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Bino Viewers / Are they worth using ?


Polar Bear

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Fabulous way to look at anything in the sky - binoviewers really are a treat. The best value for money ones are the William Optics binoviewer set. Comes complete with two 20mm wide angle ep's and a 1.6x barlow nosepiece. Best to have a 2" diagonal to plug them into cos it's quite a hefty load for a 1.25".

The views are very immersive and give a 3D space walk feel. Tip - Get wing shaped eye guards to go with them to block stray light from the sides. :)

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Thumbs up for binoviewers :) if it's only for the fact that I find it a lot easier to observe.

In cyclops mode I have to close on eye and strain the other, with binos it's relaxed and I can observe much longer.

The only problem might be the 70mm of your scope as the binos halve the light throughput per eye.

But then Thomas over there on CN swearse by his Telementor with binos and his scope has only 63mm diameter.

You might want to consider the Baader Maxbright binos. Can be attached to the T2 Baader diagonal fir the shortest lightpath and with the 3available Glas Path Correctors you will get every scope into focus.

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Binoviewers gives wonderful views as I experienced at SGL6 this year. However, you need to be careful using binoviewers on refractors and Newts.

My F/7 frac has a great focuser but I could not obtain focus using William Optics binos in a 2" diagonal. I only gained focus using a 1.25" diagonal and the 1.6x barlow.

So check before you buy.

Mark

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Reading Marks post - I should mention that I use my bv's primarilly on the Sct which has a large mirror throw for focussing. Other scopes I can't vouch for save to say I have seen them on large fracs - but not seen them on newts at all. :)

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I think you should try before you buy. They do work for many people but I'm not one of those people. For me they are a constraint. If they did for me what they do for many people I'd be right in there, however. Astrosoc or star party should help you decide.

Olly

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Hi Paul

I don't know if they will work on your scope, but yes I have a wide rande of EPs but only ever really use my Williams optics binoviewers and a barlow.

Better views right out to DSO's and so comfortable. If you use just one eye to view. Is that your best eye ? would you hop around if you had two legs ??. Soon as I got keen on astronomy i wondered why most people use one eye ?.

Stevie816

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Hmmm. I don't have binoviewers but I do go to the opticians. Right eye 6/5 just. Left eye 6/5 OK. Both together - still 6/5, but the same letters are vastly easier to read. I'm sure the same would hold for astronomy. I'm not persuaded though, mostly because I don't want the expense and clutter. Also, I'm pretty sure that most of the time I'm atmosphere limited rather than acuity limited, but I guess I won't know for sure until I try.

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The difference in image quality is extreme with binoviewers - more than twice as good - I'd say that (for me) it feels like four times better in terms in terms of clarity.

However - as Olly says - it's quite clear that some people just can't get on with them; even struggling to merge the images in some cases. I've never understood how that can be the case, but it can't be denied that some people just don't take to them

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Just to back Olly up, I had a pair of WO bino viewers and could never get on with them so sold them. Just couldn't get to a stage where I felt they were improving what I was looking at, and found them quite cumbersome.

Plenty of people do though, but just check you are not someone who doesn't

Cheers

Stu

Sent from my GT-I9000 using Tapatalk

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Thanks for all the info folks.

I do worry that due to my short sightedness (left -2.25 / right -2.75) that I may have focussing problems , or do they normally have individual EP focussing as with astro binoculars ?

As many have said they may be a definite 'try before you buy' item.

Paul

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