New toy

[claire1985]

I have a new toy to play with :-D which inevitably means its my fault it's cloudy, kindly given to me by someone who wishes to remain anonymous, I am eternally grateful to this person.

Needs some eye pieces though, so I need some advice, I'm rubbish at this stuff. Where's the best place to get them from cheap as poss really as money is an issue. And what mag should be I looking at getting? It's a nexstar 5 if that helps with advice giving. Xxx

[planetdnb]

Nice, good luck finding a patch of clear sky!

[michael.h.f.wilkinson]

Nice little scope. SCTs are very good all-round visual performers.

[Vince1963]

Thats a great gift Claire, Generally the cheapest EPs are going to be Plossl you can get the cheaper Kellner, But i think the Plossl would be good for now plus there's a lot of them about . I'd try Ebay, Astro buy and sell http://www.astrobuysell.com/uk/ and classified on here. i'd look for 10mm and 25mm first as these are the most common so there gunna be cheap and they'll get you started. Hope this helps

[Vince1963]

How about these for starters http://stargazerslou...lstron-plossls/ or http://www.ebay.co.uk/itm/Meade-Super-Plossl-DS-26mm-1-25-inch-Multicoated-Astronomicial-Eyepiece-Case-/261189024798?pt=UK_Telescope_Eyepieces&hash=item3cd0143c1e . in fact there's loads on fleabay for next to no money

[rowan46]

You don't want to go much above 8mm which will give aprox 158x mag and you don't want to get anything lower than 32mm because of the tube baffling. This may be a cost effective starter eyepiece not great but it will give a good range for your scope

http://www.ebay.co.u...=item1e73fe84f0

[LukeSkywatcher]

You don't want to go much above 8mm which will give aprox 158x mag and you don't wat get anything lower than 32mm because of the tube baffling. This may be a cost effective starter eyepiece not great but it will give a good range for your scope

http://www.ebay.co.u...=item1e73fe84f0

That could be a good punt. Its about the same cost as a single middle of the road valued EP.

[Vince1963]

Nice one Rowan46, I never thought of that

[claire1985]

You don't want to go much above 8mm which will give aprox 158x mag and you don't want to get anything lower than 32mm because of the tube baffling. This may be a cost effective starter eyepiece not great but it will give a good range for your scope

http://www.ebay.co.u...=item1e73fe84f0

That's a fab idea! Thanks you :-) x

[Pig]

Claire,

I use a Celestron zoom eyepiece with my Nexstar 6SE and it works really well (8-24mm).

It is especially useful when setting the GOTO star alignment.

Get the object in view at 24mm and zoom in gradually to 8mm centering the star as you go, resulting in greater alignment accuracy

[LukeSkywatcher]

Skywatcher is a great brand. A zoom EP is a one stop shop. For 40 quid, i think you could do a hell of a lot worse. I would say go for it.

You really dont need anything below 8mm (as stated above), and the largest EP you would want is something in the 30-32mm range.

This zoom will cover most of that range.

[claire1985]

I'm so useless at telescopes, I've not got a clue when it comes to eyepieces and magnification, mainly because I've never owed a scope, looking forward to learning though, thanks for the advice :-) xxx

[michael.h.f.wilkinson]

I use a 7mm in my 8" SCT on night of good seeing, more often the XF 8.5mm is the limit of what I use. When I had an 8mm Radian as shortest EP I did start to miss the Vixen LV 7mm (good series of EPs, well worth a punt if they come up secondhand, the NLVs are also very good)) I used to have. Zoom EPs do give a lot of versatility, but the field of view they present is a bit restricted. If you wear glasses while observing (as I do), the eye relief of zoom EPs is often a bit uncomfortably short.

If the scope came with a 25mm Plossl (as they often do, mine came with a 26mm of very good quality), I would go for something like a 12-15mm and a 7-9mm eyepiece. If you do not have astigmatism, you can observe without glasses, and two Plossls will help a lot. These can be had very cheaply (I got two very passable Plossls (6.3 and 20mm) for my kids for 25 euros for the pair). Otherwise you will want something with an eye relief (optimal distance between your pupil and the eye lens of the EP) of at least 15mm. The TMB Planetary EPs and clones fall into that category, as do the Vixen LVs. The BST explorers get a good press, and have better eye relief than Plossls, but at 12-15 mm is not as good as the planetaries (16mm) and (N)LVs (20mm).

Hope this helps