Looking for a 3x Barlow

[TheWelshMagician]

I'm looking for a 3x Barlow plus 4x and 5x, so I can add them to my collection and use them to the best of my ability, anyone have any preferences and links please

[AlexB67]

Perhaps it is worth considering you already seem to have a nice collection of eyepieces. The reason to buy one is to consider what is missing if you feel a need for a specific magnification. For example a 2x barlow with the 12mm would give 6mm, nice magnification to have. but a 3x barlows and above, as far as  know are rarely used for visual work anyway.  A 5x times would not be useful at all pretty much, for the 25mm it will give 5mm, you already have it.  Any of the other eyepieces would result in magnification you'd rarely use with a 5x.  

Unless I misread the post, I would consider saving your cash or buy a UHC or OIII filter or something else you do not have that may be more useful at this stage perhaps. Sorry if I am coming at this from the completely wrong angle and misread, but not sure why you would want to add a 3x,4x and 5x barlow at this point.

No doubt some can suggest a good brand for a 3x. I've never used one so can't really help there.

[ronin]

Try Alan at Sky's the Limit, he has a few 3x barlows that sound good.

Will say I can see little use for a 3x as the jump it makes to an eyepiece can easily make the lower length eyepieces useless. I doubt that a 3x will be any use with the 5mm or 8mm BST eyepiece, and a 4x would render the 5mm, 8mm and likely the 12mm unusable. So you do not gain "additional" eyepiece focal lengths.

[TheWelshMagician]

I've read that you need a 3X Barlow to view Mars which visits our evening skies on 8th April, the only reason I want 4 & 5 X is so I can go further, I'm so intrigued to see what I can see :-)

[John]

Your 5mm eyepiece gives 200x when used on it's own or 400x when used with the 2x barlow you have. The 8mm BST with the 2x barlow gives 250x and that would be the max thats useful, even on Mars, for 98% of the time. I don't think a 3x, 4x or 5x barlow would be any use to you to be honest with you - the magnifications produced would be largely impractical.

[rwilkey]

I've read that you need a 3X Barlow to view Mars which visits our evening skies on 8th April, the only reason I want 4 & 5 X is so I can go further, I'm so intrigued to see what I can see :-)

You will see nothing more with 3, 4 or 5x Barlows, these are for astro-photography work, not visual.  I would say leave Barlows altogether, your ep collection is sufficient for all possible seeing conditions, but if anything, only the 2x Barlow will be of any use to you.

[TheWelshMagician]

Thanks for all your replies, I have recently bought a modified camera (which I need to add to my signature) so as an added question, would it be useful to get the barlows for the camera?

[rwilkey]

Only if you need them for inward focus travel (afocal), in my view, then you would only need the one, most AP's I've read get the 5x, but I hasten to add that I am not a photographer.

[luminova11]

I have one of the Skies the Limit 3x ed barlows and it is not bad at all. I have only had a chance to try it briefly on the Moon but it seems to hold up pretty well with my MV 16mm 68° giving 225x in my SW 8" dob. For £24 I say give it a go. If you find it useful you can always get something better in the future if you feel you need it.

Sent from my LG-D802 using Tapatalk

[denis0007dl]

My recommendation would be APM 2.7x ED barlow, which you can use even at 3.2x without image breakdown.

...and it costs no much 

[Charic]

I had the Revelation 2.5x Barlow, and it was no good for my 5mm. Too much power resulted in terrible images. I've since sold that on ( It was  a good Barlow, but not realistic for the 5mm BST  most nights. That said, I purchased a Skywatcher Deluxe 2x Barlow. On this Barlow I can un-screw just the lens, and screw it directly onto an eyepiece. Its perfect now on the 5mm at 1.5x Barlow during the right seeing conditions (the best session I had for the Io (Eye-Oh!) Moon transit some time back?) and my recent best was 1.5X on the 12mm BST on Jupiter again.  As said above, A Barlow helps to increase magnification, and fills in the gaps in an eyepiece collection. I would suggest more Barlow's will be,  IMHO a waste of your money!

To get the best from what you have, is to frame the subject correctly, Your combination of  EP's allow this. If you want bigger images, more detail, more contrast, then a bigger telescope is what's required, not Barlow's?. Your eyepieces would transfer to the new scope, unless the focal ratio gets to fast, then you may need better EP correction for the coma?

Maybe your getting aperture fever already ?

[astrofox]

We buy barlows for two distinct reasons:

1: To increase the focal length of the scope whilst visual observing. Harking back to my photographic days focal adaptors (Barlows) where available but the conventional wisdom was to leave them well alone as they only magnified the image and a prime lens would always beat them on resolution.

2: AP. This is where the barlow comes into its own. Often with planentary imaging the image size is too small for the camera and needs magnifying. Barlows of x2 to x5 reign supreme in controling image size on the chip.