Planetary EP for a skywatcher 200p dob

[Paulhenry85]

Still not a single clear night so my plan is to buy an additional 2 eye pieces to go with the supplied ones I've got, so too be ready for them clear nights . I've bought a 32mm skywatcher panaview eyepiece for DSO and I'm happy I've made the right choice for my telescope, using reviews and topics found on here, but I would like an eyepiece for planetary observing but with so many brands, I'm after a couple of recommendation for my f6 dob so I can swot up on my budget is £150.

[John]

Do you wear glasses when observing and do you have any preferences such as a wide field of view for your high power eyepiece ?.

For £150 you could get two orthoscopic eyepieces which would provide excellent lunar and planetary views but, like all orthoscopics, they have a narrowish fields of view and you need to get your eye close to the top lens so not suitable for those who wear glasses.

A 7mm (171x) and a 5mm (240x) would be useful focal lengths.

[bingevader]

The 32mm PanaView is a great choice for the money in this 'scope. Yep, it's a little soft around the edges, but still one of my most used EPs.

I have a 5mm, it's lovely, but only on good nights. My 6mm (200x) is used much more often and I can whole heartedly recommend it in this 'scope. A 7mm or 8mm would be a safer bet.

John's orthos would be fab, but the eye relief will be a little tight if it's something that bothers you.

The 8mm BST gets very good reviews on here, but I've not tried it. The Sky Watcher SWA 70^o also come in 8mm, but there aren't many reviews on them atm.

Cheers

[Paulhenry85]

I

Do you wear glasses when observing and do you have any preferences such as a wide field of view for your high power eyepiece ?.

For £150 you could get two orthoscopic eyepieces which would provide excellent lunar and planetary views but, like all orthoscopics, they have a narrowish fields of view and you need to get your eye close to the top lens so not suitable for those who wear glasses.

A 7mm (171x) and a 5mm (240x) would be useful focal lengths.

I don't need to wear glasses when observing, but I am slightly short sighted and only use glasses when driving at night, I forgot to mention I'm a newbie so have little experience, I'd like comfort when using the EP if that makes any sense, when I 2x Barlowed the 10mm supplied EP I ended up with face ache!!, I budgeted £150 for the one piece so if I could get a recommendation on size and some brands I'll be able to start finding reviews ect, thank you.

[Paulhenry85]

The 32mm PanaView is a great choice for the money in this 'scope. Yep, it's a little soft around the edges, but still one of my most used EPs.

I have a 5mm, it's lovely, but only on good nights. My 6mm (200x) is used much more often and I can whole heartedly recommend it in this 'scope. A 7mm or 8mm would be a safer bet.

John's orthos would be fab, but the eye relief will be a little tight if it's something that bothers you.

The 8mm BST gets very good reviews on here, but I've not tried it. The Sky Watcher SWA 70^o also come in 8mm, but there aren't many reviews on them atm.

Cheers

Thanks for the recommendation I had to google WO SPL I've noticed everyone abbreviates but I'm getting better at trying to work it out

[Qualia]

When it comes to planetary viewing, Paul I've noticed that slight changes in the focal length of eyepieces makes a difference to what can be tweaked from the given object. In terms of general useful magnification, I have a little collection of EPs which run the following parameters:

• f/10: 200x, 166x, 142x, 133x, 111x, 100x, 83x.
• f/5: 250x, 208x, 178x, 166x, 138x, 125x, 104x.

For Lunar work, all these magnifications offer up something to be amazed by. The low power help frame the Moon, the mid-range frames craters and seas and mountain ranges and the high-power helps tweak out subtle features like terraces, tiny craters, ray grazes etc.

For Jupiter, I typically use mags between 140x to just over 200x. I have gone to 250x on a number of occassions but generally find I'm working between 180x to 200x in the 10" and between 140x to 160x in the 4".

For Saturn - Again I have found 140x to over 200x useful mags to play around with. You can go higher here, but a lot will depend on the night's atmospheric conditions.

For Mars, I figure Jupiter is about 3x the size of Mars and to see Jupiter nicely is, say, at around 200x which means that for me to get a 'similar' view of Mars I need 600x. Well, I'm just not going to get that kind of viewing quality. So, I figure a compromise is needed, say, around 250x which still means seeing conditions will have to be very good. As such, I haven't found Mars a particularly giving planet..

For Solar work in white light I find about 50x is a nice working magnification which can be upped to around 100x for more detailed work when skies allow.

Other than that, in general, try to view the given object as close to the zenith as possible and bear in mind that as a general rule of thumb the brightness of an object will decline as you up the magnification. If I up the mag twofold, say, I'm reducing the image brightness by a factor of four. If I keep on doing this eventually details just disappear.

On the other hand, increasing the mag does make detail more apparent, so, as you can appreciate, we're now at a trade-off: will increasing magnification gain more detail even though I'm making the object fainter?

I've found that playing around with this trade-off - dependent on the evening's seeing (LP doesn't really affect planets, Moon or the Sun) - does make a difference. Even as little as 1mm increase or decrease in the mag - about 10% to 15% difference of magnification - can be quite surprising which is the main reason why most planetary observers will have quite a run of high-mag EPs.

For planetary work, I use Orthos and in particular those that were made by Baader - the Baader G.Os which are no longer in production. These do crop up from time to time on the secondhand market (often overpriced). Nevertheless, John has made some excellent reviews of the Hutech and Baader Classic range which appear to be of very similar quality and sharpness.

The B.G.Os in particular - and I imagine it to be the same with the Hutechs and perhaps with the Classics - will give you a quality of image just about as good as it gets. If you want a similar quality image EP but with a wider field of view and perhaps a more comforting eye-relief (I haven't had any problems with the BGOs) you're going to have to spend more, a fair bit more.

Final thought, whenever possible try to sit with your given planetary object for a peaceful twenty to sixty minutes or so (at least) and you'll find that they'll be moments of great clarity and seeing. By practicing attentive sitting you come to notice more and more detail from the given object.

Here's a relatively recent sketch of Jupiter with the triple moon transit. Needless to say, the actual size of the object was a tad bigger than a large pea in the palm of my hand, the Jovian moons no bigger than a . but with sufficient time, questioning and observing I think this gives you a good idea of what should be possible with your 8" and a decent but cheap Ortho from First Light Optics.

[Lee M]

I've just added a Meade 6.7mm to my 8mm & 5mm BSTs. I was out early the other morning and Jupiter was stunning in the 8mm but 5mm was too much. Really needed something inbetween. Equally there will be times when 8mm is as much as you can do in the 200p. I think at the high mag end a bit of choice is a good thing.

Around 8mm seems fairly safe. If the seeing is so poor that you can't use that then pack up and have a beer. 5mm I tend to only use for the Moon and star tests. Maybe try to find something 6 to 7mm as well.

[John]

Good information in the last couple of posts - this is why I suggested that you should be looking to get a couple of high power eyepieces - you need that versatility   

[Paulhenry85]

I've just added a Meade 6.7mm to my 8mm & 5mm BSTs. I was out early the other morning and Jupiter was stunning in the 8mm but 5mm was too much. Really needed something inbetween. Equally there will be times when 8mm is as much as you can do in the 200p. I think at the high mag end a bit of choice is a good thing.

Around 8mm seems fairly safe. If the seeing is so poor that you can't use that then pack up and have a beer. 5mm I tend to only use for the Moon and star tests. Maybe try to find something 6 to 7mm as well.

How did you find the 6.7mm, have you had a chance to test it out?

[nerointegrale16v]

i would recommend 2" eyepiece around 30/32mm ish (ostara/explorer scientific) and a 1.25" TMB 2 planetary eyepiece 5/6mm ish

martin

maybe these

http://www.ebay.co.uk/itm/Explore-Scientific-2-68-deg-Series-Argon-Purged-Waterproof-Eyepiece-34mm-/111078869301?pt=LH_DefaultDomain_0&hash=item19dcd10935

http://www.ebay.co.uk/itm/Explore-Scientific-2-68-deg-Series-Argon-Purged-Waterproof-Eyepiece-28mm-/111076447688?pt=LH_DefaultDomain_0&hash=item19dcac15c8

from USA (tax???)

http://www.ebay.co.uk/itm/6-0-MM-TMB-2-PLANETARY-EYEPIECE-1-25-58-FOV-ASTROBITS-/271283615799?pt=UK_Photography_Telescopes&hash=item3f29c37837

http://www.ebay.co.uk/itm/TMB-Planetary-II-wide-angle-eyepiece-5mm-focal-length-1-25-fitting-diameter-/271105043115?pt=UK_Telescope_Eyepieces&hash=item3f1f1eaaab

have good look at FLO  or harrison telescopes

[bingevader]

Sorry about the abbreviations!

If you are looking at spending around £150 on an EP, then you might look at the Explore Scientific EPs. They have a 6.7mm and an 8.8mm. There's a review of the whole set here.

Cheers

[Paulhenry85]

Qualia thank you for taking the time to reply with such a detailed post, you've definitely inspired me to start making a journal of my nights out, it's something I already do when I'm out mountaineering. It could make for interesting reference in the future.

Thanks for all the advise, from what I gather for my first high power EP I should get one no lower than a 6mm as this seems to be what will work best overall in my scope, so with that my short list is:

http://www.firstlightoptics.com/skywatcher-eyepieces/sky-watcher-swa-70-eyepieces.html sky-watcher swa 8mm

http://www.firstlightoptics.com/william-optics-eyepieces/william-optics-spl-eyepiece.html WO SPL 6mm

http://www.firstlightoptics.com/baader-planetarium/baader-hyperion-68-degree-eyepiece.html baader 8mm Hyperion

http://www.firstlightoptics.com/celestron-eyepieces/celestron-luminos-eyepieces.html celstron luminos 7mm

http://www.telescopehouse.com/acatalog/Meade_5000_Series_HD-60_6.5mm_LE_Eyepiece.html Meade 5000 6.5mm

Is anything in the list I should avoid or that I should consider? If not I'll start swotting up.

[Andy_E]

Sorry about the abbreviations!

If you are looking at spending around £150 on an EP, then you might look at the Explore Scientific EPs. They have a 6.7mm and an 8.8mm. There's a review of the whole set here.

Cheers

I must admit the 6.7mm ES 82 was my first thought on reading this thread. Either that or a second hand radian (though they seem to be harder and harder to come by these days)

[John]

If you can find one, a used Tele Vue Radian is a great bargain these days at around £100 apiece. Comfortable eyepieces to look through and very sharp too. 

Keep an eye on the UK Astro Buy & Sell website - you never know what might come up.

[russ.will]

How about a Maxvision 16mm SWA for 59 Euro and a really good 2x focal multiplier like the ES/Meade 2x Focal Extender?

The MV is widely reckoned to be the equal of a Panoptic (don't let the price fool you) and with the Focal Extender (Televue Powermate clone) you will have an 8mm EP that performs and feels in use, exactly like the same EP at half the focal length. It's not a Barlow, which I'm not a fan of due to the way they increase eye relief and is, to my eyes, very transparent in use. I lent mine to John and he was very complimentary about it.

Every 1.25" EP you buy afterwards will effectively double up at a shorter FL, increasing your EP collection at a far higher rate if you go this route. That and the fact that a mid range FL like 16mm is a seriously handy EP to have in the collection.

Russell

[Paulhenry85]

How about a Maxvision 16mm SWA for 59 Euro and a really good 2x focal multiplier like the ES/Meade 2x Focal Extender?

The MV is widely reckoned to be the equal of a Panoptic (don't let the price fool you) and with the Focal Extender (Televue Powermate clone) you will have an 8mm EP that performs and feels in use, exactly like the same EP at half the focal length. It's not a Barlow, which I'm not a fan of due to the way they increase eye relief and is, to my eyes, very transparent in use. I lent mine to John and he was very complimentary about it.

Every 1.25" EP you buy afterwards will effectively double up at a shorter FL, increasing your EP collection at a far higher rate if you go this route. That and the fact that a mid range FL like 16mm is a seriously handy EP to have in the collection.

Russell

I think for the time being I'm gonna slowly build a small collection of fairly decent eyepieces I've got a decent low power eyepiece which I've just got out the box (lovely clear skies out at the moment, just shame about the moon being so bright) the panaview 32mm and a revalation 2inch with the 1.25inch adaptor 2x barlow which works well but I'm convinced a purpose eyepiece will give better views. Only time will tell I suppose as I work through my list of options

[John]

The trouble with using a barlow with a long focal length eyepiece is that the barlow pushes the eye relief (the distance that your eye needs to be placed above the top lens of the eyepiece) out further. You can find yourself having to "hover" your eye above the top of the rubber eye cup to find the correct eye placement which is not really comfortable and lets light get onto the top lens of the eyepiece which reduces contrast.

Barlows seem to work better with medium to short focal length eyepieces and, with the latter, the extension of the eye relief can actually make observing more comfortable.

I think your plan to slowly develop a set of good quality eyepieces is a sound one. Good quality eyepieces will serve well in any scopes you may own in the future and many of us have probably wasted quite a few £'s on what seemed like good economical eyepiece decisions at the time   

[Lee M]

How did you find the 6.7mm, have you had a chance to test it out?

I've only tried it on the Moon so far. It seemed quite sensitive to eye position and as my widest angle EP so far I think it might take a session or two to get used to.

[Lee M]

I've just found Uranus for the first time. Looked very nice in the 6.7mm and I now appreciate benefit of the wide angle in a manual dob. Great to have a good FOV for the object to pan across before having to adjust. I'm liking it

[Paulhenry85]

Thanks for all the feedback guys I decided on the 7mm skywatcher nirvana in the end and it works perfect with me scope, it's everything I was hoping for. I've done a review on it for anyone else wanting a similar ep http://stargazerslounge.com/topic/198890-7mm-skywatcher-nirvana-uwa-82-degree-fov/#entry2095538

[bingevader]

Excellent, I'm glad you're enjoying it!

Cheers