Zeta Reticulan

I don't know exactly who will land on Mars first. It's a good bet their first language will be Mandarin though.

1 minute ago, globular said:

That's the fella. Hop and a skip from M80, a nice globular.

Well, soon be spring lol.

15 minutes ago, globular said:

They are in Skysafari under SHJ 225 and SHJ 226.

Cool.

4 minutes ago, maw lod qan said:

Do you think the ancient Astronomers were looked upon as some one special?

With that time being still hunting and gathering would they have been relied on for when and where to focus their attempts at finding food.

Regardless, it is astonishing how so much of mankind's past was spent looking into the night skies.

I think they had less light pollution.

53 minutes ago, markse68 said:

Sharpless seems to be a catalogue of nebulously like the Messier catalogue though rather than stars. It’s got me stumped- I’ve looked on SS in the vicinity of where they should be according to the descriptions but there’s nothing there that i can find 🤷‍♂️ Simbad doesn’t like them either

Mark

Maybe Shapley? 🤔

Yeah, there are too many catalogues if you ask me lol.

36 minutes ago, Neil_104 said:

So a couple of observations I have so far of the Titchy Sixty from looking at it (but not through it yet unfortunately).

Firstly, the felt used for the inside of the dust cap is truly terrible. It leaves small fibres all over the lens! I noticed the fibres when I first took the cap off, thought "oh dear" and proceeded to very carefully remove them. Put the cap back on, then took it off some time later (had to see the lens again)....and all the fibres were back! It was at this point I released they were coming from the felt on the inside that gives a good fit to the dew shield. I've since removed the felt and replaced it with some sticky-backed pads. Problem solved. Really not sure what they were thinking with this. Anyone else had this issue?

Secondly, I can't get over how heavy this thing is. I mean, it's not really heavy at all of course and is probably just a case of it being small, sorry, titchy. Kind of like an optical illusion (but not at all) as in you're not expecting something so small to have much weight to it. Ever had that experience where you take delivery of something heavy in a big box, and by the time you've un-packed it down to the smallest box inside it seems much heavier? Kinda like that.

I've not had any problems with the lens cap. But mine is a V2 and has the original tube ring/dovetail design.

I bought the red X-rings separately as they weren't originally available.

Unfortunately they shifted the centre of gravity. It's the focuser that makes these scopes rear heavy as it is a rack and pinion. I was about to pull the trigger on a 60mm Takahashi but the retailer ran out of stock. I'm not overkeen on Takahashi focusers anyway. So I went for the Titchy instead. I prefer the focuser but it is aimed at AP. Eventually I used the dovetail from the X-rings combined with the original tube ring.

This made it super portable and if I stick to small 1.25" accessories it balances on the AZ5 mount (more or less).

10 minutes ago, markse68 said:

BTW, I’ve been reading about a “double double” in Sco- Sh 225 and Sh 226. Trouble is Skysafari doesn’t recognise those designators. Don’t suppose you know what catalogue Sh is or alternative designators?

Mark

I think it refers to the Sharpless Catalogue.

25 minutes ago, ScouseSpaceCadet said:

The 25mm Celestron X-Cel LX was the first mid range eyepiece I bought to replace the stock Skywatcher 25mm. A pre-owned bargain I had for three years, being replaced with a 24mm 65° Altair UFF. I did enjoy the feel, eye relief, relatively light weight and view through the Celestron, however combined with f5-f6 reflectors there was some edge 'seagulling'.

The new price has increased by approx. a third since I bought mine, so they're less of a bargain with the likes of Vixen, APM, Svbony, Altair etc offering excellent glass in the same price range and for beginners, the ever popular BST Starguiders still holding their price below £50.

Great review, thanks. 👍

You're welcome, and thanks. I agree they're probably less of a bargain these days. I've used the 9mm with a Barlow in a a Newt' for planetary, so never noticed any avian distortion. It's odd how some eyepieces used in reflectors with faster focal ratios can show edge astigmatism, and yet are fine in refractors of the same f/number. 

12 minutes ago, markse68 said:

Thanks- added to list though Sco is very low now

Mark

You're welcome. It's a spring thing for me. If you can find Antares it's pretty easy to spot. I usually only have a few weeks of window before it's too low for me.

22 minutes ago, markse68 said:

Which one?

You can see Beta Scorpii (aka Graffias, Acrab) marked with a reticule in the picture above. It's one of my favourites. 

The Celestron X-Cel LX has an apparent field of view of 60º. There are six internal elements. I have no information on the amount of groups. The eyepiece body is made of black anodised aluminium with orange and white lettering. Celestron declares that it has a 16mm eye relief. They also claim the X-Cel LX are parfocal with the others in the range. Although this is not strictly true in my experience with them. I paid £109 for the 25mm last year.

The housing (including barrel) is approximately 85mm in length and 95mm with the twist-up eyeguard extended. It has a generous eye lens and I make the field stop about 26mm. The housing sports a novel equatorial treaded rubber grip reminiscent of a tractor tyre. The barrel includes a filter thread, adequate baffling and a shallow undercut. The eyepiece weighs around 170g according to my scales and is supplied with its own bolt case.

I now own several X-Cel LX eyepieces. About seven years ago I acquired the 9mm.

It was the first X-Cel LX I bought. As it had a 60º FOV I tended to use it predominantly as a planetary eyepiece. It was only years later that I discovered just how good the 9mm X-Cel was for rich field observing, particularly in short tube refractors.

The original Celestron X-Cel eyepiece range were reputedly among the worst designed eyepieces in the world. They were not particularly successful. Celestron eventually released a new range with the same X-Cel brand name but with the letters ‘LX’ added. So, no confusion there then! These LX versions generally have a very good reputation. Although I have had quality control problems with them in the past. Three or four years ago I had to return three 7mm focal length LX’s consecutively due to visible debris in the field. This was a known problem with some other focal lengths as well. Apparently due to a bad batch. I’ve not had the same problem with recent purchases.

X-Cel LX eye lens dust caps are very close fitting. This seems to be the same throughout the range. The upside is that the cap won’t come off if the eyepiece is in your pocket. The downside is that you may lose a fingernail trying to remove the cap in the first place. Okay, maybe it’s not that bad. The field lens caps are fine.

I got first light with the 25mm X-Cel LX in my 72ED DS Pro Evostar. It gave 16.8x for (about) 3º, 34’ FOV with a 4.3mm exit pupil. My main observing was in the Summer Triangle and the rich star fields within and around it. Collinder 399 (Coathanger Cluster), M57, M29 and M27 were all duly observed. I used an Explore Scientific broadband OIII filter for the Dumbbell/Applecore Nebula and the Veil Nebula. The overall sharpness and colour separation were superb. It is a well corrected eyepiece and showed very little edge astigmatism and no lateral colour. I’d say it had a slight edge on my 25mm TS Optics Planetary HR which has a similar field of 58º. I found the eye placement excellent and with no ergonomic problems, although the 16mm eye relief is a little long for me. The twist-up eyeguard helped with ameliorating this somewhat. I’ve always liked the X-Cel eyeguards. They have an elegant simplicity that works well during actual observing.

Overall this is an enjoyable eyepiece to use and I specifically bought it for the 72ED, primarily due to its comparatively light weight. It’s definitely a keeper.

20 minutes ago, Second Time Around said:

Scorpion in Scorpius for me.

Tail's a bit low for me. The claw on the other hand contains a great double.

The Dover paperback facsimile is back on Amazon.

What fascinates me the most is that this constellation (Taurus) seems to have been identified with a bull/aurochs so long ago. I think I can just about see the 'bull' in Taurus. I can see the lion in 'Leo'. Not so sure about any of the other zodiacal signs. 

2 hours ago, Highburymark said:

It’s also useful as an indoors eyepiece/optics tester, particularly if you have limited space! 

Far out.

OK guys, I have the T-shirts.

59 minutes ago, Highburymark said:

Very nice! They are very capable little scopes in my view - CA control is excellent for an F/6 - inevitable field curvature however. 

Oh, that's so cool and cute at the same time!

Also, the Panoptic really Barlows well in the TV 2x basically transforming it into a 9.5mm Panoptic (1.5mm exit pupil). What impressed me the most was that the 60 EDF is really good for planetary for such a titchy scope. Galilean transit shadows are quite easily detected. I think the telescope is manufactured by Kunming United Optics.

45 minutes ago, Neil_104 said:

Glad to join it, 101 later 😀

If you can suggest what low magnification eyepieces work well for it in your experience, I'd be grateful - looking forward to some relaxed, wide field observing with this thing.

Depends on whether you want to use 2" eyepieces or not. I only use 1.25" now and a minimalist number at that. Basically a 19mm Tele Vue Panoptic for rich field, a TV 2x Barlow and usually a 6mm EP. At the moment I'm using a 6mm SvB (below).

This gives me a 1mm exit pupil and 0.5mm when used with the Barlow.

Welcome to the club.

8 minutes ago, cajen2 said:

It depends how you compare them. I have two Pentax XWs, which are fine EPs, but my Morphs are better and cheaper.

I can't recall what I paid for my Morpheus now. The range were relatively new though. I think they've gone up disproportionally. 

5 minutes ago, apaulo said:

the morphs are great e/ps i just need the 12 to complete the set. unfortunately most but not all retailers keep putting the price up, because they know we will pay it. nothing to do with baader. just greed.

The Morpheus were a reasonable price when I bought my 14mm. Not now.

11 minutes ago, cajen2 said:

The Morpheus range has a 2" barrel as well as the 1.25" so you wouldn't even need an adaptor.

It depends if it's used in a 2" diagonal. It would potentially contact a prism/mirror surface.