F15Rules

Thanks Steve😊 .

Well I'm out now (7.40pm) and of course clouds are rolling in!

I tried Jupiter but it's right over our chimney pot at the moment..and our log burner is on, so Jupiter is wobbling like a jelly!

On the other side of the sky the Moon is obscured by the clouds so no go there at the moment.

I'll stay out for a while as I'm hopeful there may be some breaks in the cloud..it's a lovely calm night and I'm well wrapped up, and it's early yet..ever the optimist!!

Dave

2 minutes ago, teoria_del_big_bang said:

What a lovely scope, I hope the skies stay clear but wrap up well it#s going to be another cold un 🙂 

Steve

Thanks Steve, much appreciated!

Dave

30 minutes ago, Nicola Fletcher said:

It’s an absolute picture - what a fabulous scope. Love the name too!

Thanks Nicola🤗..

I named the scope firstly for the character in the Matrix Trilogy, which I love, and also for my Christian faith, which is important to me..

When I was much younger I could never have imagined owning such a scope, and every time I use the Tak she brings a smile to my face😊👍.

Dave

"Trinity", my Tak FS128, hoping to get a rare outing this evening, after  a long combination of cloudy skies, flu and Covid jabs and busy retirement life have conspired to really limit my sessions recently.

Here she is, cooling down, and loaded with 2" dielectric diagonal and newly decloaked Celestron Axiom LX 23mm 82deg UWA..- intended target Orion constellation and M42 and the sword region in particular..its'  BIG brother, the Axiom 31mm is also waiting in the wings too😊👍.

Clear skies, All!

Dave

Hi Mike, that's a splendid setup, and as one splendid chap to another, a splendid mount on which to sit your splendid tripod and splendid scope.. in short, simply splendid!!😋🤭😂

Dave

29 minutes ago, Stu said:

Yes Jeremy, I use it quite a lot. On axis it is as good as anything, very sharp and with a 60 to 80 degree afov it is broadly comparable with a bunch of Delos or XWs. I don’t think the edge correction is as good but it’s so flexible that I really enjoy using it. Eye positioning is very easy too.

I have a two inch adaptor permanently fitted to it which has a T2 thread in the bottoms. So, I can add a 1.25” adaptor to this if needed, though I rarely do as all my diagonals will take 2” eyepieces. I sometimes add the element from my AP Barcon to increase the mag a bit too.

I know some don’t get on with this zoom for some reason, but I find it excellent quality and a great way to minimise the number of eyepieces needed.

I had a Leica Vario 7.3mm - 22mm zoom a few years back and couldn't fault it (it had IIRC a 38-60 deg range).

The best built zoom I ever owned was the Pentax XL 8-24mm, just a wonderfully solid unit and optically excellent too..very close to XWs apart from the smaller fov vs the 70deg of the XWs.

Dave

51 minutes ago, wookie1965 said:

I have been lethargic since my booster strange other people would say that I had astrazenecea. My back and hip are playing up quite significantly even though its clear out I won't be going out don't want to make things worse. 

Sorry to hear that Paul..I had AZ for my first 2 jabs and was quite ill after the first one- but not until 24 hours after the jab, and was then ill for 24 hours. The 2nd jab was better.

They told us that Pfizer is in short supply, and they are avoiding AZ due to clot scares in younger people, hence the use of Moderna..

Best stay in tonight just to be safe?

Get well soon Paul.

Dave

Just now, John said:

The focusers would cope OK I think, especially the Feathertouch on the TMB/LZOS 130 - it's in another league

Sorry for the intermittent involvement - we had our booster jabs yesterday and are feeling a little groggy today

Ditto, John! My wife and I had them at a large sports centre about 16miles from home, as our surgery haven't any, and to be honest were much less than helpful.. same with the flu jab which we had last week 🥴.

We got the flu jabs from Boots Chemist (25 miles away, but free) last weekend, and Covid Boosters yesterday at 6pm..with quite a long queue behind us.

We both had Moderna this time, so not sure what to expect..it's now been c23 hours and so far we feel a bit lethargic and with a sore jab arm.

Ironically, the forecast is for clearing skies tonight, but I'm not sure I'm going to be tempted, as it's gone very cold here today, and the pull of the log burner and post-supper Lindor truffles may just be too hard to resist!!😂

I hope you and yours feel back to normal soon.

Dave

19 minutes ago, Dave scutt said:

I'm still trying to aquire more ep's I've only got 4 .

Haven't had a chance to use the 14mm yet but tonight might be clear 😱🤞

Great selection there, Dave. Not sure I'd make many changes or additions there..maybe replace the 28mm with a similar focal length ES widefield? I've owned bother the Es 24mm 68 and the ES 34mm and really liked them. The 34mm gave me some memorable views of the Double Cluster in Perseus, for example.

That extender is also very nice, and gives you some worthwhile additional options with your existing set👍

Dave

52 minutes ago, callisto said:

Your right...I also have the 10, 14, 17.3mm Delos what cost me a fair bit but I use the others more 🙄

 

Mark.

Thanks Mark..I love my Morpheus 17.5mm (I originally had two for binoviewing),  but so far this year I have found myself using the 9mm more, both natively and with a barlow.. using the 2.25x Baader barlow and the 9mm in my FS128 gives me 260x with a 76 deg fov, for some wonderful views of doubles.

I am going to be really interested to compare the Morpheus 17.5 with the Axiom 23mm on winter objects like M42.. in a few days the moon will be out of the way!😊

Dave

5 hours ago, jock1958 said:

Not counting the variety of eyepieces I use for binoviewing it’s my TV 3-6 zoom for planetary / double stars, TV 14mm Delos for nubulae / galaxies also TV 24mm Panoptic & TV 31mm Nagler for widefield star patterns / galaxies /  nebulae. 

Er...isn't that 4 excluding the zoom, Iain??🤭😋😂

13 hours ago, callisto said:

I mostly use my 4.5mm Delos for close work on Moon/planets along with a 7mm Nirvana...big widefield scanning with my ES 34mm & 24mm Maxvision...and my OVL 7.2mm-21.5mm zoom for solar work 

Nice selection there, Callisto👍😊.

There does seem to something of a pattern emerging here..lots of high power (10mm or less), and low power (22mm or more) being quoted, and far less in between 11 and 21mm? 🤔

Dave

4 hours ago, Ags said:

I'm betting three reasons: weight, weight, and weight.

I doubt that.. John's refractors have good, strong focusers. 

Of course, John can respond for himself though 🙂..

Dave

13 hours ago, Kon said:

It used to be 25mm box standard plossl that came with the Dob, 15mm and 8mm BST with my 8" Dob. I have recently upgraded all of them to ES including 24mm 68 degrees, 14 and 8.8 mm 82 degrees. (If seeing is good I might use the 6.7mm 82 degrees). I have decided to stick with 1.25" format for now.

Hi Kon,

That's a lovely upgrade set you have there..I've owned the ES24mm 68 deg (can you believe I got one some years ago in a Bresser Germany online sale, brand new, for £59!!😱).

It was a fine eyepiece, and only gave way to a remarkable 22mm Vixen LVW.

Dave

9 hours ago, Ian McCallum said:

For me it's my second hand 28mm 2" LET, great for wide views. 

Second would be my BST StarGuider 12mm ED, for closer in observing. 

Lastly would have to be the BST StarGuider ED 8mm for occasions when the seeing is good. 

That's a nice spread of powers, Ian..

The 28mm LET 2" is actually a really nice eyepiece at F8 or slower, giving nice, crisp views..ok, the edge correction can't match a really expensive eyepiece, but when viewing on axis, it gives a lovely, quite wide "context" to the  views👍.

Dave

9 hours ago, John said:

With my refractors I would say that the 24mm Panoptic, the 5mm Pentax XW and the Nagler 2-4mm zoom get the most used.  I don't seem to do much medium magnification observing with those

With my 12 inch dob it is often the 21mm, 8mm  and 4.7mm Ethos's

 

 

 

Hi John,

That's interesting..can I ask, why would you use your 24mm Panoptic in your refractors in preference to your Ethos 21mm?

11 hours ago, wookie1965 said:

Dave, 

            I have a mixture of eyepieces Meade, BST, Televue, Celestron and Vixen. 

8 use my Celestron zoom to star align the mount. 

My most used are the 25mm BST to make sure I'm in the right place next the 15mm BST to me this is one brilliant eyepiece punches well above its weight. 

For tighter doubles its either the 11mm plossl or the 10mm vixen which although being a old eyepiece it's one of the best I have in my locker. 

I have lower mag eyepieces but nothing that compares to them I really need to get better ones but having a tal x2 Barlow I can Barlow the 10mm. 

I would love to try other eyepieces in my scopes but I will have to wait until I get to go to a meet but I'm happy with what I have and they do the job for me. 

Paul 

Thanks, Paul.

You have some lovely gear with your 5" refractor and Vixen plossl and Tal barlow..you might find, when you try out some other more modern eyepieces at a future meeting, that apart from field of view, there really isn't that much difference in on axis image quality between most of them!

Dave

14 minutes ago, jock1958 said:

Not counting the variety of eyepieces I use for binoviewing it’s my TV 3-6 zoom for planetary / double stars, TV 14mm Delos for nubulae / galaxies also TV 24mm Panoptic & TV 31mm Nagler for widefield star patterns / galaxies /  nebulae. 

Cheers Iain..

I should have said in my OP that I do use a binoviewer as well from time to time.

I only have one binoviewing pair currently, a nice pair of Kson 16.8mm orthos with 50 deg fov: this is actually all I need for now, as I can combine them with 2.25x and 1.6x for high power/lunar use and they work very well.

I would consider buying a longer FL pair (s) in the future if and when (I as I hope) I get a better quality binoviewer to use them with. But for me, binoviewing will never be about real widefield observing, much more lunar, planets and some doubles.

Dave

Having fairly recently streamlined my main eyepiece set to just 6 pieces, I thought the title question might bring out some interesting answers.

This thread is not intended to be a competition between brands/types of eyepiece..it's just for interest, entertainment...and, perhaps, might help us all to gain insight, inspiration and ideas as to how we might revisit our choices of eyepieces, and how and why we use them?

Although I do use all 6 of my eyepieces, there are definitely 3 that I have used most in the past 6 months (ie during late spring and summer, into Autumn).

My set consists of the following:

Carton 7-21mm zoom (40-60 degrees fov).

Morpheus 9mm - 76 deg

Nagler T2 22mm - 82deg

Morpheus 17.5mm -76deg

Axiom LX 23mm - 82deg

Axiom LX 31mm - 82deg

Over the spring and summer months, (in limited sessions, due to our using our freedom during the summer to travel to visit family and friends), my most used of the above were the Carton Zoom, Morpheus 9mm and Morpheus 17.5mm. However, the two Axiom LX UWA's are newer additions, and so haven't been available to use for very long.

Also, I think it is likely that my choices will change over the winter season, and I predict that my most used winter eyepieces will be the 9mm Morpheus, the 12mm Nagler and the 23mm Axiom.

I should also add that I do often use a Baader 2.25x Hyperion zoom barlow on the Zoom (at the 7mm setting, for very high power) the Morpheus 9mm and the Nagler 12mm, again for higher power on doubles etc.

I bought the two Axioms specifically for lower power wide angle observing: the 23mm was bought in the hope that it would match or better the amazing Vixen LVW 22mm that I foolishly let go several years ago, and are now like hen's teeth to find on the used market.

The 31mm I bought as I had read reports of it rivalling the fabled Nagler 31mm 82deg UWA, which is a very expensive eyepiece to buy, even used. In limited early testing of the Axioms so far, I am well pleased with them.

My case is shown below..the two largest black smooth barrelled eps are the decloaked Axiom Lx's.

Anyway, enough from me... let's hear about your choices, why you made them, and your reactions to other people's choices😊!

Dave

1 hour ago, Bobby Glasser said:

These comprise full extent of my eyepiece "collection" and are ALL I could ever want and/or need!

I think it's very refreshing to read of someone who is settled on, and comfortable with, just 3 or 4 eyepieces.

When I think about it, I probably use about 3 of mine (of a modest total of 6) for probably 2/3 of my observing.

I've gone through dozens and dozens of eps in my time, and have probably wasted so much potential quality observing time over the years, just searching for that "Holy Grail" set to cover all eventualities..but not any more.

I have a couple of great scopes, not bad observing conditions with Bortle 4 skies, and slowly deteriorating aging eyes.

Life is too short for me to waste any more of it chasing eyepiece  Nirvana..I'm now just trying to make more of what I do have, than fretting about what I don't!

I salute you and your choice, Bobby👍

Dave

We have one of the most variable climates on earth, and loads of micro climates locally. It's always been the same for all of my life.

I've learned long ago that, apart from rare spells of UK wide settled weather, it's literally a waste of time to do anything other than use Mark I eyeballs to check for yourself what's happening in your personal observing location.

Modern technology has many benefits, but I don't think predicting accurately and dependably clear or cloudy conditions at a very local level is one of them.

Dave

3 hours ago, Sunshine said:

In my 10” f6 dob it produced stars with seagull effect at the edges of the Fov which I could not ignore as they were prominent, not sure why.

I thought it was normal for ships funnels to attract seagulls..?

Sorry🙃

Dave😁

Great post, and photos, thanks for sharing..👍

I remember as a boy in the late 60s reading about the "great telescopes of the world" such as the Mount Wilson and Palomar 100" and 200" reflectors and the Yerkes and Lick giant refractors, and the Rosse 72" was often cited as being inspirational in the quest to "go bigger, and deeper".

At a time when a 4" refractor or 8" reflector were highly costly and aspirational instruments for the masses, such a huge scope must have been literally awe inspiring!

We truly don't know how lucky we are today to have access to high quality optics at relatively affordable prices..🔭🔭🔭

Dave

4 hours ago, Mr Spock said:

This scope is sooo tempting... I'm thinking it's nice and compact, will fit nicely on my EQ5, will be great for wide field, solar and doubles alike. A nice replacement for my ageing Celestron 80ED with its useless focuser and my 120 achro and its prominent CA.

Scope, shoe + finder - need to find the cash from somewhere 

Heres the formula you need, Mr Spock..

Selected Ortho sale + Selected LVW sale = Significant cash inflow = new Starfield 100mm F7 scope!

Live long and Prosper!!😊

Dave

On 03/11/2021 at 13:38, AL1 said:

Oklop 100/900 bag fits my Vixen ED103 nicely.

Great bag for a superb scope!👍

Dave