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More Myriads join the 9mm

John

By John
in Discussions - Eyepieces

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John

John

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Back in June last year, thanks to a generous loan from First Light Optics, I briefly reported on the new 9mm Skywatcher Myriad 100 degree apparent field eyepiece and how it compared with the William Optics XWA 101 degree 9mm that had also been launched around that time. To summarise, they were identical and here is that thread for anyone interested:

http://stargazerslounge.com/topic/218397-skywatcher-myriad-mwa-vs-william-optics-xwa-spot-the-difference/?hl=%2Bmyriad#entry2493955

Further focal lengths have now been added to the Skywatcher Myriad range; 20mm, 5mm and 3.5mm. Interestingly the 5mm and 3.5mm boast a 110 degree apparent field putting them on par with Tele Vue's 4.7mm and 3.7mm Ethos SX's in terms of specification. Clones of these eyepieces have also now appeared under the TS (Telescope Services of Germany) branding and William Optics have also added the 3 additional focal lengths to their 9mm XWA. Personally I'd like to see one further focal length added around 12mm-14mm as there seems to be a gap there and it's a very versatile focal length in many scopes. Who knows, it may come along soon !

First Light Optics have come up trumps again and have now sent me the three new focal lengths in the Myriad Range to try out alongside the 9mm :smiley:

It turns out that the 9mm is the smallest and lightest in the Myriad range. The weights and optical componants of these monsters are:

20mm = 1,200 grams,  9 elements in 6 groups

 9mm =  620 grams,  9 elements in 6 groups

 5mm =  935 grams, 8 elements in 6 groups

3.5mm = 945 grams, 8 elements in 6 groups

The 5mm and 3.5mm have the same nicely excecuted screw on 2" barrel option that the 9mm does. These add-on barrels are threaded for 2" filters and they screw onto the 1.25" filter thread in the smaller barrel of the eyepiece making for a very neat fit.

The overall quality and finish of these eyepieces is very high. The coatings on the eye and field lenses are a luxuriant deep green and looking through the eyepieces in daylight I can't see any internal reflective surfaces. The wide hard rubberised eye cups twist up and down travelling about 10mm to allow for different eye position preferences although for me the tallest position seemed the best one. The stated eye relief for the Myriads is 15mm except for the 9mm which has 13mm. I notice that the eye lenses in the 5mm and 3.5mm models are recessed a few mm which may make the useable eye relief on those a little less.

With the 9mm and 20mm Myriads I can just about see the edges of the 100 degree apparent field of view. With the 110 degree 5mm and 3.5mm focal lengths I seem to have to more conciously move my eye around to see the eyepiece field stop. With these the effect is that it's all field really with no "edges". These impressions were gained in daylight I ought to stress. When nighttime viewing the results are sometimes a little different.

The eyepieces arrived yesterday and the skies have been heavy with clouds, rain, and sleet ever since so the crucial observing tests will have to wait a bit. Below are a few photos of the Myriads from various angles. The smaller eyepiece in some pictures is a Vixen NPL 30mm plossl in the 1.25" fitting which I included for scale. The bottom ends of the eyepieces are shown twice, once with the 3.5mm, 5mm and 9mm in 1.25" mode and once again with those three wearing their 2" barrels. The final one shows my 20mm, 13mm, 8mm and 6mm Tele Vue Ethos eyepieces with the Myriads. The 20mm Myriad is almost exactly the same size as the 21mm Ethos although the Myriad seems just a touch lighter in the hand. The 3.5mm and 5mm Myriads are pretty massive for such short focal length eyepieces but then so are the 4.7mm and 3.7mm Ethos :smiley:

I have been favourably impressed with the 9mm Myriad when I've used it over the past few months. I hope the additional focal lengths will impress me as much. I'll be posting again on that when I've had a few sessions with them.

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John

John

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And there's more .....

I ought to have added to my post that I've visually compared the apparent fields of view of the Myriad eyepieces to my Ethos eyepieces and the Myriads certainly do seem to deliver on or around 100 or 110 degree fields. I thought I'd add this feedback following the recent reports of Meade's latest offering in this niche not quite living up to it's billing :wink:

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Charic

Charic

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I too have just bought a 9mm? Right at the bottom of the price stack! Looks like I'm building a set of Plossl GSO/RA EP's just now, just for the fun of it? I just  want to check again, to see if anything out there, at such a ridiculously low price, comes anywhere near,  or  exceeds my Starguiders at such low prices? After all, I think,  by just having the best EPs like your Televue's (John) wont necessarily improve the image for my eyes only. Yes the TeleVue's will give a perfectly magnified rendition of the image from the focal plane, but the final part of the equation is to have a decent pair of Mk1 eyeballs to match. If my eyes are not up to it, then no expensive EP is gong to help me  any further ( I assume this theory without test ) This is my reasoning for budget oculars, and the fact that an f/6 does not require special optics?


I'll  try and report on the GSO/Revelations when it happens, a  personal review rather than anything scientific, the results based on my  old  eyes.


One Day,  I  will get the opportunity   to test a  Delos, Naggler or even an Ethos, to see if my theory  stands.


That aside, I think most folk here always welcome your EP tests. Cheers.

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John

John

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Charic - I was not trying to start a debate on budget v's more expensive eyepieces. I was just posting some information on the 100 degree Myriad eyepieces that First Light Optics have been kind enough to lend me for those who might be interested in them.

If you are happy with your eyepiece choices then thats great and I hope you get lots of enjoyment from them :smiley:

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michael.h.f.wilkinson

michael.h.f.wilkinson

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I too have just bought a 9mm? Right at the bottom of the price stack! Looks like I'm building a set of Plossl GSO/RA EP's just now, just for the fun of it? I just  want to check again, to see if anything out there, at such a ridiculously low price, comes anywhere near,  or  exceeds my Starguiders at such low prices? After all, I think,  by just having the best EPs like your Televue's (John) wont necessarily improve the image for my eyes only. Yes the TeleVue's will give a perfectly magnified rendition of the image from the focal plane, but the final part of the equation is to have a decent pair of Mk1 eyeballs to match. If my eyes are not up to it, then no expensive EP is gong to help me  any further ( I assume this theory without test ) This is my reasoning for budget oculars, and the fact that an f/6 does not require special optics?
I'll  try and report on the GSO/Revelations when it happens, a  personal review rather than anything scientific, the results based on my  old  eyes.
One Day,  I  will get the opportunity   to test a  Delos, Naggler or even an Ethos, to see if my theory  stands.
That aside, I think most folk here always welcome your EP tests. Cheers.

This is exactly why I have always upgraded an EP when I started seeing its limitations. The 10mm Celestron (Vixen made) Plossl went due to poor eye relief (not poor image quality), and was replaced by more expensive Vixen LV 9 and 7mm EPs. Much later, the 36mm Plossl was replaced by a 40mm TMB Paragon: WAY bigger FOV, WAY more comfortable (the Plossl has excessive ER at 36mm). The 26mm Plossl stayed on longest (Vixen made for Celestron: the famous Silver Top). I then filled a gap in the EP range between 9 and 26mm (let's face it, that is a gap) with a 14mm UWA from Meade (Mk 1 Series 5000). VERY nice again, but with almost the same true FOV as the 26mm Plossl I found the 26 was no longer used much, and I found myself getting hooked on wide fields. Enter the Nagler 22T4 (second-hand). Slippery slope indeed.

I have previously described the process as a "ratchet-effect": If you buy one EP that is even a touch better than the rest of your collection, you start seeing the defects in the others, which means you replace one of them by a better one, which may be better than the best you have, and so the cycle goes on. One of the limitations you might see is FOV, which is why we are discussing 100 deg EPs now. That is not to say you cannot do great observations with cheap EPs.

Cheap Plossls can produce great views, as I have found with the cheap (15 euro) 20mm Plossl I got for my kids. Very sharp, and easy to use. They also have a similarly priced 6.3mm, which is totally unusable for my eldest and myself, though useful for my youngest who does not wear glasses. They got a (cheap) Skywatcher UWA Planetary 4mm (secondhand) which is now their favourite planetary EP, due to improved comfort and wider FOV. The beginning of the slippery slope.

Now, back to the myriad ;)

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John

John

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John,

Do you have field stop data for these eyepieces?

Yong, Skywatcher don't seem to publish this data. William Optics have effective field stop diameters for their XWA versions as follows:

20mm = 38.4mm

  9mm = 15mm

  5mm = 9.6mm

3.5mm = 6.7mm

Telescope Services have field stop diameters for their TS XWA series as follows:

20mm = 37mm

 9mm = 15.7mm

 5mm = 13mm

3.5mm = 10.5mm

So no agreement there then ! :rolleyes2:

I've not done the maths yet to work out what stop size would actually be needed to give 100 and 110 degree AFoV's in these focal lengths. I'll find time to do that some time.

Holding the eyepieces up against a light background side by side with the Ethos seems to indicate that the AFoV's are in the right order but thats not precise of course.

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Dude_with_the_tube

Dude_with_the_tube

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Looking forward to your review John,would be interesting to hear comparison between them and Ethos.initially it looks that eye relief is more or less the same as Ethos,I would be interested to hear how Myriads perform on: light scatter,field flatness,on axis,and importantly on edge performance.Just looking at pictures from the "business" end,looks that they have done a good job on blackening the edges,but is it the picture quality or there is a serious amount of thread lock glue visible on  the 5mm and 3.5mm Ep`s in 1.25" format?

Good luck and looking forward to the report/review   :)

P.S. can we keep the talk about Starguiders out of this topic please? These ones have NOTHING to do with current topic :D

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Mark at Beaufort

Mark at Beaufort

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John as you know I have the 8mm, 13mm and 21mm Ethos as my EPs. To gain extra magnification I screw in a Baader 2.25x barlow which is OK. I have been looking at getting a high mag EP - 5mm Nagler or a  5mm Myriad because I like the wide field. I did think about the 4.7mm Ethos but at £455 was it worth £200 more than the Myriad?

So John I look forward to getting further information about the 5mm Myriad.

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John

John

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Thanks for the info, John :smiley:  I would not be surprised if TS updates the field stop info for their 5mm and 3.5mm though.

Looking forward to your review.

If you want to smile have a look at the field stop specs that WO have put against the XWA eyepieces on their website here :smiley: :

http://www.williamoptics.com/eyepiecesDCL/eyepieces_xwa.php

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Dude_with_the_tube

Dude_with_the_tube

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If you want to smile have a look at the field stop specs that WO have put against the XWA eyepieces on their website here :smiley: :

http://www.williamoptics.com/eyepiecesDCL/eyepieces_xwa.php

thats a promising start isnt? :D

lets write that down to a total not understanding of what the heck i need to type in there of the web master who put that info on,but it is funny loooooool !

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Charic

Charic

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Charic - I was not trying to start a debate on budget v's more expensive eyepieces. I was just posting some information on the 100 degree Myriad eyepieces that First Light Optics have been kind enough to lend me for those who might be interested in them.

If you are happy with your eyepiece choices then thats great and I hope you get lots of enjoyment from them :smiley:

JOHN - STOP RIGHT THERE!

Where did that come from? It wasn't my intention from  my message above to spark any debate about budget EPs?  I just  saw the funny side  of me  comparing a £9 Plossl   against my BSTs, with  you at the other extreme with  premium   EPs,  and to thank you for the reports, that you offer!

Sorry if there was anything to suggest otherwise. PM if there's an issue. I didn't intend to make one!

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