John

I have a BC&F brochure from 1990 which prices the Fullerscopes wide angle "plossls" as they called them at £150 apiece. The KK Widescan III's were originally priced at £160 for the 1.25 inchers and £200 plus for the 2 inch one. So they were expensive eyepieces. The chinese clones of them don't have the build or optical quality really.

I'm just hoping for a small patch of clear sky between 12:35pm and 3:00 pm-ish. I won't see the end of the transit because the Sun will have set and it's probably asking too much for clear skies for the 1st and 2nd contact events so just a chance to see the disk of Mercury against the solar disk will do for me

I've owned a few of those, some branded Fullerscope and some under other branding (University Optics). Their performance is just as Peter says. Great at F/10 or slower but flocks of seagull shaped stars star to show at the edges of the field of view in faster scopes. This I found very disctracting when I tried these eyepieces in my F/6.5 refractor so I didn't use them in that scope. At one time there were a range of focal lengths available including a 30mm in the 2 inch fitting. They originate from the manufacturer Kokusai Kohki in Japan. There was a later version of the design with improved coatings which were called the Widescan III range. They have also been copied by chinese manufacturers eg: https://www.365astronomy.com/16mm-Columbus-UWA-Ultra-Wide-Angle-Eyepiece-with-80-degree-field-of-view.html

Couldn't resist a little "dry run" in case I can find some clear skies tomorrow

Nice sunny day here at the moment - perfect for observing a transit of Mercury Trouble is .......... the transit does not start for 24 hrs 25 minutes

I started a thread on this a few years back on this topic. It might be of interest:

I've tried binoviewers a few times and currently have a set of the William Optics ones on loan from FLO. I've not really taken to them to be honest. I get nicely merged images and the view of the moon (for example) looks nice with both eyes but I've not felt them to be something essential in my toolkit. Maybe I'll become converted someday ?. Or possibly not.

Its best to align them with the scope optics using as distant an object as possible just for this reason.

Just another note on aligning the mount with Polaris before observing - a rough alignment of the right ascension axis with Polaris is sufficient for visual observing. I find that getting the "north" leg of the tripod (arrowed in the pic below) pointing in the direction of Polaris is sufficient to give reasonable tracking for visual observing. Imaging is different - the alignment needs to be much more accurate which is where the small telescope built into the RA axis comes into play.

You have got it right. It does seem a fairly basic way to mount a scope but it is the way it's generally done. Tighten the clamp and the smaller security screw onto the bar firmly. It will mark the bar but thats what the bar is for.

I was also thinking that the Pan 24 ticked all the OP's boxes with the exception of eye relief ! Plus he already owns one .....

Yes, things a looking a little brighter here on Monday afternoon too.

Sounds hopeful. I'm sort of in the SW but I can go further !

Getting eyepieces that are wide, well corrected at F/4.7, have decent eye relief and are light in weight is a tough order. To get the well corrected performance at fast focal ratios and good eye relief, quite a lot of large glass elements are needed with some radical curves on them and those are what weighs the most of course. Of those discussed here, I've owned the Nagler T4 22mm and thought it a very good performer and comfortable to view though. I now use the Ethos 21 and a Nagler 31 but those are definitely in the heavyweight category.

Reduced light pollution makes a lot of difference when observing deep sky objects. Hardly difference any when observing the Moon, planets and double stars. It's difficult to be precise but my guess is that he would need something like 150mm get anything like the views your 80mm will show of deep sky objects at your location Of course when he comes to your place, his 150 will outshine your 80mm by quite a margin ! Edit: then you will want to upgrade, then he will and so on and so on !

Is that the Gibraltar 5 Cleetus ?

I'm going to be there on Friday - hope to see FLO friends there

Imagers tend to prefer GOTO systems with both axes driven. The simple single axis drive system is handy for high power observing for not many £'s.

I've used good quality plossls and orthos in my F/5.3 12 inch dobsonian and they have worked very well. Your F/10.75 refractor will pose no challenges to such eyepieces

If you want a low cost single axis drive (RA) for the EQ5, Telescope House have one branded Orion in their clearance sale currently: https://www.telescopehouse.com/offers/clearance/truetrack-singlel-axis-drive.html

So was the design of a long focal length achromat refractor like your 93mm f/10.75. Well executed plossls and orthoscopics will serve very well in such a scope

Friday for me. Family stuff happening at the weekend.

A good decision I think. An undermounted scope is very frustrating.

Length has more impact than weight mostly but there are exceptions when the optical tube weight is close to the mount limit. With the weight of your scope I don't think it's possible to say with any certainty whether or not the star discovery mount would be able to handle it For low to medium magnifications it might do OK but become less easy to use with higher powers.

I'm glad that I managed to get a glimpse of the last one ! Still got my fingers crossed for Monday though.