep up the good reviews!