Advice on starter scope upgrade

[woodward2]

Hi, and sorry this has turned out to be a bit long, but I do tend to waffle …

After a lot of reading and research, I took the plunge a little while ago and ordered a Sky Watcher Heritage 130P f5/650mm from Scopes'n'Skies. I'm very pleased with the scope; build quality is excellent, much higher than I was expecting with a “starter” scope and it is easy to carry outdoors! Having got to know the scope, I have a few questions:

1. At the moment I want to keep my options open and explore the whole range of planetary, stellar and deep sky object observations. Is that feasible in relation to question 2?

2. I would now like to upgrade to better eyepieces. The two supplied with the scope were no-names, which seem to be [Sky Watcher Sky-Watcher Super-MA Series Eyepiece upgrade set] From all I read, I didn't expect too much of them, and I wasn't disappointed! - fringes of colour around bright objects (chromatic aberration?) Having read the excellent article by Warthog on eyepieces in the Beginners Help and Advice forum, I think I would like to buy a small range of super Plossls. From what I have researched the Meade 4000 series seems to be about the best compromise for my budget (£100-£150). I was thinking of a 6.4mm, 12.4mm and a 26mm. What do you think of the Meade 4000's and my choice of focal lengths (given question 1)?

3. I'm confused about Meade/GSO. Again, reading on here, I understand that GSO make the optics for Meade, yet they seem to get mixed reviews, whereas Meade are generally positive. If I understand it correctly, GSO offer an eyepiece kit (Revelation Photo-Visual EP kit) consisting of 9, 12, 15, 20, 32mm eyepieces + filters + Barlows for slightly less than I would pay for the 3x Meades. How come? On the principle that “you get what you pay for” am I better of avoiding this set?

4. Rother Valley Optics seem to offer the best price on my choice of Meades. Any opinions on this company?

5. Finally (!) I live in a fairly light-polluted town centre. I bought an anti-light pollution nebula filter with the scope [Sky Watcher 1.25" anti-light-pollution nebula filter (LPR)] but when I tried to view the Andromeda galaxy, I could see no discernible difference with or without the filter. Both were just a vague fuzzy blob. Is this likely to improve with better eyepieces, is the filter no good, or am I wasting my time with DSO's from a town centre location?

Thanks for your patience in reading. Any comments will be appreciated.

Andrew Woodward

[nightfisher]

if its any help i use the GSO ep`s and rate them very highly

[jimmyjamjoejoe]

Eyepieces are kind of a personal choice... Try and find somewhere you can test them first, if not, just buy one and see how you get on.

Consider a quality barlow too, since it will reduce the number of eyepieces you need to buy. In your example above, buying a 6, 12, and 24mm piece could be reduced, since a 12mm + barlow would be equivalent to a 6mm, or a 24mm + barlow = 12mm etc etc.

[woodward2]

if its any help i use the GSO ep`s and rate them very highly

Did you buy them separately, or the "Revelation" kit? I just don't see how they can do that many EPs + extras for the price without compromising quality!

[woodward2]

Eyepieces are kind of a personal choice... Try and find somewhere you can test them first, if not, just buy one and see how you get on.

Consider a quality barlow too, since it will reduce the number of eyepieces you need to buy. In your example above, buying a 6, 12, and 24mm piece could be reduced, since a 12mm + barlow would be equivalent to a 6mm, or a 24mm + barlow = 12mm etc etc.

Presumably, Barlows come in different "qualities"? i.e two Plossls + a decent Barlow is better than 3x Plossls, but 3x Plossl is better than two Plossl + cheap Barlow???

[jimmyjamjoejoe]

I don't know much about quality of barlows, there will be good and bad ones, but from what i read the tal barlows are pretty acceptable and you can pick one up for about £40. Think of it as a long term investment, seeing as it doubles your effective number of EP's, any EP's that you buy in the future will effectively be 2 for 1.

[ronin]

GSO make eyepieces for Meade but like all things the eyepieces will go through some sort of test before released. This probably amonts to a couple of seconds over a laser and a sensor to detect the resultant pattern. After this I guess they are graded, marked and sold to whoever.

GSO will make eyepieces for more then just themselves and Meade.

For the budget you have given I would suggest that you look at the BST Explorers as well. They have a good reputation and are £41 a piece I think. Skys the Limit seel them and Alan has a good reputation also.

Not heard of any problems with Rother Valley and they get good reports when people review them.

Andromeda is a fuzzy blob, even if you get a 10" scope it will still be a fuzzy blob. The fact that you could locate it and see it means you are not too bad.

[brantuk]

The eye piece kits are always a tempting solution but by the time you subtract the value of everything but the eyepieces then divide whats left by the number of ep's, you often find you're spending equal or less per eyepiece than the supplied ones.

I've used GSO-s and they represent a decent step up in quality from supplied eyepieces. They do suffer a fair bit at the edges though - but as stated above - everyones eye are different and it depends what you personaly get on with best.

As for barlows - best in the £30-£40 (new) region are the Tals. A better choice would be the Orion Shorty Plus or Celestron Ultima (essentially the same). These have a proven track record and have been very popular for a long while (around £80 new).

A very good buy is the Antares 1.6x 2" barlow - especially second hand £60-£70. Much above that and you're into Powermate territory - best magnifiers in the market imho.

But as always - the best thing you can do is get to a local obs group, or astro soc, failing that a star party. You'll find plenty of folks willing to let you try their ep's and barlows so you can decide what you like best for yourself. HTH

[cantab]

5. Finally (!) I live in a fairly light-polluted town centre. I bought an anti-light pollution nebula filter with the scope [Sky Watcher 1.25" anti-light-pollution nebula filter (LPR)] but when I tried to view the Andromeda galaxy, I could see no discernible difference with or without the filter. Both were just a vague fuzzy blob. Is this likely to improve with better eyepieces, is the filter no good, or am I wasting my time with DSO's from a town centre location?

I'm not speaking from first-hand experience, but my understanding is nebula filters work best with actual nebulae, which emit distinctive wavelengths of light.

[iceblaze]

Hello woodward2,

I tend to think of GSO products as the blue-colar, working man's astronomy gear. However, they have produced some legendary products, such as the Orion branded SkyView 90mm Refractor (compared to the Synta equivelant). You can pretty much blanket all GSO products as "decent".

Here's a scenario where I purchased GSO over other brands:

I have a small 90mm refractor achromatic telescope that came with a disappointing ST-80 plastic single speed focuser. I didn't want to spend the $500 on a Feather Touch focuser as that would be overkill for this little Chinese refractor. So, instead I purchased the GSO 2" crayford style focuser for about $140. It's all metal with really good machinery, and although its not as smooth as a Feather Touch, there are guides online to fine tune this particular focuser, like this one: GSO Focuser

HTH

-James

[twotter]

In my plossl case I have a mix of Meade 4000s and GSO Revelations. They give equally good views, but I prefer the GSOs, as they are around £10 an EP cheaper and also have a retaining groove which I like to use.

Recommended

[woodward2]

Thanks everyone for your replies so far!

jimmyjamjoe, brantuk: I will have a look at Tal Barlows as you suggest.

ronin: Will look at BST Explorers. Thanks. “Andromeda is a fuzzy blob, even if you get a 10" scope it will still be a fuzzy blob. The fact that you could locate it and see it means you are not too bad.” Must be doing something right then! Yeah, before purchasing the scope I spent a while trying to learn my way around the sky with naked eye / binoculars. Also rely on Stellarium to help me

brantuk: I will certainly try to get to a local group, but at the moment time is at a premium, with family, work and church commitments <sigh>.

cantab: hmmmm, maybe I was a bit too hasty in this purchase. I must admit I didn't do as much research on this as I did for the scope. I paid more attention to the “anti-light pollution” bit than to the “nebula” bit!

iceblaze: I would probably consider my self a “blue-colar, working man” LOL (I'm a school science laboratory technician).

twotter: Thanks for the thumbs-up for GSO!

[jimmyjamjoejoe]

Don't write off filters completely - It's just that nebula filters are generally narrowband and specific to certain types of nebulae. One nebula filter won't be good for ALL nebula, since they emit different wavelengths of light etc, so you'd need several to cover all your bases.

That said, you can get UHC filters (Ultra High Contrast) which are apparently great for cutting out light pollution.

In essence, with the nebula filters you're filtering out EVERYTHING except a very narrow wavelength specific to nebulas, whereas the UHC filters will filter out only wavelengths close to the sort of thing you'l get from light pollution, leaving everything else visible.

Obviously there are varying qualities, and it depends on your type of light pollution, plus you'l get slightly dimmer images since inevitably SOME of the light from your targets will be at the same wavelengths as those of the filter, but bottom line, many people see improvements by using UHC filters.

[woodward2]

... In essence, with the nebula filters you're filtering out EVERYTHING except a very narrow wavelength specific to nebulas, whereas the UHC filters will filter out only wavelengths close to the sort of thing you'l get from light pollution, leaving everything else visible. ...

Just re-checked the blurb of the filter I purchased:

"1.25" anti-light-pollution nebula filter (LPR) The filter rejects specific wavelengths of light, typically the wavelengths emitted by mercury and sodium vapor lighting (the two main types of urban lighting) while allowing the important wavelengths for the viewing of nebulas like Hydrogen-Alpha, Hydrogen-Beta, Oxygen III, as well as wavelengths of the visible light spectrum to pass through."

I think maybe the item description is a bit mis-leading. It isn't as you say a nebula filter, allowing only certain wavelengths, but rather claims to reject specific wavelengths which sounds more like what you describe. If it does what it says, it should work I think?

Oh well, will try it again when I get another clear night ... maybe even tonight!

[valleyman]

Your discription of Andromeda was very much spot on "A fuzzy Blob" . Thats all most of us see.