Anyone else truly happy with there EP collection?

[swamp thing]

Don't John. I'm skint after putting a new engine in my van. I daren't even look at AB&S right now

[John]

....Of course I'll not mention that word solar and Ha, seeing I've seen some members selling their kit  because they are hooked on it. Best solution for me,  Don't look through a solar scope, don't want to go an sell half of the stuff I bought again   

I owned a PST for a short while. It was nice to see the Sun in Ha but the solar bug did not really grab me. I feel a little like "the odd one out" with the current scramble for solar gear but there you go ! 

[alan potts]

I think if I had a PST it would have melted today, 35 degree, crazy weather. For what it's worth, it don't bother me either, I can always do a projection and look at Sun spots.

I have a clear sky but I am not saying it will last, forecast gives me 2 hours, still better than nothing.

Alan.

[Mark at Beaufort]

Over the past few weeks I have reduced my eyepiece collection by half. I still retained my 8mm, 13mm and 21mm Ethos EPs and I bought a  new Pentax zone for my PST and double star viewing in my Frac and Mak/Cass. So accept for a pair of 25mm plossls and a pair of 15mm Skywatcher wide field EPs to use in my binoviewers that is now my EP collection.

I have bought some Vixen SG2.1x42 binoculars which I hope I will be able to use whilst star hopping.

Will I buy anything else? If I do it might be the new Lunt 50mm H.Alpha scope.

[avtaram]

I owned a PST for a short while. It was nice to see the Sun in Ha but the solar bug did not really grab me. I feel a little like "the odd one out" with the current scramble for solar gear but there you go ! 

I thought it was just me that was the odd one out. Nice to have a bit of company.

I have not been bitten by the Solar and AP bug yet.

Avtar

[John]

I thought it was just me that was the odd one out. Nice to have a bit of company.

I have not been bitten by the Solar and AP bug yet.

Avtar

I think it is sensible to put the word "yet" in there. You never know where this hobby will take you 

[nightfisher]

To be honest, i think the only change i would like to make to my ep set is swap the BGO18mm for a circleT 18mm and this is just so my circle T set is completed

[russ.will]

I owned a PST for a short while. It was nice to see the Sun in Ha but the solar bug did not really grab me. I feel a little like "the odd one out" with the current scramble for solar gear but there you go ! 

Good job you didn't have a look through the double stacked Lunt at IAS then. My jaw nearly hit the floor when I looked through that and it was far from being the biggest solar scope there. I've never seen anything look so three dimensional with one eye, ever. There's Ha and then there's Ha, that's all I'm saying.

Russell

[Stu]

I owned a PST for a short while. It was nice to see the Sun in Ha but the solar bug did not really grab me. I feel a little like "the odd one out" with the current scramble for solar gear but there you go !

Get yourself a Lunt Herschel Wedge in your 120ED John and that should convince you about solar, especially on days like today with so many lovely active regions on show :-)

Sent from my iPhone using Tapatalk

[Stu]

Ahem, after declaring myself done just a few days ago, I have a shiny new Tele Vue 3mm Radian. Just over £130 brand new from Telescope House with the IAS 10% discount. Too tempting, especially as it will get me up to a reasonably sensible 120x mag with my 60mm frac. This really is complete now I am not in any way tempted by a 2.5mm Or rather, if there was a 60 degree, 2.5mm with 20mm eye relief, it would be more tempting than free beer. But there isn't one of those as far as I am aware. So I am done. Definitely. Probably. I would think so.

Not quite 60 degrees Luke, but how about the Vixen SLV 2.5mm? 50 degrees afov and 20mm eye relief :-)

Stu

Sent from my iPhone using Tapatalk

[Sarah]

Not quite 60 degrees Luke, but how about the Vixen SLV 2.5mm? 50 degrees afov and 20mm eye relief :-)

Stu

Sent from my iPhone using Tapatalk

Don't encourage him Stu!

[Stu]

;-)

Sent from my iPhone using Tapatalk

[michael.h.f.wilkinson]

Another shift in EP collection may e approaching, as a William Optics Zoom II 7.5-22.5mm is under way. It has a rated eye relief of 18-19mm, which should be perfect form me. I can then thin down my solar collection to just that zoom, I think. I will test it against the usual stiff competition of Pentax, TV, and the odd MaxVision

[Luke]

Good shout, Stu. I was weighing up the 3.5mm Delos, 3mm Radian and 2.5mm Vixen (and 2.5mm TS HR). I think Sarah would go nuts if we ended up with all three focal lengths!

I think in fairness to Sarah she wouldn't want to use the 2.5mm, she's happy at lower power. In which case, I might as well throw a T6 2.5mm Nagler into the ring, as it will be for me really anyway, I can live with the tighter eye relief at a push   We sold our T6 11mm and 13mm Naglers as Sarah didn't get on with them, but I was okay with them, very fine eyepieces. They would be fab to use with small fracs and giro mounts, with their low weight and compact size.

I actually thought the Vixen was 45 degrees for some reason. Having used my Radian 3mm last night with my 60mm scope, at 120x mag, one thing struck me - I didn't have to nudge the giro mount that often. I was thinking I wanted 60 degrees plus for my Giro mount, but was forgetting that with the 60mm scope, I'm at much lower mag anyway at full pelt than with the bigger scopes, it's not like it would be 300x mag with things whizzing along through the view...

Hmmm.

I still don't know if I am done or not!! :grin:

Not quite 60 degrees Luke, but how about the Vixen SLV 2.5mm? 50 degrees afov and 20mm eye relief :-)

Stu


Sent from my iPhone using Tapatalk

[Luke]

Thanks, Alan. It is tempting. My 9mm TS HR does run an 8mm Radian pretty close on the Moon. The 2.5 would I think mostly be used for lunar. But the Radian does somehow feel a little more effortless than the TS HR. To my eyes anyway, it takes a (very) brief moment to see as much detail with the TS HR as I do with the Radian. With the Radian, snap, it is there. Ditto the Delos. So I am a bit torn whether to barlow a Radian/Delos and possibly have a slightly more effortless view, or to go for the convenience of a good to go eyepiece that is almost as good optically! Or even ditch the long eye relief as it matters a bit more to Sarah than me and she probably won't want to use a 2.5mm anyway, I think even the 3mm is pushing it a little bit for Sarah's taste. If Sarah won't use it anyway probably, maybe I should consider a 2.5mm T6 Nagler. Nice problem to have, though. I definitely get the feeling my 60mm scope will do something useful with a 2.5mm eyepiece.

Luke,

So that's 3 Delos eyepieces and a Radian no wonder I have not had a clear sky this month.

2.5mm HR planetry from TS is long eye-relief and 60 degree FOV, these are by all accounts decent quality and not expensive, I would buy one. I reviewed the 2.5mm from TMB about three weeks back, the TS one is the same or better as it was from a design rubber stamped by TMB or so I am told.

Alan

[Joves]

I'm very tempted by the Nagler 2.5mm. I currently have the Vixen LV 2.5mm, which is a nice eyepiece, but would love to compare the two.

After having just had a dodgy so-and-so run off with $350 of mine after offering to "sell me his Coldplay tickets", I'm kind of wishing I had just bought the eyepiece instead.

Nothing like surprising your wife with invisible concert tickets

[Stu]

That's not good Aaron :-(

My concern about these short focal length eyepieces in small scopes are floaters. I tried the 85 with a 3 to 6 zoom yesterday and below around 4.5 my floaters became annoying. I must say I prefer the views at 9 or 12.5mm, hopefully the Leica will be handy here too :-)

Back to floaters, in my WO66, the 2.5mm nag I used to have have x155 with a 0.4mm exit pupil and whilst it was quite nice on certain targets, Mars for instance, the floaters we intrusive on the moon. Luke, it would be interesting to hear your experiences or thoughts. I'm sure the scope will cope with it, just not sure about our feeble eyes!!

Sent from my iPhone using Tapatalk

[Luke]

Hmmm, floaters are a bit of a worry. Exit pupil would be about 0.42 with the 2.5mm.

Is it purely down to exit pupil, then? I was very impressed with the view of the Moon with the 3.5mm Delos on my 120mm F7.5, giving about 0.47 exit pupil. If it's all down to exit pupil, the 3mm Radian with the 120 should give me a good idea, that would be 0.4?

Also, do you think a Barlow test at about 2.5mm would be similar to a proper 2.5mm eyepiece regarding how bad the floaters are?

[Luke]

Yikes, I don't know how some people can do such things

I feel a pull to the Nagler if Sarah's eyeball will be out of the running anyway. Just the small matter of lack of funds and no more stuff left to sell!

I'm very tempted by the Nagler 2.5mm. I currently have the Vixen LV 2.5mm, which is a nice eyepiece, but would love to compare the two.

After having just had a dodgy so-and-so run off with $350 of mine after offering to "sell me his Coldplay tickets", I'm kind of wishing I had just bought the eyepiece instead.

Nothing like surprising your wife with invisible concert tickets

[Stu]

Hmmm, floaters are a bit of a worry. Exit pupil would be about 0.42 with the 2.5mm.

Is it purely down to exit pupil, then? I was very impressed with the view of the Moon with the 3.5mm Delos on my 120mm F7.5, giving about 0.47 exit pupil. If it's all down to exit pupil, the 3mm Radian with the 120 should give me a good idea, that would be 0.4?

Also, do you think a Barlow test at about 2.5mm would be similar to a proper 2.5mm eyepiece regarding how bad the floaters are?

Narrowing down to 2.5mm should give the same exit pupil so the same level of floaters. I find them more intrusive on extended bright targets like the moon and Jupiter, smaller targets like Mars and thing like double stars are less of an issue.

You may not suffer too badly from them, I know that I do have an annoying one in the centre of my observing eye but have learnt to look around it where possible.

Give it a go and see

Sent from my iPhone using Tapatalk

[alan potts]

I was using the 2.5mm TMB/Burgess with the 70mm ED and my APO, I do sort of agree with Luke with regard to detail and snap to focus, however we are talking much less than half the price of a Radian and a fraction of a Delos 's cost.

I know Stu had a 2.5mm Nagler and mentioned floater to me as I was buying his 7mm some time ago, these can be a problem and I respect his opinion on the matter. I however didn't notice this in the review I talked of earier but that could just be my eyes after all weare all different.

I would also agree with the Barlow/Powermate idea it will give an excelent result and I only got rid of my PMate because it really never got used and was a waste me having one. If you can afford it this is the way I would go, in fact it was the way I went.

Alan

[Mark at Beaufort]

When I had a WO SD66 I bought a TS HR 2.5mm and was really happy with the quality. I never used it that much preferring the wider field of a barlowed 8mm Ethos (3.5mm). Its main use was looking at double stars.

To be honest the amount of use this size EP gets I would prefer buying a TS HR 2.5mm rather than spending extra on the more higher quality EPs.

[John]

I've owned the 2.5mm T6 Nagler but only briefly because I found my floaters were just too distracting with the exit pupil it produced. This would be the same with any 2.5mm eyepiece. I have a 3mm (Radian) now which gives me some of the same issues but not quite so much so thats the shortest focal length eyepiece I have. I guess this will vary person to person though.

[Luke]

Mmmm, I think the thing is, though, Mark, that I suspect I *would* use the 2.5mm lots! If floaters are not too much of an issue for me, and if the 60 takes the mag okay, then it could potentially be my favourite eyepiece with the 60. I know the small fracs are great for wide views, but the Moon and Sun are my big loves these days, and the 3.5mm Delos with my 120mm made quite an impression on me when viewing the Moon the other night!

I am however open to some kind of Ethos and Powermate arrangement Mind you, that combo would be bigger than the scope

[RikM]

I have used my 7mm Pentax with a 2.5x Televue Barlow for a 2.8mm effective focal length and that worked very well but looked like baseball bat sticking out of the focuser.