40mm SUPERWIDE

[Nevy]

Has anyone got or looked through an old Meade 4000 SUPERWIDE 40mm smoothie , are they any good ?

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[alan potts]

I've looked through one but it is a while ago, I was not able to compare new against old, but I would say that there was little differences that I remember between that and the 40mm SWA I have, The edges may have been softer on the older one. These I believe were made in Japan and as such should be good quality. I have looked at a few reviews in the past on this eyepiece and many people rate them highly. I would say yes they are good but I am not sure on faster scopes. I used it on a Meade F10 scope, if it can't be good on that ,then , well what can it be good on.

Alan.

[rwilkey]

What sort of scope will you use it with as this affects the suitabilty of the eyepiece, they don't suit all scopes for example...

[Nevy]

Mainly a C11 (F10) to fill in the gap between a 31 nagler and 55 plossl , although it may get used occasionally with F 4.5 & F5 dobs as the 55 plossl works quite well as it can fit the pliadies in the whole field.

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[rwilkey]

Not tried the Meade, and also i am not fond of very low power, but if the 55mm works for you the 40mm should work OK, I have heard good reports about the 'smoothside' series.

[Nevy]

Ok thanks for the replies alan & rwilkey, I havnt got it yet but it's on the way so I'll try it when it arrives , I don't expect it to be in the same league as the nagler but I don't use very low powers that often so I thought it was worth a punt as I'm very pleased with the 4000 Japanese smoothside plossls so if it's the same quality as them it should be alright.

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[John]

I hope it's better than the old 18mm and 24.5mm 1.25" Meade superwides (the old 4000's). They were OK at F/10 but, given their price, I was pretty disappointed when I used them at F/6.

The 2" Meade SW's might have been a bit better though, especially if used in slowish scopes.

[Nevy]

It arrived today (with its little brother)

I'll report back with to how it performs when I've had a look through it.

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[Nevy]

I've had a quick go with it in the C11 , I only managed a quick look at andromeda with it before clouds came in , I like it , the edges arnt perfect but I didn't expect it to be , it gave a very nice view of m31 with the other two smaller galaxies in the same field , no averted vision needed , very nice it's a keeper.

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[michael.h.f.wilkinson]

I am curious to hear how much you will use the 40mm. I found my Paragon 40mm (69 deg AFOV) got very little use in my C8, since I have a 31T5 at my disposal. It has only a slightly larger field stop (probably the same as a 55 Plossl).

[Nevy]

Yes I did notice it is about the same field as the 56 plossl although the image is bigger , I probly won't use the 40mm that often which is why I bought it , if I was to use that low power alot I would have got a 41 mm panoptic, it was a suck it and see purchase.

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