Martin63

Mars was just a orang blob for me on 91/18, but Jupiter and Saturn were stunning.

I am going to stay up later tonight and catch Mars higher in the sky.

2 hours ago, John said:

Practically any of alternatives would be sharper in the outer parts of the field of view than the stock 35mm eyepiece I would think.

Yeah a significant portion of the edge is blurry.

26 minutes ago, John said:

Will that show you any more sky than your current 35mm 2 inch though ?

It is the default one that came with the scope, anything must be better? 

On 11/09/2020 at 11:03, Rob_UK_SE said:

Given your telescope’s focal ratio is f5.9, the resulting exit pupil from a 35mm Panoptic would (amusingly) also be 5.9mm. This would be ok, but contrast would certainly improve with a slightly smaller exit pupil under general conditions. I like to use a 4mm(ish) exit pupil for low power views with my dob. I also found the eye relief a little too long on the 35mm pan. However, it is easier to hold your eye in the correct position when using Tele Vue’s eyeguard extender too (might just be my eyes though!). 

My recommendations would be to look into either the 30mm APM ultra flat or 30mm Pentax XW (currently very competitively priced by 365 Astronomy) rather than the 35mm pan. Both of these result in an exit pupil of just over 5mm and have 70(ish) degree fields of view. Other low power options include the APM 20mm XWA (100 degrees) and 22mm Nagler (82 degrees). These result in 3.4mm and 3.7mm exit pupils respectively. The APM will show more sky, but the eye relief is a bit tighter. The Nagler is the most expensive of the bunch, but would probably yield the best overall views when used from moderately light polluted skies, in my opinion.

I think I am going to go with the 30mm APM ultra flat 70 degree. The price is right and I want the extra eye relief.

Thank you everyone for the help! 

I bought my first "real" telescope two years ago. It's a Orion Skyquest Dob.

My first upgrade was a 16mm Explore Scientific eyepiece, I am happy with it

Now that I know I want to continue this hobby I am willing to spend more money and I am looking to replace the 35mm 2" eyepiece that came with my scope. 

I want to be able to use this eyepiece to scan the sky and help find messier objects.  My location is moderately light polluted.

I was looking at  a TELE VUE 35MM PANOPTIC EYEPIECE.

This cost as much as I paid for my scope, what are your thoughts and any recommendations would be appreciated. 

Thanks!

2 hours ago, FenlandPaul said:

Speculative, but might have been a weather balloon, possibly faintly lit by light pollution etc? Just thinking about the bell shape. Your magnification wouldn’t have been particularly huge with that scope and eyepiece, so might account for it?

Otherwise I’m all outta ideas!! 🤷‍♂️ 

That makes sense, It was flying over a more light polluted portion of the sky as well. 

3 minutes ago, barkis said:

At what rate was this dark object moving, were you tracking it by manual movement of your telescope, or your drive.,,? Had you perhaps been looking at bright light prior to looking through your scope?  One's eyes can play havoc when staring through an eyepiece for long periods.  What magnification were you working with, and telescope type.

Ron.

 

It was moving as fast as a satellite, I manually found it was swinging my scope towards Antares, looking for a Nebula so I am sure my eyes were adjusted to the dark. 

XT8 Dobsonian  with a 2" 35.mm lens

Wouldn't it still be bright from the sun hitting it? 

I was scanning the sky last night and I saw what looked like a satellite in the sky. The weird thing is it wasn't glowing and had no lights on it. Just a dark brown bell shaped object going through the sky. 

I tried finding it with the naked eye but could not see it. 

Thoughts?

Thanks