EPs for new 9.25" Evolution

[kurtz9]

Just recently ordered a new 9.25" Evolution, which comes with 40mm and 13mm EPs of, presumably, not-great quality.

 
I've got a GSO 2" star diagonal as an upgrade for it (with 1.25" adapter)

I've got two other "cheap" celestron EPs left over from a 127EQ- a 4mm and a 20mm, plus a cheap 3x barlow from the same scope- I suspect these all suck though so probably wouldn't want to use any of em?


Viewing will be mostly at home (red light pollution) and 20-30 minutes away in yellow light pollution areas, and a few times a year trips to green or darker areas- mostly in central North Carolina (raleigh/durham area)


Initially looking to spend around 500ish USD for EPs plus or minus a hundred or two... I'm looking at 3 options right now- open to others though if there's some better choices.


Plan A:
Return 2" star diagonal, just use 1.25" one that comes with scope.... Buy the Baader Hyperion 8-24x Zoom plus matching 2.25x Barlow, plus celestron 6.3 focal reducer- Net cost with returning the 2"= About $450

Pros:
Would give me everything from 3.5mm up to 48mm by combining the zoom with either the barlow or the focal reducer.

Cons:
AFOV range is "only" 50-68 degrees depending on setting- though the FR apparently helps when in use.
Quality of lens not "quite" as good as expensive singles, especially toward the edges
It's "only" a 1.25"


Questions for this option-

A LOT of the reviews mention this FR really shines with the matching 2.25x barlow... but on the other hand I've seen many threads where people mention you're unlikely to need lower than 8mm (294x on this scope) other than on rare/outstanding viewing condition nights... so who is right?

Will I care about any of the listed cons given it's a goto/tracking scope where I'm presumably mostly looking center view anyway?

Will I really miss not being able to add something 2" later? (if so I could also keep the diagonal I suppose, just raises cost closer to $575 and doesn't seem to give me anything except potential to buy big/expensive EPs in the 28-40 range later to sub for the "cheap" 40 that comes with the scope)


Plan B: If I don't actually need anything higher mag than 8mm AND won't miss not having 2" options-
Buy the 8-24 zoom WITHOUT the barlow...AND return the 2" diagonal...add the 6.3 focal reducer- total cost about $300...


Pros:
I'd still be covered from 8mm to 48mm
The FR will still help with AFOV on the 1.25" EP
Cheapest option


Cons
Same as Plan A, plus-
Max magnification of 294x (though again some folks suggest not much higher is usable most of the time)

Second con could be rectified as the cost is so low it leaves me enough to buy a single high-quality high-magnification EP like the ES82 in 4.7 or 6.7 if that'd actually be usable... though if it is I wonder if that or the Barlow would be a better idea?

Plan C: For folks who don't like the barlow OR the focal reducer, but do like keeping 2" for low-power EPs-

I keep the diagonal, and get the 8-24 zoom and a 2" ES82 30mm... that runs around $630ish

Pros:

No swapping extra glass behind the EPs

Gives me a really wide 82 FOV low mag EP

Cons:

Back to the "lesser" 50-68 FOV from 8-24

Max mag is 294x

Quality of lens not "quite" as good as expensive singles, especially toward the edges

Plan D:
Just buy a couple of nice ES82 EPs and a 2x ES Focal Extender- The price difference to go from ES68s to ES82s is negligible, but the price to go to 100s is large so 82 seems the sweet spot for higher-end EPs- and ES in general seems the sweet spot for high-end EPs without televue prices. (open to alternatives though if somebody is suddenly rebranding Naglers for 1/4 the price or something and I haven't heard about it)

Cost here will depend on exactly which ones I buy.... (more on that below) but ranges from roughly 600-700 bucks total for two ES82s and the ES 2x focal extender

Pros:
Overall EP quality is a better (by a little or a lot depending who you seem to ask)
AFOV is significantly larger
Would actually have justification for keeping the 2" diagonal

Cons:
Much more limited range of magnifications
Highest cost


Relevant question- what's the max magnification/smallest EP that would actually be useful on most nights given the use/conditions/scope I described above? That'd help me figure out which 2 expensive EPs to get and if a 2x barlow would be relevant or not...

Possible combos from the ES82 range based on that answer-(again open to other suggestions)

30mm 2" and 18mm 2" plus 2" 2x ES Barlow- Gives me 30, 18, 15, and 9mm effectively all in 82 AFOV... max mag is "only" 261x... this is the most expensive option, and the lowest max magnification at around $710 with barlow

30mm 2" and 14mm 1.25" plus 2" 2x ES Barlow-- Gives me 30, 15, 14, and 7, all in 82 AFOV... max mag is 336x... cost goes down to about $645, but size spread really only gives me 3 EPs instead of 4 in the first example.... optionally for about the same price I could skip the barlow and instead get a third EP- ES82 in 8.8 or 6.7 depending if 6.7 is actually useful or not (max mag would be 267 or 351 there)

30mm 2" and 11mm 1.25" plus 2" 2x ES Barlow-- Gives me 30, 15, 11, and 5.5, all in 82 AFOV... max mag is 427x... cost remains $645, size spread is better, but unsure if 5.5 is realistic to expect to use much or ever.

24mm 2" and 8.8mm 1.25" plus 2" 2x ES Barlow-- Gives me 24, 12, 8.8, and 4.4... all in 82 AFOV... max mag is 534x just shy of Celestrons speced 555x max effective for the scope... cost drops to $615... don't know that I'm losing much going from the 30 to the 24 or not, but even more dubious of the 4.4 being useful at all



Anyway, thanks to anybody who actually read all that- and extra thanks in advance for anybody who actually has answers/input on all of the above 

[Tonynexevo925]

A lot of questions and I'm not experienced enough to offer guidance - however, I went with the Baader zoom and Barlow plus 2" clicklock as well as the .63 reducer to give all the options you refer to in plan A!? Happy with my decision.

Also went down the Baader Hyperion set and 36mm aspheric to use the 2" and possible use with astroimaging.

I'm sure the radian 10mm is probably the "best" single EP (2nd hand from a member) and is really clear but on the c9.25 I find the Baader to be excellent. I can't comment on whether others would be better but suspect better EPs come into their own on faster scopes.

Hope that is of some help. Enjoy regardless of which EP - even the views with the standard supplied EP and diagonal were stunning to me

Regards,

Tony

[kurtz9]

A lot of questions and I'm not experienced enough to offer guidance - however, I went with the Baader zoom and Barlow plus 2" clicklock as well as the .63 reducer to give all the options you refer to in plan A!? Happy with my decision.

Also went down the Baader Hyperion set and 36mm aspheric to use the 2" and possible use with astroimaging.

I'm sure the radian 10mm is probably the "best" single EP (2nd hand from a member) and is really clear but on the c9.25 I find the Baader to be excellent. I can't comment on whether others would be better but suspect better EPs come into their own on faster scopes.

Hope that is of some help. Enjoy regardless of which EP - even the views with the standard supplied EP and diagonal were stunning to me

Regards,

Tony

Tony,

Thanks for the reply- I especially appreciate that you're someone with the same scope and able to comment on the Zoom EP option working well...

I was curious if you could comment a bit more on the magnifications you find yourself getting good use out of, especially with the barlow or focal reducer involved?

The biggest question there is I wasn't sure how useful the barlow would be since I wasn't sure how much going under 8mm is useful on the 9.25?

Also curious about your use/experience with the focal reducer especially since there's some overlap for mag/FOV...  for example in theory setting the EP to 16mm by itself, or setting it to 8mm with the FR, both give you 16mm, but presumably better AFOV with the FR?

Oh- one other major question since you actually have direct experience to answer-

The diagonal.... did you notice any significant improvement between the one that came with the scope and the 2" baader diagonal?

[Tonynexevo925]

Ha ha

Here's a duplicate reply to your post. I thought the original had somehow vanished.

You'll see I commented on usefulness of high mag. 8mm with Barlow sometimes struggle but comes into its own with my tv85. I got the Barlow because as a package the price was little more than without it!

I'd get the zoom and Barlow and see how you go from there. It'll answer many of the questions on useful mag etc.

The focal reducer is purely for imaging and tbh I haven't used it yet for anything as weather and time have been against me.

Definitely noticed the difference with the Baader diagonal and Hyperion EPs.

Hi,

The stock EPs and diagonal offer great views though limited options wise.

I actually went with your plan A fully - very happy with result and the Baader zoom is a useful piece of kit to carry away from home base.

I also have the Baader Hyperion 36mm aspheric and the Hyperion set 5mm to 24mm. I do believe with the 2"Baader clicklock and diagonal the viewing is significantly better.

I have a radian 10mm which is also very sharp but my understanding is that for a slow scope like our 9.25 it isn't as advantageous to venture into super expensive EP territory. Unless you have the cash or have tried and tested imo.

I spend a lot of time viewing with the 36mm and the 5mm can be tricky tbh. The 8and 10mm are great on the moon and the zoom I find yo be a real pleasure and very convenient to use.

Welcome, hope that helps you.

I would use some of the available tools to see what effect various EPs, barlows etc will have.

Regards,

Tony

[Highburymark]

Only have the six inch Evolution, but I found replacing the diagonal made a big difference - stock celestron diagonal a weak spot in the package. Getting better eyepieces is really important too, but the diagonal becomes intrinsic part of the telescope. Anyway, enjoy kitting yourself out - you have a fantastic telescope.

[YKSE]

Good advices from above. Just some general comments:

1. barlow needed or not. If you're using with 6.3 focal reducer, then the scopes becomes f6.3, the barlow will be very useful. But in native f10, it will not be needed 99% cases.

2. I'm for the 2" alternative, since 6.3 focal reducer will be only useful in Celestrion's SCT, while a good 2" eyepiece can be used in other scopes in case you find that you need one later on.

3. Just to throwing in some confusion  , 30mm 82deg ES is an excellent eyepiece, but, SCT has its inherent field curvature,  even if 9.25 SCT is the most flatest field none-edge SCTs, the curvature is still there, 82 deg eyepiece will show not as good edge sharpness as, say 68 degree ES eyepieces, simply because it shows more curved edges, if you're very keen on sharp edges so to speak.

[kurtz9]

Ok, so I have a quick update... the scope actually arrived yesterday- but of course that meant it was completely overcast and you couldn't see a single thing in the sky.

So tonight I finally got to try it out.... just the scope with the 2 EPs it comes with (40mm and 13mm) plus the stuff I assume to be fairly junky that came withe Celestron 127EQ I got for 50 bucks (a 4mm, a 20mm, and a plastic 3x barlow)

Sky was only mildly overcast, but otherwise conditions were about as awful as I ever expect em to be... warm, humid, only about 9-10pm so barely even fully dark...and just observing out my back door, which is in a red light-pollution neighborhood with other houses right next to each other and a tree or two to make it worse.

Given all that I was pretty happy with results... alignment was pretty easy, though the red dot that comes with the scope is...not awesome.

Anyway, started out with the 40mm- jupiter and the 4 big moons looked pretty nice even at this low magnification... sadly Saturn was blocked by houses/trees and the moon wasn't up yet... not a ton of DSOs visible given the conditions and the blocked visibility, but got a nice look at the beehive cluster and a couple of double stars.

So then I decided to see what I could get out of higher magnifications...

Jupiter looked even better with the 13mm (181x) getting a nice view of the banding now... given I'd only really spent much time seeing it in a 90mm old-style C90 with a 7mm plossel I was pretty pleased...

And I was thinking- well, everybody keeps saying it's rare/great conditions when anything much under 10mm will be useful.... and I kept wondering if it was so... so I considered what I could do to find out.

I figured the 4mm was gonna be utterly useless at 588x.... but... I had that cheap 3x barlow and the cheap 20mm... if I combined em that'd give me 6.67.... 352x... surely that'd be terrible given the quality of the stuff, the poor conditions, and the high magnification, right?

Nope. Even with all that Jupiter looked pretty **** good. Very clear banding now, some nice color... it wasn't CRYSTAL clear, but it wasn't bad AT ALL.... I can only imagine what it'd have been like with a quality EP and/or barlow on there.

So then I though- heck, why NOT try the 4mm.... sure it's higher than even the on-paper max useful mag (588x versus the listed 555x) but worth a shot.

Ok... well... it was actually not entirely useless. Certainly losing some fine detail at that magnification, but it wasn't a fuzzy messy blob either.

I suspect an actual quality EP in the 500x range would've been interesting.

Only after I put everything away did it occur to me I could have tried the 13mm with the 3x, for a slightly more in-spec 543x and with a bit better base EP, so I may give that a shot tomorrow.... I also had started straight away with the 2" GSO diagonal, next time might try the 1.25 diag that came with it to see the difference since many folks report the stock one isn't that great

So anyway, long story short (too late!) it seems reports that magnification much past 200-250 is rarely useful have been greatly exaggerated.

May have more to report tomorrow if I get a chance, especially if I lug the thing to a spot where I can actually get it pointed at Saturn...

Otherwise I'm working on a plan where I might get to try out a decent range of nice EPs, so may have something on that in a week or two.

[Highburymark]

Kurtz, even with my small evo I get very sharp views at 250x on Jupiter and moon (through 6mm Delos EP) - but not much else. With darker skies and good seeing in your scope you should be able to see significantly more - all a case of trial and error as you get to know the telescope. Would be interested to read how you get on.

[John]

If your conditions are very good and the scope optics are in collimation then quite high powers can be used to great effect on thje right targets.

Whats interesting about Jupiter though is that the nature of the finer disk details is that they are low contrast targets. The high contrast targets such as the planetary limb and the moons respond well to high magnifications but the lower contrast features such as festoons, barges, eddies and others tend not to be so clearly seen at increased power. 

Saturn and Mars are a different matter and do tend to respond bettter to really high magnifications.

So I don't think the advice to use more moderate magnfications on Jupiter is over-cautious, it's just a tip to help tease out the finer details on the planet, the stuff that really does not jump out at you but needs patient observing and eye training.

[Sonicfishcake42]

I use the 9.25 + Baader zoom combo and I'm very pleased with the results. The general consensus is that of course zooms are never going to be as good as standard size EPs for individual functions. However after a lot of research I find the Baader zoom is regarded as one of the best players in the zoom category. I'll be honest, I absolutely love it, it's met and exceeded my expectations. My only issue with it is the 24mm zoom function which can feel a little claustrophobic at times however 24mm is a magnification I have very little use for so this doesn't bother me. All in all, it's a great well made piece of kit that will complement your scope nicely!  

In terms of magnification I currently do not have the Baader barlow (I will of course be picking this up), at 8mm I do crave a little more magnification so a good quality high power 4-6mm EP is next on my list. 

Enjoy your new scope, it's a cracker  

[kurtz9]

Well, here's what ended up happening-

We tried out a bunch of different EPs in various AFOVs (50ish, 68-72ish, 82, and 100) and magnifications (everything from 4.7 to 40mm) and several different brands (Televue, ES, Vixen, Baader, and Celestron)  and basically ended up tossing the original budget out the window when we realized how fantastic the wider fields of view were... we ended up with this:

1 30mm ES82

1 20mm ES100

1 14mm ES100

1 ES 2" 2x Focal Extender

1 Siebert 2" 2.5x Focal Extender (because they're apparently the only folks offering a genuine telecentric 2" focal extender/barlow in anything other than 2x and 4x and 4x wouldn't be too useful to us)

This gives us 30mm, 15mm, and 12mm at 82 degree AFOV and 20mm, 14mm, 10mm, 8mm, 7mm, and 5..6mm in 100 degree AFOV.

Plus everything is 2" so it leverages the 2" diagonal, never leaves me looking for the 1.25" adapter, and  lets me keep the scope balanced further forward on the dovetail so I can clear the diagonal going to zenith.

FWIW the Baader zoom wasn't bad at all... but the AFOV difference was pretty noticeable, especially at the lower magnifications, the the ES EPs looked a little better overall.

Oh, and we even included the legendary 24mm Televue Panoptic in the testing as compared to a similar ES EP...  and the Televue WAS better... very, very slightly... like where the eye doctor keeps switching between 2 lenses asking "Better here, or better here?" and you have to ask him to switch them 3 or 4 times between the same two and finally decide "I guess the second one is a little better"

That reinforces the notion that TV EPs give you 5% better performance for 100% more price compared to the ES offerings.... 

[John]

Great eyepiece selection - I'm sure you will love them

Having owned an ES 100 / 20mm I'd say the difference between it and the Ethos 21 (which I currently have) is closer to 2% with that pair.

[Mark in Macc]

You have opted for exactly the same set as me. Very good choices for the 9.25. Now, have you considered binoviewers? Beware, not a cheap option, but trust me, you won't regret it. I still use my ES eyepieces for wider field low power observing, but only use the binos for lunar and planetary observing. Outstanding!

[kurtz9]

You have opted for exactly the same set as me. Very good choices for the 9.25. Now, have you considered binoviewers? Beware, not a cheap option, but trust me, you won't regret it. I still use my ES eyepieces for wider field low power observing, but only use the binos for lunar and planetary observing. Outstanding!

I did consider them...right until I saw the pricing   

A Denk binotron 27 with all the options cost 50% more than the 9.25 Evolution did

[Tonynexevo925]

I'm looking at the Baader option - still too expensive at the moment though - there is a member who was considering selling his - I'm hopeful...

[Mark in Macc]

I use the William Optics binoviewers and the are excellent. I started off just using the eyepieces that come with the binos and have slowly added to my collection. UK price for a new pair (including a pair of 20 mm eyepieces) is £180. Denks would be better but this option is still excellent.

[Tonynexevo925]

That's not a bad price - I will have a look at the WO.

[Mark in Macc]

Just checked the price and now selling for £200. Still a good buy in my opinion.

[Tonynexevo925]

Where's that Mark - I only looked briefly on FLO and they have the set with 2 x eps for £219...

Regards,

Tony

[Mark in Macc]

365 Astro

[Tonynexevo925]