High Powered Eyepiece

[rizzi]

Hello all, I just have a question regarding high powered eyepieces.

I have a Skywatcher 130p dob (130mm apperture f/5 650mm focal length) and I was considering getting a high powered eyepiece esp to view Saturn. Couple of my candidates are

1) http://www.firstlightoptics.com/william-optics-eyepieces/william-optics-spl-eyepiece.html (3mm)

2) http://www.firstlightoptics.com/vixen-eyepieces/vixen-npl-eyepieces.html (4mm)

Any good? Any suggestion?

Thanks

[fredster]

The 3mm SPL is a nice eyepiece but that would be 217x in your 130P, a little too high for most nights of the year and may spend more time in your kit bag. The Vixen 4mm will be incredibly tight on eye relief and not that nice to use. But it is cheap and people seem to like the optical quality of them.

Another suggestion maybe the TMB Planetary clone, like the ones sold by the Skies the Limit and others. Only costs a little more than the Vixen 4mm but has very comfortable eye relief, still sharp and lots of sizes to choose from (2.5, 3.2, 4, 5 etc).

http://www.ebay.co.uk/itm/4mm-Planetary-Wide-Angle-Eyepiece-58-degree-angle-1-25-fitting-/120827981145?pt=UK_Telescope_Eyepieces&hash=item1c21e8ad59&_uhb=1

[Matt Scunthorpe]

The vixens are cheap enough for you to take a gamble on, and like Fred above said, people seem to like them.

Another one to throw into the mix is the Celestron Xcels, i have a collection of them and the Eye relief is very good on the 9mm. Cannot comment on one as low as 4mm as i dont have one, but they are same price as the William optics.

Hopefully someone who has used them personally will be along soon

[Qualia]

Saturn does take magnification well and 217x is possible, but it just depends if you want an EP that you may not get to use that often. 200x is more realistic and I think upping the magnification won't necessaily show you any more detail. I'd stick around the 150x to 200x and learn to pick out features by spending more time at the EP, training the brain and eye to what is being seen and gradually tease out the features under the compromise of scope and viewing conditions. I don't own a fast scope, so looking at this theoretically, it might be an idea to buy a more comfortable 7mm with decent eye-relief (a BST or X-Cel LX - which I highly recommend) an EP which would show up the beautiful wide-field possibilities of an f5 and be very useful on Jupiter, the Moon etc and then barlowing it for my work on Saturn. Just an idea

[Lenny147]

I had a Vixen NPL 10mm and couldn't get on with it as the eye relief wasn't great, I have a 25mm which is excellent though

Sent from my iPhone using Tapatalk

[bendiddley]

thumbs up on the celestron x-cel lx's, i've got the 7mm and 12 mm and they are great!

[rizzi]

The 3mm SPL is a nice eyepiece but that would be 217x in your 130P, a little too high for most nights of the year and may spend more time in your kit bag. The Vixen 4mm will be incredibly tight on eye relief and not that nice to use. But it is cheap and people seem to like the optical quality of them.

Another suggestion maybe the TMB Planetary clone, like the ones sold by the Skies the Limit and others. Only costs a little more than the Vixen 4mm but has very comfortable eye relief, still sharp and lots of sizes to choose from (2.5, 3.2, 4, 5 etc).

http://www.ebay.co.u...21e8ad59&_uhb=1

Have you used it? Haven't heard of this brand before

[cantharis]

For a bit more, the Baader hyperion range offer good eye relief and with the finetuning rings a range of focal lengths.

[Matt Scunthorpe]

I always thought (and was told) that 5-6mm is the lowest you want to go to, just because you need almost perfect seeing conditions to use much less.

[rizzi]

For a bit more, the Baader hyperion range offer good eye relief and with the finetuning rings a range of focal lengths.

Sorry but I think the Baader hyperion are out my budget at the moment.. but I have looked into them and they are really cool!

Are these any good? http://www.firstlightoptics.com/skywatcher-eyepieces/skywatcher-sp-plossl-eyepieces.html

Or this http://www.ebay.co.uk/itm/4mm-Planetary-Wide-Angle-Eyepiece-58-degree-angle-1-25-fitting-/120827981145?pt=UK_Telescope_Eyepieces&hash=item1c21e8ad59&_uhb=1

Thanks

or this

[knobby]

Hi Rizzi, so far you've looked at 30 quid EPs but been recommended EPs from 65 to 105 quid

Here's a great ep for 47 quid... Somewhere in between!

Good luck choosing

[fredster]

Sorry but I think the Baader hyperion are out my budget at the moment.. but I have looked into them and they are really cool!

Are these any good? http://www.firstligh...-eyepieces.html

Or this http://www.ebay.co.u...21e8ad59&_uhb=1

Thanks

or this

The Ebay jobby is the one i recommended further up the thread. Great for the money at £37. You get decent eye relief, good on axis sharpness and decent contrast.

As for the Plossl, they are great in focal lengths above 9mm where the eye relief can still be tolerated but at 4mm its a real no no. The eye relief is approx 70% of the focal length, so about 3mm. Real nasty.

[rizzi]

this a cool website I think lol and I've selected three eyepieces, and this is my fourth option http://www.ebay.co.uk/itm/4mm-Planetary-Wide-Angle-Eyepiece-58-degree-angle-1-25-fitting-/120827981145?pt=UK_Telescope_Eyepieces&hash=item1c21e8ad59&_uhb=1

Which do you guys think I should go for? Sorry this is the last time I'm gonna bother you.

Its just that I wanna get it right with my eyepiece coz I live far away from UK and have to rely on people coming from there or if I go there myself.

Thank you guys

[cs1cjc]

I like my (20mm and 30mm) NPLs, but I think 4mmm is unlikely to be comfortable. 3mm is very short as others have said. I would go for the 5mm X-Cel LX

http://www.firstlightoptics.com/celestron-eyepieces/celestron-x-cel-lx-eyepiece.html

[LukeSkywatcher]

Hello all, I just have a question regarding high powered eyepieces.

I have a Skywatcher 130p dob (130mm apperture f/5 650mm focal length) and I was considering getting a high powered eyepiece esp to view Saturn. Couple of my candidates are

1) http://www.firstligh...l-eyepiece.html (3mm)

2) http://www.firstligh...-eyepieces.html (4mm)

Any good? Any suggestion?

Thanks

I have the same scope (Heritage 130P) and i love the Vixen NPL eyepieces. They are cheap(ish) and they work amazingly well with the scope. You really dont need/want a 4mm eyepiece to observe Saturn because it will race across your FOV even before you see it and tracking will be near impossible (if not impossible). Personally when observing planets, i dont go below 8mm.

The optical quality of the NPL is brilliant. They are tack sharp almost across the FOV and they are very contrasty (they really show shades of white/grey well against the black background of space).

[CSM]

I suggest you try something like the Skywatcher 7 -21mm zoom eyepiece. You can find out just how often you are likely to use a high power eyepiece and then decide if you really want to splash out. A decent 2x Barlow would also help with your existing eyepieces - not the one you have.

[rizzi]

I have the same scope (Heritage 130P) and i love the Vixen NPL eyepieces. They are cheap(ish) and they work amazingly well with the scope. You really dont need/want a 4mm eyepiece to observe Saturn because it will race across your FOV even before you see it and tracking will be near impossible (if not impossible). Personally when observing planets, i dont go below 8mm.

The optical quality of the NPL is brilliant. They are tack sharp almost across the FOV and they are very contrasty (they really show shades of white/grey well against the black background of space).

can you make out that saturn has a ring with a 8mm vixen?

[fredster]

That's the beauty of a short focal length widefield eyepiece. It gives you a decent field in a dob to just let the object track across, then just nudge back and let it go again. I regularly track planets at 200x+ with my AltAz setup, no problems at all. I think you would be aiming too low at 81x. The scope and you are capable of more.

A zoom with a barlow is a very good idea. You can then find a power that works best for you, the scope and the skies. The cheaper zooms tend to be soft at the high power end and narrow at the low power end. With a barlow added you don't need to use the extreme high power end. I found the Skywatcher/Celestron/Seben 8-24 zooms pretty good. And yes i did say Seben, its the same zoom as the others. The zooms also have decent eyerelief and a wide field from 12mm to 8mm.

[wookie1965]

Sorry just to confuse you or maybe help you a 5mm or 8mm BST explorer at £47 are reasonably priced and are very good in fast scopes ive got the 8mm and Jupiter through that is amazing ive seen the red spot and 4 bands and that was from light polluted skies cant wait take scope to dark site.

p.s you can get them from here http://www.skysthelimit.org.uk/ and Alan who owns shop is really helpful.

[chiltonstar]

For what it's worth, I have an Orion ED80 scope with the same FL (600mm). I tried a few different EPs to give me the theoretical max magnification for the aperture and settled on the Orion 3.7mm ED Epic - this is excellent for planetary and double star viewing and has very good eye relief (I've found that small children can use it easily!), which is unusual for high-powered EPs. Heavy though and I don't know how it would work with a fast reflector.

Chris

[wookie1965]

For what it's worth, I have an Orion ED80 scope with the same FL (600mm). I tried a few different EPs to give me the theoretical max magnification for the aperture and settled on the Orion 3.7mm ED Epic - this is excellent for planetary and double star viewing and has very good eye relief (I've found that small children can use it easily!), which is unusual for high-powered EPs. Heavy though and I don't know how it would work with a fast reflector.

Chris

Its a nightmare advising people on eyepieces as there's so much opinion i had same thing when i asked and your so right about getting the right one for fast scopes that's the most important thing no matter how good the eyepieces are in scopes its how they perform in fast or slow ones.

[breezy]

the bst`s are good, alan at skies the limit is out of stock of the 8mm at the mo but new delivery is expected nxt week i think.

he also lets you try an eyepiece out to see what you think as well, worth giving a ring

[John]

Its a nightmare advising people on eyepieces as there's so much opinion i had same thing when i asked and your so right about getting the right one for fast scopes that's the most important thing no matter how good the eyepieces are in scopes its how they perform in fast or slow ones.

Even more of a challenge when you live in Bangladesh as the OP does and presumably can't switch eyepieces quickly and easily as we can if your initial choice does not suit.

My recommendation would be to go for one of the 4mm TMB Planetary "clones" such as the ones Skies the Limit sell. They are not perfect of course but pretty good for their cost, are comfortable to use (decent sized eye lens and good eye relief) and work well enough with F/5 scopes. I don't think I'm the first poster in this thread to recommend one of these though.

With a 130mm / 650mm scope the above eyepiece will deliver a very usable 163x which should show as good views of Saturn, Jupiter, Mars, the Moon etc as the scope is capable of showing. More magnification won't show any more detail, just a larger, and quite possibly less well defined image.

[breezy]

darn i forgot rizzi was in india, see thats the net for you, we are all so close but yet so far in some cases

[wookie1965]

Even more of a challenge when you live in Bangladesh as the OP does and presumably can't switch eyepieces quickly and easily as we can if your initial choice does not suit.

My recommendation would be to go for one of the 4mm TMB Planetary "clones" such as the ones Skies the Limit sell. They are not perfect of course but pretty good for their cost, are comfortable to use (decent sized eye lens and good eye relief) and work well enough with F/5 scopes. I don't think I'm the first poster in this thread to recommend one of these though.

With a 130mm / 650mm scope the above eyepiece will deliver a very usable 163x which should show as good views of Saturn, Jupiter, Mars, the Moon etc as the scope is capable of showing. More magnification won't show any more detail, just a larger, and quite possibly less well defined image.

Reminder to myself read everything not just post didn't even click OP was in Bangladesh.