John

This is from the Tele Vue plossl patent documentation:

Slight curvature of the outer facing lens surfaces ?

Chris Lord !

I was lucky that my garden actually gives me a reasonably clear horizon in the right direction, for a change !

If you can post a photo of the focuser as you have it setup for observing that will help diagonse the issue

3 hours ago, AdeKing said:

 

Thats looking good John, I assume this is a mobile phone shot, but is it visible to the naked eye or is it a binocular object?

I think I might make the effort if We have any clear mornings forecast this week.

Ade

It was DSLR. 1 sec, ISO 800, 200mm FL, F/5.6. Single shot, just tweaked a bit for contrast.

Not naked eye (quite) but visible in the camera viewfinder and I would guess any optical instrument.

If it brightens a touch more it will be naked eye visible I'm sure. Might be now to the eagle eyed with low NE horizons.

Best comet for years for me 

You got it though Dave.

I'm off to bed. So excited though. 60 year old bloke hopping about the flower beds like a kid with his binoculars, tripod, camera etc. What a lark !

Nice view here !

Brilliant view here with 11x70 binoculars.

Snapped this hasty image:

As you so rightly say Dave, a PROPER comet at last !!!

Would be naked eye if the sky was a touch darker I reckon but really good with the binoculars.

Just managed to see Neowise with my 11x70 binoculars. Very low in the NE. Absolutely wonderful !!!!!

Just an amazing sight !!!!

Bright nucleus and a long spreading, elegant tail.

Get out there and see it. One of the best, if not the best, comet I've seen in the 30+ years I've been at this hobby

The Baader Morpheus eyepieces would make a lot of sense in your scope. They have a 76 degree field of view and are very good performers by all accounts.

You can (nearly) get 2 of those for the price of one Delos.

The 17.5mm Morpheus would be a great eyepiece to add to your others.

Many years back I found that an 8 inch F/6 dobsonian provided slightly better planetary views than my Celestron C8 did, rather to my surprise.

Given that the dob cost £150 (used) and the C8 about 5 times that I was happy to let the C8 go and invest in some nice eyepieces for the dob.

Still a big dob fan today

2 hours ago, JamesF said:

Did Deep Purple not get a mention for "Space Truckin'"?  That would certainly fit fairly well with some of the others....

They don't write stuff like that today

I use 10x50's and also a pair of 8x56's which are rather nice for astronomy. I use porro prism binoculars rather than the roof prism design because I prefer the ergonomics. Is a roof prism as good for astronomy purposes ? - not sure that I know the answer to that one

I have some rather tall Leylandii along the side of the back garden. Yes, they block the sky to some extent to the N and E but also they also block neighbours lights very effectively thus making observing much more feasible from this garden. So I'll forgive them the chunk of sky that they hide from me and wait up later for targets to rise above the Leylandii line.

Plossls ? ....... eh, in them days we were lucky to have a bit of broken glass to peer though .....

Sounds like you would really like to go for the 102mm F/11 ED refractor

If that is the choice you make, do make sure that you have a mount that is up to holding the scope steady and without undue vibrations at high magifications. This will ensure that you can fully exploit what this type of refractor is capable of. The mount may need to be stronger than you think - the length of the tube, with this scope, will have much more influence than it's weight.

30 minutes ago, Barry-W-Fenner said:

Sorry to sound a complete amateur! But what does the term "plossl" actually mean about this type of eye piece? 

Thanks

Baz

 

4 glass elements in 2 groups. It's on this chart, somewhere:

40 minutes ago, johninderby said:

 

It all depends. Some people get on with binoviewers and some don’t If ypu find using binoculars comfortable you will probably like binoviewers. I don’t use binoculars as they always give me a headache but I’m just one of those that isn’t suited to them.

I'm in the camp that do not get on with binoviewers as well. I have tried them a number of times.

I appreciate that some really do find them game changers though.

I quite often use the zoom + barlow combination for flexible high power observing of the moon, planets and double stars. Sometimes small planetary nebulae and globular clusters as well.

My scopes, mostly, have shorter focal length than the C6 SCT though.

With the barlow lens, my zoom gives me a focal length range of 9.5mm to 3.2mm. In most of my scopes, that is a very useful range.

Having the ability to instantly adjust the focal length is very useful for finding out the optimum magnification for the seeing conditions and target.

These are "Super" but not really ......

I think this is pointing to something being wrong with the 9mm eyepiece

I suppose there comes a point when you have been in the hobby quite a while and have seen quite a lot of stuff.

Perhaps there is a fork in the path at that point where you becomes less interested in seeing new stuff and more interested in seeing the best quality views possible at lesser apertures ?

Maybe light pollution intrudes and you either get a huge dob and a camper van to carry on going deeper and further or invest in premium quality smaller apertures ?

As @Stu says in his post above, there are multiple options as you go down the path and all of them lead to interesting new challenges and places

Just don't step on the fork !

The alternative route was taken by Celestron with their version of these eyepieces - the Ultima range. The 5mm in that range did not use a barlow set. The eyepiece was consequentially physically much shorter but the eye relief was much tighter. There was no 3.8mm in the Ultima range though. Presumably without a barlow element the eye relief would be so short you would practically need to glue your eyeball to the eye lens.

The odd thing is that a planet that is visible with the 25mm eyepiece should disappear when the 9mm eyepiece is used. It does not make sense because in your scope (a 130mm F/5 newtonian reflector I believe ?) the 9mm eyepiece should be entirely functional - the 72x that the eyepiece produces is hugely within the limits of the scope.

It's a puzzle

Looks a good job. The Baader film is designed to work fine with the ripples in it. It should not be tight across the apertures.