Eyepiece sets

[Rachael99816]

Is the 'Celestron Eyeopener Eyepiece and Filter Kit' good/suitable for a skywatcher skyliner 200p? If not can you give me some suggestions and advice please?

Thanks!    

[Charic]

Hi and welcome.

Often the case is, no, don't buy a kit, as quite often, you will never use some of the items supplied, yet whatever eyepiece you buy, if you like the result, invariably, you will want for more?

I went down the budget route of eyepieces, I bought the 8mm Starguider, I now have a 'kit' and glad I did, the BST Starguiders are perfect for my eyes on the Skyliner. I'm also playing about with some cheap Plossl eyepieces, again of good quality, which have a slightly smaller field of view, but it was my intention to own a Plossl set from the start.

Below 10mm  when using a Plossl, the eye-relief gets very short ( the distance from your eye to the eye lens, brushing your eye lashes when your too close) but with the BSTs, for me, far more comfortable.

A 6mm eyepiece will get you the 200x power that the scope is capable of, and if you multiply the focal ratio by the size of your pupil, you can decide whereabouts your low powered eyepiece should reside. I went for a 32mm in a 2" format. Anything in-between fills the gap, and possibly the purchase of a Barlow, which extends the focal length of the telescope, resulting in higher magnifications, using any existing eyepieces, so a 10mm and say a 12mm eyepiece with a Barlow will have the same effect as using a 5mm or 6mm eyepiece.

[laudropb]

Most advise against getting sets. The filters you will probably never use.

[Paul73]

Try a couple of Charic's BST's. £50 each new (£35 used).

Many people collect a set of these to suit their scope and don't feel the need to upgrade further.

Paul

[Highburymark]

Agree with advice - I find any Plossl under 12-15mm unusable anyway.

[SpaceWalker]

I agree with others, you don't need any kits compiled by vendors just to sell what  almost nobody needs (e.g color filters, short focal length Plossls etc).  Just get the 12mm BST Starguider and a 2x Barlow. If you like the Starguider you'll buy 2-3 more of them to complete your eyepiece collection.

[Moonshane]

Pretty much any eyepiece will work well in pretty much any scope. Filters can be useful on planets to reveal subtle surface detail. Eyepiece sets do give you a benchmark by which to gauge which magnifications work on your scope best on average. I actually prefer plossls for many objects.

That said, I do agree with the consensus. Buy a small number of eyepieces and a Barlow for now and see how you go.

Personally though I would consider other things before eyepieces, including a red dot finder, a good star map, red torch, maybe a right angle correct image finder all of which make finding objects easier. A less than perfect view of a located object in the basic supplied eyepieces is better than a crystal clear comfortable view of the wrong bit of sky.

[Mak the Night]

I bought the 'Eyeopener Kit' and it taught me a lot about eyepieces and their abilities. Although I think the 13mm, 17mm and 32mm Plossls are the only useful focal length sizes due to the fact that they have a more bearable eye relief and realistic field stop size than the 6mm and 8mm Plossls included in the Celestron kit. The Barlow isn't bad and is similar to the Celestron Omni Barlow. The Barlow element can't be unscrewed however unlike on other Celestron Barlows to facilitate being screwed directly into the objective end of another eyepiece. Although this doesn't detract from the Barlow itself. 

Celestron Kit Barlow compared to Omni Barlow

Celestron Barlow with detached Barlow element.

The Eyeopener case is the most useful thing about the whole kit IMO. With the diligent application of a Swiss Army Knife and some foam plugs from an Orion case I modified mine to contain newer EP's. The 32mm Plossl is the only original eyepiece left now.

[Roy Challen]

I'm not sure that eyepiece sets are such a bad thing. If I were a beginner again, I would be delighted with the Revelation set. Most people are going to own eyepieces with similar if not the same focal lengths, and if you get on ok with the eye relief of plossls, then all is good. As Moonshane mentioned, filters can help with planetary observations, if you choose not to use them that can't be blamed on the manufacturer for including them in a set.

If Tele Vue, Pentax, ES and the other premium manufacturers out there offered sets how many of us would go for them, particularly if they worked out cheaper than buying individually? Examples of high quality eyepieces available in sets; Zeiss ZAO 2, Brandons, Hyperions etc.

[Charic]

I think the reasons of cost forbids an outright TeleVue set, Im looking at three premium EPs at present? if a set was a minimum of 3 EPs , thats about £600 minimum? but whatever you buy as a single eyepiece, you buy one, then one soon becomes a set! If there was a clear discount, and after having tried a particular EP in any brand, then a reduced kit option can make sense.

I still have an interest in upgrading, which may be crazy, as I clearly have not exhausted the limit of my telescope, or the very capable Starguiders for this f/6 scope, but every now and then, someone just needs to say or mention something, that makes you sit back and think a minute. Cheers John! Im holding off for a while. But maybe not forever?

[Ruud]

Hello Rachael, welcome to the forum.

Congratulations on the telescope. You made a really good choice there.

If I had your telescope and £147 to spend, I'd put the money to a collimation tool, a 15 mm eyepiece and a 2x Barlow.