Skywatcher Heritage 130P Eyepiece Advice

[skyatnightfan]

Hi,

I was wandering if anyone could offer some advice on additional eyepieces.

I've currently got the two stock eyepeices the 25mm which gives 26X and the 10mm which gives 65X.

I've also got 2 orbinar plossls 6.5mm and 4mm.    Which give 100x and 162X.  However i've had some serious quality issues with these as stated in a previous post.

I'm currently looking at the skywatcher planetary eyepieces.  They have a decent looking 4mm Planetary eyepiece with good eye relief.  Giving 162x.

I'm also considering the skywatcher 7-21mm zoom eyepiece, to fill the gap.

Would these be a good buy for my scope?  As you can see i'm on a rather limited budget.

Or would a barlow combination with a larger mm eyepiece work better?

I've been put off getting a barlow for the heritage as i've heard there's focusing issues.

Any help would be much appreciated!

Thanks

[AlexB67]

As budget eyepieces go the BST and Vixen NPL are in similar price range and  popular for this scope, as some others,, there are plenty alternatives.  For the barlow the Skywatcher Deluxe barlow I have will work fine in 2x mode, but the 1.5x adapter alone I cannot reach focus with in the Heritage.  One point to note is that if you go for an eyepiece with short eyerelief like  a plossl at high power, you may find it to be very hard to use having no eyerelief to work with, having to squeeze your eyeball right up against it, with glasses on this is impossible.  For the really high power a 6mm UWA with 2x barlow as I have is easy to use and easier on the eye.   

Personally I am not that keen on the skywatcher barlow, not because of the hassle putting It on, but apart from the brighter targets like the moon and planets I find that it noticeably reduces quality, loss in contrast and light loss in general, versus the same magnification with an eyepiece alone. Good expensive barlows do exist, or the powermate which is not a barlow, but fullfills the same function, but they'll cost more. 

In the end as is often the case you can spend as much as you like on eyepieces, much more than that scope is worth,  and the more you pay, usually the better It gets, but for the price personally I think in the Heritage the BSTs I am very happy with as a very noticeable upgrade from the stock eyepieces, bearing in mind that this is the best I've ever looked through anyway so I would not know any different.  For slightly more to quite a bit more the SE maxvision are better still, I have not tried them, but they are highly recommended on here, as are of course the TV plossls if you are happy with a 50 degree FOV. I can't comment on a good zoom myself.

No doubt others will add to the list of things. Good luck

[Schorhr]

Hello,

stay clear of the zoom. The seben 8-24 is said to be better, check the reviews, but you may not like Seben anymore now ;-)

I have one of the 21-7, with another lable, the ts 21-7, and the 21mm range is so narrow it makes no sense to use... I rarely use it with my Heritage.

Plus you get two wide angle eyepieces with similar performance regarding sharpness of thhe outer field for the same price (or more if you order them at aliexpress instead...)

http://m.ebay.co.uk/itm/140717462903

http://m.aliexpress.com/item/1219476347.html

The only downside is that they are only available in 6, 9, 15 and 20. The 20mm is okey-ish but the shorter focal length ones have a barlow element and do work better at f/5. I find their sometimes mentioned flaws (some kidneybeaning, some uneasy viewing through the 6mm) not troublesome, at least with the one I own.

Those seem to be Erfle types at first glance, but I read they are another modified Plössl design... Who knows. At 20-27£ not bad at all, even if the outer field is not completely sharp at f/5.

The tmb or hr planetary perform better (depending on what eyepiece focallength exactly of course, there are differences) but have a smaller aparent field of view...

The 2.5x ed barlow someone here had troubles with. The cheaper achromatic ones I have from meade and seben do work well for the 16/13£ I got them for.

But a fixed focal length eyepiece beats them.

It all boils down to your budget, and whether or not you like to tinker (as changing the 66deg or tmp barlow elements distance changes their magnification, can be a nice project for DIY, or buy the astrozoom adapter, compared to the 7/21 the afov stay the same but the range is smaller).

I mostly use a 30mm seben/orbinar (hurray) plössl (52deg),

Much more a simple a 20mm erfle (70deg)

and the 8mm hr (58deg),

and if conditions allow 3.2 or 2.5mm hr planetary.

I do use the 6mm 66deg eyepiece but have not had many nights of observing with it yet. The large aparent field of view is stunning, the smaller exit pupil compared to the 8mm make it a bit less universal but not as much.

The 2x seben achromatic barlow is a great way to fill gaps in magnifications, it's better made then the cheap meade 3x I own.

They both beat the cheap plastic ones but won't do mirracles. Both don't cause focus problems.

In general three or four eyepieces are enough, depending on how much you want to spend, what you want to observe, and how the conditions are there. I would not want to miss my 2.5 and 3.2mm eyepieces, but the occasions observing really benefits of them are rare due to seeing conditions.

Budget solution imho is the 6 or 9mm 66deg eyepiece and a 30 or 32mm Plössl. Plus barlow. But if you decide on a more expensive one, you may want to invest it in a good eyepiece instead.

King solution is a 24mm68deg 1.25" (or whatever gives the maximum field on the 1.25" focuser), defenately a 8-10mm eyepiece (tmb/bst or better ES) and either two more filling the medium magnification and high mangification, or a good barlow if you can find one that won't cause troubles. OR, the astrozoom of course. I use my 8mm as fixed eyepiece now as I didn't have a extension tube for the 1.25" focuser as it's a short and tight fit otherwise, plus the eyepiece is lighter and a lot smaller by itself. Fits into my pocket that way and does not disturb the Heritage's balance ;-)

[skyatnightfan]

Thank you both for the very helpful advice.  it's given me a lot to think about!

I'm not going to bother with the zoom lens now after what you said and after research. 

The idea of a Barlow lens is appealing.  I think with the current eyepieces this will be a good range.

I definitely want a planetary eyepiece still.  As you say the 3.2mm at 203x may not get used as much.

I was thinking of getting a 4mm planetry eyepiece, which gives 162x and on the very rare occasion the conditions are good i'd barlow up the 6.5mm lens i've already got to get 200x.

With regards to the barlow it's a difficult choice.  As you said AlexB67 about the image quality i probably shouldn't go for the skywatcher.

Do you know of any other barlows that are compatable with the heritage?  I've tried researching but come up blank.  I'm willing to spend a little bit more for quality if it works.

If not i'd reluctantly have to go with the seban, at least it shouldn't fall onto the mirror 

Proto star in terms of image quality how do you rate the seban barlow?

Thanks again!

[AlexB67]

Honestly I don't know what barlow to recommend for a reasonable price that would be better, suffice it to say that they will exist. Personally I find I rarely use one,  except on planets, the moon I find it to be rather quite good actually since it is so bright anyway.  With that scope I am not a magnification freak myself that often,  I find Jupiter/saturn views very appealing at 108x with the 6mm already. I'd probably get a 4 - 5mm at some stage that would do for me in that scope, that would give me 130 - 160x or so. I would be happy enough with that myself. Sure I've put the barlow in with the 6mm to give me 216x, but to put it in perspective with the barlow I have, to my eyes at least I tease out as much the view in terms of how pleasing they are at lesser mags mostly, unless the skies offer that, given that brightness and contrast suffer with my barlow anyway.  

If you are going to get a barlow and decide on that route the only thing I would say decide earlier rather than later, so you can plan your eyepieces accordingly to get the range of magnifications you want, and therefore do not end up with redundant overlaps that eyepieces already offer.  It would be worth spending quite a bit on a decent one IMO.  For me the powermate 2.25x would be the ideal,  but that will set you back quite a bit but will be a good long term investment if you are prepared to stretch it.  That being said, I am sure less costly and quite adequate solution barlows exist.    

You may also like to have a read of this

http://stargazerslounge.com/topic/145241-barlow-or-powermate-which-is-better/

[Schorhr]

Proto Sar is just the user ranking ;-)

The 2x Seben does introduce some chromatic abberation. The moon is a blast though. Planets will seem a bit less crisp (I compared the 6mm66deg+2xSeben with the 3.2mm HR Planetary on Saturn, but it was standing rather low).

Double stars will work too with the barlow, such as Albireo.

As the Seben's price on ebay increased, there may be someone to reccomend another one available in the UK. Also I saw a zoom barlow.

Seben http://www.ebay.co.uk/itm/Achromatische-Barlow-Linse-BA2-2x-fur-Teleskope-31-7mm-/200607942106?pt=DE_Foto_Camcorder_Okulare&hash=item2eb52a45da

Cheaper TS barlow I have not tried is http://www.ebay.co.uk/itm/achrom-Barlow-Linse-1-25-Kunststoff-fur-Einsteiger-Teleskop-2BLK-/390658420139?pt=LH_DefaultDomain_16&hash=item5af50e6dab , they do have some good more expensive ones.

"Zoom" barlow by changing the distance to the eyepiece

http://www.ebay.de/itm/Compact-1-5x-to-2-5x-Zoom-Barlow-Lens-/120985251224?pt=LH_DefaultDomain_3&hash=item1c2b486d98

But again, not sure if this has acceptable optics or not.

ED Barlows will cost at least two times as much. They do make sense if you have a good eyepiece to zoom with... Though I think I would favor the Astrozoom over that.

From my experience with the cheap barlows I noticed even "brand names" have quality issues (bad black coating for example) if you go cheap.

But even combining a 20mm Eyepiece with a 2x and a 3x achromatic barlow works. I used this embarrassing combination a couple of times on the balcony to just look at the moon quickly. Not reccomended as a standard optic equipment ;-) But I had to try it and it worked a bit better then I excepted. http://www.ringohr.de/tmp6//barlowbarlow.jpg

The great thing about the heritage is that you can change the tube length in case you can't get into focus.

Also you can build a zoom eyepiece if you are handy, even with hardware store parts;

http://www.ringohr.de/tmp6/PipeZoom.png

Some barlows can't be disassembled though, eyepieces are a bit too small to fit into the pipe without additional sleve/fitting, and the pipe would need blackening to increase the contrast - - - making it a bit difficult but a nice project.

[skyatnightfan]

Sorry Schorhr! Proto Star would be a cool name though. 

Thanks again.  I'm going to go for the seben barlow.   One day when i'm rich i'll buy a more expensive one but optically speaking i was happy with the seben eyepeices so i'll go with it.

One more question if i may,  I'm going to get 2 planetary eyepieces not 1.  Checked with the missus 

Either a 6mm which will give 108x and 216x

      

A 5mm which will give           130x and 260x or

A 4mm which will give           162x and 324x

Now i know the 324x and 260x is far to much magnification and would never really be used.  But I'm wandering which 2 to pick.

AlexB67 with the 6mm are you able to see banding on jupiter? I do like the fact it could double up to 216x, which could be useful for say mars.  The seban plossl at 6mm just about showed detail for me but with not much eye relief. However it gave a very nice view of uranus.

Do you think the 5mm at 130x and the 4mm at 162x are too close together?  I've already got a 6.5mm and 4mm seban plossl but as i'm a glasses wearer that's why i like the idea of the planetary viewers. 

Going round in circles in my head!

[Schorhr]

Don't worry, it does sound like a neat name ;-)

I don't think the 13/14gbp TS barlow will be worse or better, so you could go for that one.

The two middle bands of Jupiter will be visible with almost any telescope and eyepiece ;-)

I think the best would be the 6mm as it will also be usable for many deep sky objects / clusters and such.

260x is nice if the seeing is good, which it's rarely. And 216x will show the most usually, as the telescope's practical limit depending on the mirror should be considered in that range.

Magnification is not everything, I probably use the 20 and 8mm the most. Planet's are neat, but for deepsky objects a usable exit pupil, probably around 1.5-3mm is more versatile.

[AlexB67]

I can see banding  yes on Jupiter at 108x, how much varies on the night. Can I see the rings on saturn clearly, yes, and Cassini div, IIRC, also a yes when skies were good, but it has been a while now since I saw Saturn. Mars I never tried in this scope.

For planetary doubling that up with the barlow with the moon being the major exception I would honestly say that the barlow I have at least made it not worth it most of the time, considering the smaller  FOV, extra nudging needed too, and often the atmosphere not letting up, plus the reduction in quality from the barlow,  all that combined In the end mad me seldom use it. Mag can also be a bit of a personal thing mind you.

Than being said something that would offer me  something in the range that gives 160x - 180x times with a straight eyepiece would be nice in this scope no doubt about it, and with a decent barlow there is no reason the same cannot be achieved,  but since I now also have a second scope with longer focal length, my existing eyepieces give me those sort of higher mag ranges anyway, so it is now much less of a need as I did not end up going that route.  I admit had I not had the second scope I would have ended up buying a 5mm BST, or a planetary at 3 - 4 mm even to add to the collection by now and avoided the barlow myself, given that I decided early on a barlow was not for me, and try to get enough of a set of eyepieces instead. 

Don't take that as a barlow being a bad thing though as I said earlier,  they can even offer some benefits in other areas too besides just giving magnification 

[skyatnightfan]

Phew, finally decided.

I'll go with the seban barlow, the 6mm Planetary eyepiece and the 4mm Planetary eyepiece.

Thanks so much for your help!

[happy-kat]

I learnt I have a preference in eyepiece design. With a light poluted backgarden I much prefer eyepieces with a floppy top design like the supplied 10 and 25mm ones.

[skyatnightfan]

I learnt I have a preference in eyepiece design. With a light poluted backgarden I much prefer eyepieces with a floppy top design like the supplied 10 and 25mm ones.

The 25mm gives nice views!  Light pollution is a problem.  Have you considered a light pollution filter?  I got a cheap one off ebay and have had mixed results.

It makes the sky go darker, you can see a bit more detail on jupiter, and it brings out detail in the orion nebula!  It really brings out the colour in the plieades as well.

AlexB67 and Schorhr i decided in the end to go for a 5mm BST and the seben barlow.  Just tried out the BST eyepiece and it's stunning!

So much eye relief at a good magnification!  With Jupiter i was able to see the two bands fading in and out.  With a light pollution filter it was easier to see detail.  

I'm half thinking the scope may be out of alignment or it's just me being impatient.  Did the out of focus star test though and it seems fine :-).

Next target was the orion nebula.  Absolutely stunning at 130X!  Possibly the best sight i've ever seen through a telescope.

I think 130x is a nice comfortable magnification for this scope.  Anything higher would need constant adjustment.

Thanks for the advice :-)

[Solar_observer]

I'm getting this scope in the morning and I've also got the 5mm bst on order. I'm glad your happy with this ep and the 130x magnification. I'm not sure if it would have worked but you have just put my mind at rest. Thanks for reporting your find :-)

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[Solar_observer]

Says fedex and my heritage is out for delivery :-) and maybe.....just maybe, clear skies tonight.

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[happy-kat]

My sodiums got changed for led street lights so filters have ziltch affect with these reading posts.

Have the GSO 32mm for big views.

Hoping to actually use it tonight :-)

[skyatnightfan]

Says fedex and my heritage is out for delivery :-) and maybe.....just maybe, clear skies tonight.

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Good stuff!  Nothing beats getting a new telescope.  Lets hope for clear skies!

[skyatnightfan]

My sodiums got changed for led street lights so filters have ziltch affect with these reading posts.

Have the GSO 32mm for big views.

Hoping to actually use it tonight :-)

How annoying!  Hopefully they'll invent some led light filters one day..

I bet the 32mm looks good scanning through the milky way.  Does it give better views than the stock 25mm?

[Big_Daz]

The Heritage 130p is a great little scope for the money, we should start a Heritage beginner group lol.

[Schorhr]

Clear skies & quick delivery-trucks! :-)

The 5mm eyepiece is a good choice.

With Barlow or a 2.5mm eyepiece the magnification is too high for most nights.

IF the seeing is great, the telescope collimated and the mirror decent, it will be amazing though on moon and planets, under dark skies even at some brighter DSO.

For double stars it's usable more frequently.

The 25mm is Ok, the 10mm not as good but of course usable.

After using a good wide angle eyepiece, the craving to replace them will come soon ;-)

The 32mm Plössl are not ideal on f/5 BUT they will show the maximum field on a 1.25" focuser and make the ideal eyepiece for searching and simply wander over the night sky.

I use a cheap 30mm Plössl and would not want to miss it :-)

The HR Plantary eyepiece and probably th BST eyepieces as well can be unscrewed and the bottom barlow element moved downward, though I don't know of a source for extension rings, so it's only up for the tinkerers. By changing the barlow element's distance the magnification increases further...

Anyway, enough rambling, have fun with your telescope!

[Solar_observer]

Guess what this is? :-)

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[Big_Daz]

Guess what this is? :-)

Are we excited much????

[Solar_observer]

Just a little :-) I have too walk the dog first though

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[Schorhr]

*holds ear to package*

Colllimateee meee

[Solar_observer]

Don't wish that on me ....lol

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[Schorhr]

Don't worry, it'll be fine, and even if it's not 100% it will show a lot of things :-)