Louis D

Another possibility in that price range having a similar field of view with better eye relief would be the 6.5mm Morpheus.

I recall travelling in Germany around the end of June, beginning of July decades ago with my wife and noted how constantly cloudy and cool it was.  I don't think it ever got above 65°F.  At the time we lived near NYC, and it was 96°F with full sun when we left Newark airport and then again when we returned to it.  It was rather startling that there was a 30°F difference between the two mid-summer.  We had each brought one pair of jeans in case it was chilly and two pairs of walking shorts.  We ended up never wearing the shorts and instead wore those jeans until they were stiff with grunge.

I'm guessing UK weather is similarly cool and cloudy.  It must be something to do with the North Atlantic currents.  It sounds a bit like the weather in the US's Pacific Northwest.

Using a 24mm APM UFF in my AT72ED yields a 3.6° true field of view (TFOV).  While that's decently wide, it's only maybe a degree or so wider than what's achievable with 2" eyepieces in an 8" f/6 Dob.  Why limit a natively wide field instrument in such a manner?  Put a 2", 40mm Pentax XW in the 72ED and now you've got a 6.1° TFOV (nearly twice as wide linearly and almost three times more area), which puts it in binocular and low power finder scope territory.  Instead of barely framing Orion's belt (Collinder 70) or the Pleiades and looking straight through the Hyades, you can now see them in a wider context and actually perceive the Hyades as an open cluster.  Looking around the open clusters of Perseus and Cassiopeia becomes an entirely different experience because you can see how they group together in thick and thin patches, large and small.  Cruising the summer Milky Way across the sky is also a lot of fun.  You can see how various nebula group together with OCs in a single FOV.

It should work well for that as well as Jupiter's moons and some of its belts along with Saturn's rings.  Don't expect to pick out Saturn's moons very well, though.  They are tiny and dim and benefit from aperture.

If you spring for a 2" diagonal and 2" widest field eyepiece, you won't need any sort of finder scope for it.  That, and the views while sweeping the Milky Way can be breathtaking at those low and wide mags.

You'll also need an alt-az mount and tripod, so budget accordingly.

Probably would be okay for a start, but you'd be limited to about 125x max for planetary work, and that is pushing it.  This would be fine for typical UK nights.  You will see a lot of purple fringing at that power on planets based on my experience with an Astro-Tech 72ED with FPL-51 glass.  Resolution is a bit limited by the relatively small aperture.

It would be good for open clusters and nebula, especially large ones.  Bright planetary nebula and globular clusters really need more aperture, as they regularly need more than 100x (150x for GCs).  Smaller nebula will be limited by the small aperture if the power is increased to resolve them better.  Smaller OCs will remain satisfying.

This scope would be good for travel as well due to its compactness and light weight.  If a scope is too big and heavy to move to an observing site, it's not likely to be used.

You might also checkout the TS-Optics 70 mm F6 ED for comparison.  It might have nicer mechanicals (R&P focuser, etc.) and be a bit more compact for a similar price if imaging is in your future.  I believe it to be the same as the Altair Starwave ASCENT 70ED.  I know the non-R&P focuser on my AT72ED slips with 1kg loads near zenith while the R&P focuser on my 90mm TS-Optics APO does not.

1 minute ago, Don Pensack said:

f you have 2" capability, the 70° Super Wide Angle eyepieces from Barsta are just as good and have more modern coatings, so a little bit brighter.

Except that @Paz specifically wants a pair for binoviewing, so I'm assuming limited to 1.25" eyepieces.  I would think a pair of 17.5mm Morpheus might be a good fit in that case.  Anyone know the difference in field stop diameters between these two eyepieces?  Regardless, a pair of either would add quite a bit of weight to a BV setup.

If you can find some used LVs for under $70 (which used to happen quite a bit here in the States), they would be a bargain upgrade.

I don't know that I'd pay $169 for SLVs when Tele Vue Delites are $269 and Pentax XWs are $266 here in the States.  Either would give a very nice boost in performance over the BST Starguiders.

1 hour ago, Ian McCallum said:

Whilst I was forewarned about CA with achromats, I picked up a used SW Evostar 120 recently.  I can easily detect the purple fringing and it's more obvious than I thought it was going to be.  I guess having used a 8" Dob for over 18 months has spoiled me...🙄

Here's a photographic comparison from Rohr of various fringe filters through an achromat:

ohne Filter is without any filter.  The Contrast Booster does the best at completely eliminating fringe.

Here's the what the various spectrums look like through each filter:

It's clear that the CB filter is the most aggressive at cutting violet and blue.

For completeness sake, and so y'all can understand my misunderstanding of car sizes over there, here's the top 25 best selling cars in the US.  Notice that the top three are all full size pickups (as is #12).

3 hours ago, johninderby said:

Or the British van. Wouldn’t want to pay the fuel bill though.  🙂

As I said above, these big gas guzzlers are reserved for weekend and family duty here in the States.  They do become the commuter vehicle when the normal commuter car is in the shop for repairs.  I can attest they are expensive to fill up even in the States for daily driving duty.  However, they are great for hauling the family on weekend outings and weeks long road trips.

According to the web, the average number of cars per Brit (1.2/household) is lower than in the US (1.9/household).  Thus, it's less common to have extra vehicles for leisure trips in the UK.  I know our household peaked at 5 vehicles when we had 5 drivers for a time living at home, all going different directions at the same time.  We're down to 3 vehicles for 2 drivers now that we're working empty nesters.

3 hours ago, WatcherF said:

One of these....(I'm not joking)

My apologies.  I could almost fit that in the back of my Astro Van with the seats removed.

That's basically a commuter-only car here in the States.  Generally, we would have a larger vehicle for weekends and family trips that sits idle during the work week.

I have no idea how much space you'd have left for a scope and mount/tripod after putting your normal luggage in it.  Maybe an image of it fully loaded for a trip would help.

1 hour ago, ScouseSpaceCadet said:

10x50 binoculars should fit in the boot.

Or possibly 15x70mm binos.  Heck, I was quite happy scanning the skies around the eclipsed moon with my 8x42mm binos Friday morning.

On 12/11/2021 at 07:34, Magnum said:

P.S does anyone know what Baader mean by CMOS optimised, as I cant for the life of me see how a line filter would perform different on cmos vs ccd, sounds like marketing to me.

I know some camera lenses like the Tamron Adaptall-2 SP 90mm Macro f/2.5 had a violet hot-spotting issue with digital sensors that was nonexistent with film.  It was due to a reflection off the digital sensor back to the near planar rear element and then back to the sensor:

Perhaps Baader has better controlled the reflections from the back of the filter than previously?

We had clear, cold, and calm skies, so a beautiful view of the eclipse last night from Texas.  Only problem, it peaked at 3am local time, and I had to get up and go to work in the morning.  As a result, I set my alarm, got up, saw it looked great, woke up the wife (she had said she wanted to see it if it was clear), and we enjoyed the view through 8x42 binoculars and naked eye.  The Pleiades looked great almost right next to it.  Orion was due south and amazing through the binos.  The Hyades in between were rather subdued, even in the binos.  I was way too sleepy to get out a telescope or tripod, so I snapped some hand-held images minutes after the peak with the kit lens on my DSLR and went back to bed.  This one came out the best:

It fairly accurately displays the range of brightnesses and colors visible, just at low resolution.

A quick comparison of the Telrad versus the QuikFinder after decades of using both:

• Telrad has basically no parallax issues between the circles and the sky, so your head can bob around.  The QuikFinder has a bit of parallax, so the circles drift a little across the sky as your head bobs around.  You need to keep your head centered with the QF's window.
• Telrad circles are much easier to acquire than the QuikFinder circles.  I don't know if it is because they are thinner (which they are), the window is smaller, or what, but I'm always having trouble locating the QF's circles.  The Telrad is much less frustrating to use in that respect.
• Telrad circles won't pulse without an add-on.  This is built into the QuikFinder.  However, I don't find this difference to be at all a big deal.
• Telrad is huge and best for bigger Dobs.  QuikFinder is diminutive, so well suited to smaller scopes.
• Telrad dimmer switch tends to become a non-dimmable switch over time.  The QuikFinder switches seem quite stable over decades.
• Telrad AA batteries should be regularly replaced to avoid irreversible corrosion damage to the internals.  Simply replacing the battery holder doesn't fix the damage done.  The CR2025 lithium button cell in my QuikFinder is still going strong after 20+ years with no leakage.
• Telrad has a 4 degree outer circle.  QuikFinder stops at 2 degrees.  That extra circle is very useful in light polluted skies where stars visible to the naked eye tend to be more sparse.
• Attaching the Telrad to its base is a bit fiddly in the dark.  I simply can't tell if it is seated all the way without turning on a light.  You think you've backed out the locking screws enough for it to drop in when in fact you haven't.  The QuikFinder has a tab and a click-lock that are impossible to screw up in the dark.

1 hour ago, ScouseSpaceCadet said:

Jeremy you will be pleased to observe the Svbony variation has a smooth barrel. Just think with that £30 saved, your butler can this Christmas feed his kids with the extra bonus. Just imagine, "Little mites, smashing news! There's no need to queue at the food bank this year. We can buy a turkey breast between the six of us thanks to Master Jeremy's kind 'earted jesture!". " Little Johhny your rickets will be cured by January! Rejoice my little ones!" 😉

You forgot to add Little Johnny proclaiming "God bless us, every one!" at the end to complete your Christmas Carol. 😁

The 24mm and 30mm APM variants appear to be selling at about the same prices they were introduced at despite recent inflation and (dare I say it) newly added, targeted tariffs.  The list prices in the US have increased, but the selling prices have remained more or less constant.  I can't recall EU pricing, so someone else will have chime in on them.

1 hour ago, bomberbaz said:

Thanks Andrew, not that buying poor quality products would give a real bargain but that isn't always how things appear at first when one see's a lower priced alternative. 

I'm thinking early adopters like myself helped reimburse Marcus for his UFF R&D expenses.  After that initial period of higher prices, it appears that the line will be offered at lower prices by others.

A similar thing happens in the pharmaceutical industry.  It can cost billions to bring a single new treatment to market when accounting for all of the dead end ones that get shelved.  As a result, these R&D companies have to make that money back while their patents are still valid.  After they expire, the generic manufacturers jump in, manufacture them, and sell them at slim margins since they don't have very much R&D expenses to recover.

3 hours ago, Andrew_B said:

It would be interesting to know whether Marcus bought in a set of off the shelf eyepiece designs to sell as the APM UFF range or whether they were his own design (I'm sure I read that he reverse engineered someone else's design but I may be mistaken) and he didn't sign an exclusivity agreement in order to secure a lower price from the factory.

According to this CN post, Mark Ackermann of the US designed the 30mm (and I believe the rest of the APM UFF line) at Markus's request.

The LV line has super stiff, roll-down eye cups.  The rubber tends to crack with age as well.  My 24 year old 9mm has yet to tear off, though.  The LV line has slightly longer usable eye relief because the eye cup can be rolled down completely flush while the NLV/SLV cup only twists down so far, robbing a few millimeters of usable eye relief.  Personally, I hate the roll down eye cup.  I'm always putting a fingerprint on the eye lens trying to get it to roll down.  The supplied eye lens cap only fits when rolled up.  Back in the late 90s, I ended up going with the Pentax XL line for 3x the money per eyepiece and never regretted that decision.  They were more enjoyable in almost every way.

My 9mm LV does view a bit "dark" for whatever reason.  It might be due to coatings or glass types used.  It views very much like the Pentax XL/XW line, just 50 degrees wide.  Stray light is well controlled.  I've never noticed contrast or ghosting issues.

35 minutes ago, Mr Spock said:

The LV, NLV and SLV use the same optics. The only difference is in the design of the upper barrel.

Well, that and country of manufacture.  The LV and NLV lines were made in Japan while the SLV line is made China.  This matters to some folks.

Orion USA also sold the LVW line as the Orion Lanthanum Superwide series.  These often go for less on the secondary market because younger folks don't recognize them for what they are.

ROR is also popular, at least in the US.
 

Here's a posting I made that breaks out the various cleaners' ingredients according to their MSDSs:

I just saw this thread, and since I had just cobbled together a holder for SkEye usage a few months back, I thought I'd describe it here.

I used a spare phone clamp from a low cost afocal adapter similar to Starslayer's to start with, but only the clamp part.  The key thing is it needs a 1/4-20 female thread at that clamp, which seems fairly common with these.  I then attached that to a cheap photographic ball head sourced from ebay to allow it to be angled in any direction.  Lastly, I bought a dovetail foot from ebay along with a short 1/4-20 socket head cap screw to thread through it and into the base of the ball head.  If you don't already have a dovetail base, you'll need to add one to your scope.

Here's an image of the assembled holder to help you understand how it all fits together:

1 hour ago, Don Pensack said:

It will work, sure, but the Barlow probably isn't anywhere near its rated power when doing so.

My Meade 140 2x bare nose piece operates at 3x in my Arcturus binoviewer.

20 hours ago, Don Pensack said:

That's one of the reasons people don't typically use Barlows with binoviewers.

I guess I'm in the minority, but I use a Barlow to reach focus, slow down the light cone, and enable using long eye relief, long focal length eyepieces at the higher powers needed for planetary viewing, which is the majority of my binoviewer usage.

I tend to call it the insertion barrel to distinguish it from the upper barrel holding most of the optics.  I don't know that anyone else uses that term, but I wanted something unambiguous when describing eyepiece parts.

Next question, what do we call the point where that barrel ends and flares out to prevent the eyepiece from going in any further?  I tend to use the term shoulder, Tele Vue calls it the reference surface.