Zeta Reticulan

Well. they're 'cheap' compared to other TV eyepieces lol.

I honestly don't know. I know Orion sourced from GSO, and probably a fair bit from Synta and Barsta at one stage. Distributors like Orion have to rely on OEM's to manufacture their products. Any changes will disrupt supply chains.

Well, if it is a Vixen, it will be at least as good as a Vixen zoom. Vixen zooms have been manufactured in both Japan and China in the past. There have been endless debates over whether Chinese made or Japanese made zooms are better. I doubt there's any difference.

I've lost track lol. I'm pretty sure Orion are not an OEM.

I'm not totally sure where Orion source from. Plus some of their products are a tad bespoke. This 90mm Mak' is Synta, but AFAIK no else does a 90mm with a Vixen style dovetail.

I believe Meade were acquired by Jinghua Optics & Electronics at one time. There is also a Bresser link somewhere.

It's not so easy to find Orion stuff here at the moment. I'm not sure how this is going to play out.

Well, it's an educated guess, as JOC seems to make about 80% of this stuff lol.

I think they're made by JOC.

Could be an old Vixen. TV and Meade marketed variations I believe. They were all made in Japan I think.

This unusual ‘alleged’ Abbe fully multi-coated orthoscopic has a focal length of 4.8mm. I say ‘alleged’ as I don’t actually know if this is indeed a genuine Abbe design. From what I can gather it has two lens groups consisting of a triplet and a single lens. So, the odds are it is an Abbe eyepiece and very probably manufactured on mainland China. Mine has no brand name but these eyepieces have also been sold as Kson, Ascension, Apogee and University Optics orthoscopics. The eyepiece has no dust caps but it is supplied in its own plastic bolt case. The housing is almost exactly 50mm tall and appears to include the tapered barrel as an integral part of its aluminium housing. The barrel itself has a 28.5mm filter thread and is competently baffled. I discovered that my Baader, GSO and Lumicon filters all threaded fairly smoothly into the barrel. However, Meade and Barsta 2x Barlow elements were not easily threaded in all of the way. A GSO 2x short Barlow element threaded perfectly. The eyepiece features a flip-up rubber eye guard which is a rarity on most orthoscopics. I couldn’t separate the barrel by unthreading it and I assume it is essentially a monocoque design, which is also unusual in my experience. The housing is very light as a whole and feels a fair bit lighter in the hand when compared to both a 5mm Kokusai Kohki orthoscopic and a 6mm Vixen NPL Plossl. The build quality seems perfectly adequate even though it’s obviously a relatively inexpensive Abbe eyepiece. Especially compared to Takahashi and Ohi built orthoscopics which can cost up to twice as much (and then some) as the forty quid (£39.60) I paid for this particular eyepiece. The AFOV is a claimed 48° which is a good 6° wider than most Abbe orthoscopics and I suspect the extra field is created by the deployment of a larger field stop than usual for its focal length. As it is purportedly a true Abbe the extra field is probably to aid target acquisition and would be expected to exhibit an amount of lateral edge astigmatism. There is a claimed eye relief of 4.2mm which is 0.15mm longer than a 5mm Ohi Abbe orthoscopic. I got first light with the 4.8mm using my 72ED DS Pro. The seeing was a good Antoniadi II~I but the transparency was distinctly below average. The orthoscopic gave a convincing sharp and well contrasted view of Saturn at 87.5x. Saturn was fast approaching transit and I could see a fair bit of detail on the planetary surface and the rings, including the Cassini Division. In fact, I thought the contrast was better than the 6mm Vixen NPL that I directly compared with the 4.8mm ortho’. I then turned to Jupiter. The detail was very well contrasted in the equatorial belts with excellent visual acuity. I occasionally witnessed some small amount of chromatic aberration around the planetary limb but it wasn’t particularly bad. I could sometimes detect an amount of scatter near the field stop and even some sporadic ghosting, although again, it wasn’t really a problem. Europa was right next to the limb and about to transit. I observed it once it was past the limb itself and could still see the moon above the surface of the gas giant for several minutes. Meanwhile the already poor transparency was getting worse. I decided to split some doubles while I could still locate any before the steadily encroaching cloud enshrouded them. The extra 6° of field helped me find Iota Cassiopeiae more easily, but it took a 2x Barlow to properly reveal all three stars of the system at 175x. The stars were all well defined and their individual colours were easily perceived. The expected lateral astigmatism was basically undetectable when using the Barlow. But even without the Barlow it didn’t seem particularly problematic and was far closer to the field stop than I expected. I split a few more doubles at 87.5x including the Double Double, Struve 2470/74, Albireo and Almach. I could also quite distinctly see the Ring Nebula, albeit often using averted vision. Eventually I turned back towards Jupiter and could make out the GRS pretty easily at 87.5x. Apparently orthroscopic eyepieces are expensive because it is costly to properly and accurately cement the triplet part of the element. The use of an inexpensive housing may be a way to keep the overall unit cost down. I assume these eyepieces are made somewhere in Asia. They could be an attempt by a Chinese OEM to produce orthoscopic eyepieces in a cost effective way. If it is, they aren't quite there yet. Although one day there may be very reasonably priced, good quality, Chinese made orthoscopics on the market.

I agree it's a pretty reasonable price for an Ohi ortho'. Although I don't see any real difference with TS Optics. FLO is much more convenient for UK customers of course. I'm hoping one day the Chinese will learn how to make orthoscopics properly. I'm pretty convinced this was made in China. Could do better lol. They'll probably get there eventually.

Tak' have recently ceased production of their current ortho's and the LE's. There were 7mm ortho's in the past but the most recent series was: 32, 25, 18, 12.5, 9, 6 & 4mm. Maybe they will re-introduce a 7mm in a new series. Ohi have a 7mm, mine is a KK. Some are old 'Astro Hutech'.

You could put a zoom into a Barlow.

I'll take your word for it. TBH I'm glad it is aluminium. Although, it wouldn't have necessarily detracted from the quality of the diagonal. The Tak' diagonal seems robust enough. Everything TV's built like a tank lol. I'm glad you enjoyed the review.

I bought the Orion E-Series 7-21mm Zoom for £56.99. There are other zooms that appear identical to this eyepiece selling under other brand names. They undoubtedly originate from the same OEM. There are differences in their respective retail prices. The first thing that I noticed with the Orion ‘E-Series’ was how physically light it was. The Orion website says it is 136g (although I weighed it at 150g) which would make it around 20-25g lighter than my unbranded ‘Sky-Watcher’ 7-21mm zoom of almost identical proportions. The E zoom is 94mm tall, 43mm wide, and I make the eye lens and field lens 25mm and 16mm respectively. Orion Telescopes and Binoculars claim a 16mm field stop. They also state that there are six elements with a 40.0° - 57.0° FOV and the lens edges aren’t blackened. The housing and barrel are aluminium and the barrel has an undercut and a filter thread. The coatings seem fine and the other thing that I noticed is that it doesn’t seem to rattle as much as its ‘Sky-Watcher’ equivalent. In the past I haven’t had much success with 7-21mm (or thereabouts) zooms. The ‘Sky-Watcher’ 7-21mm zoom was prone to a bit more chromatic aberration than I can generally tolerate. My Pentax XF zoom (6.5-19.5mm) also displays some lateral colour on lunar and planetary targets. At around 22:15 BST on the 27th of May there weren’t many twilight stars to observe. The transparency was decidedly below average, although according to some of my software the seeing was predicted to be good. I got first light with the E-Series zoom placed in a 3x BST Barlow with my modified ST80. This gave a range of around 57x to 171x. The target was a very visible Arcturus; the fourth brightest star in the sky. The rubber eyecup can be folded down and the overall ergonomics were satisfying. I found that the eyepiece was pleasant to use with no eye placement issues. My first impression was that it was showing some chromatic aberration. I rapidly realised that this was a combination of the 0.2 magnitude of ‘ɑ Bootis’ and the fact that I was using an inexpensive achromat. I had a quick look at Vega, the fifth brightest star in the sky, and patiently waited for the night to get darker. As soon as I could discern ε Bootis through the poor transparency I decided to try and split it. The anxieties I had earlier about false colour were abated. The split at around 160x was very sharp and apparent. It appeared like the Orion had an acuity superior to my Celestron zoom. The magnitude 4.7 binary companion was very distinct and the colours of both stars were quite striking. I thought that the zoom mechanism itself was fairly smooth and precise. There is no clickstop indicator. I then tried Cor Caroli which is an old favourite of mine. I was still impressed by the overall clarity and colour separation from a zoom in this price range. Next up were a rising Albireo and ε 1 & 2 Lyrae. The seeing may have been better than the transparency as the ‘Double Double’ was a particularly effortless split. All four stars were cleanly and sharply split even at around only 100x magnification. At 170x they were still incredibly bright and acute. I spent the next hour splitting other doubles until it inevitably clouded over. I initially purchased this zoom primarily for double star observing while placed in a Barlow. It hasn’t disappointed me. The combination of light weight, relatively comfortable ergonomics, and visual acuity seems to belie its competitive retail price.

Ergonomics are very good, it feels like a slightly larger 6mm ortho'. There are a couple of extra degrees of field, probably to aid location. Contrast is excellent, but slightly less transmission than a 6mm Ohi.

I'd not had the 2" TV long and I wasn't sure if the base was plastic or not. I thought that if it was it would most likely be expensive plastic. What's most curious about the response from CN is the petty vindictiveness of it all. A virtual lynch mob assembled braying for my execution. It's not like I gave the diagonal a poor evaluation or anything. It's still a very nice diagonal. Even if it had a polymer base. After all Takahashi use them. Still, on CN, it brought out a bunch of little girls who think someone's pulled their pigtails. Honestly, you couldn't make this stuff up. Feel the hate lol.

It certainly is an addictive clicklock lol.

OK, thanks.

Yeah, I agree with you. GSO are phasing out their undercuts. I have no idea why TV aren't following suit.

I threw them away and used the barrels on other EP's. I'm tempted to get another one day.

They're not cheap, that's for sure. Cheaper than Tak's though.

They both mysteriously developed debris in the field of view. I couldn't clean it. I think it migrated from the rubber around the field stop.

Thanks. I'm a big ortho' fan myself. FLO sell the Ohi now. I have a few under different brands.