Barlow

[Greg48(newbe)]

hello all,,would it be worth my while buying a barlow for my scope,,its an astro130md,,,would i benifit from it,,would i see much in the differance,,my other EP's are 6mm,10mm,20mm,& a 32mm,,,thank you ,,Greg

[Spec-Chum]

In a word no, your eyepieces overlap too much when halved buddy. The 20 would give you10 and your 10 would give you 5. I wouldn't bother Barlowing a 32 to be honest.

[Greg48(newbe)]

The 20mm,,10mm are the ones that came with the scope,,maybe not the best 1's,,,but any 1 with the same scope buy a barlow,,i know Spec-Chum said no,,,,

[John]

Perhaps put the £'s into replacing the 20mm and 10mm with something a bit better ?

[Qualia]

Assuming a good clear, steady night, magnification is desired when looking for planetary detail, but you will probably find better views with smaller magnifications and training the brain and eye to tweak out the subtle detail in the small image.

All you need is time to practice, a little patience and to sketch what you see.

Your rich-field scope is good for wide, expansive views, but not optimized for planetary work. You don't really want to be magnifying more than 160x, 200x absolute tops on most evenings. Might be nice to upgrade those lower magnification EPs with a couple of BSTs before purchasing a barlow.