Pentax 7 & 14mm XW - First Light in a Dark Sky Location

[Pig]

I kept my fingers crossed during the evening as the forecast looked excellent for the Northants and I wanted to try out these two new wonderful eyepieces in as little a light polluted location as possible  So off I went to our local stargazers dark sky location.

I took both the 80mm triplet and the150 SCT and dual mounted them so they were aligned with one another. It was 11 pm by the time I was ready to start observing and it was still cloudless so it decided it was safe to uncrossed my aching fingers

I pointed the scope roughly in between Altair and Vega and then moved it to the left hoping to find the Albireo binary. I looked through the 14mm XW and would you believe it there they both were in my field of view, what a good shot   Mind you a did have quite a few degrees of sky in my fov so not a massive amount of skill was needed.

I centred these two beautiful stars in the eyepiece and switched to the 7mm XW and just sat and stared in awe at the wonderful contrasting orange and blue colours of this lovely double. I cannot express just how good these eyepieces are at extracting all the colour that is available, you really do have to see it to believe it.

I always find it difficult to identify stars under dark skies, this is mainly due to the fact that there are billions of them in the field of view, so for most of the night I simply scanned around the sky with the 14mm and when I found a messier or another target of interest I simply switched to the 7mm to get a closer look. For three wonderful hours I was totally impressed at how these eyepieces deliver clarity and colour, looking at so many stars in the eyepiece and being able to see each individual colour is truly a "something else"  experience.

I only used the SCT once for a brief look at Saturn  This in itself is a measure of how much I enjoyed using these two eyepieces.

At long last I know for sure the 20mm is definitely on its way to me as I have been given a tracking number, so just the 5 & 3.5mm left to buy

[John]

Great report Shaun

I agree that the Pentax XW's are superb

If I'd listened to Steve at FLO years back I'd have found this out a lot sooner

RikM also showed the way buy building a set up and sticking with them - now we know why !

[xtreemchaos]

great report mate.  thanks for sharing.  charl.

[estwing]

never looked through one but hear great stuff about them..nice report.

[alan potts]

Shuan,

Great report and clearly you enjoyed yourself.

You really have been bitten but the XW bug, rare out here where I am as the TV bug wiped them out. I have the 5mm which is great but it rarely gets used due to all the other scopes and eyepieces, as good as it is it is pretty much useless in the LX and the Mak, giving magnifications that would test the seeing in the Atacama Desert. Also it is a bridge too far in the Dob for my skills at the moment giving X450 odd, of course the local seeing would also have a say in that even if I were Dob Squad nudging instructor.

I have reviewed all the short XW's from 7mm and less and I am sure you have read them, they are as good as any eyepiece that you can buy today.

Alan.

[laudropb]

Very interesting report. You obviously enjoyed yourself and that is what it is all about.

[Pig]

Great report Shaun

I agree that the Pentax XW's are superb

If I'd listened to Steve at FLO years back I'd have found this out a lot sooner

RikM also showed the way buy building a set up and sticking with them - now we know why !

Thank you John,

I wouldn't say I had regretted the different eyepieces I have had but I must admit I wish I had tried these first

great report mate.  thanks for sharing.  charl.

Your most welcome Charl

never looked through one but hear great stuff about them..nice report.

Thanks Clavin, they have certainly surprised me

Shuan,

Great report and clearly you enjoyed yourself.

You really have been bitten but the XW bug, rare out here where I am as the TV bug wiped them out. I have the 5mm which is great but it rarely gets used due to all the other scopes and eyepieces, as good as it is it is pretty much useless in the LX and the Mak, giving magnifications that would test the seeing in the Atacama Desert. Also it is a bridge too far in the Dob for my skills at the moment giving X450 odd, of course the local seeing would also have a say in that even if I were Dob Squad nudging instructor.

I have reviewed all the short XW's from 7mm and less and I am sure you have read them, they are as good as any eyepiece that you can buy today.

Alan.

Thank you Alan,

I certainly have been bitten, I am sure the 5mm will be fine in both my scopes, PM me if your thinking of  letting it go anytime in the near future. I did read your XW review, If I remember you compared them to Nagelrs, and the review was a contributing factor in my deciding to go down this route.

Very interesting report. You obviously enjoyed yourself and that is what it is all about.

Thank you Laudropb, it was a wonderful night.... I was a tad scared being in the sticks on my own

[alan potts]

Shaun,

I think I compared them with a fair cross section, The 3.5mm was against the Delos 3.5mm and the 7mm was I believe against my 7mm Nagler, I can't remember what I did the 5mm against.

I will keep you in mind as I am in the process of having a massive overhaul of my eyepieces, 4 Delos eyepieces have already jumped ship :eek: :eek: , I am just not using my Ethos eyepieces. I wish I knew why because I like them and leaving 3K of glass collecting dust it rather daft to say the least, I have put it down to having too many .

Alan.

[Pig]

The may be gathering dust Alan but at least its gold dust

[jetstream]

Great report Shaun! Albireo is a fantastic sight..... Its amazing how some EP's can bring colors out, hmmm I may have to try an XW...

[Pig]

They are definitely a bit of a revelation to me Gerry so it may be worth it, having said you do have some excellent eyepieces already

[jetstream]

They are definitely a bit of a revelation to me Gerry so it may be worth it, having said you do have some excellent eyepieces already

From what I hear they are still the "standard" to which other wide fields are measured, rumors of very low scatter and high contrast float about with respect to the XW's- they are purged and waterproofed to boot! Nice choice Shaun- I'm glad I'm not the only one who copies John  

[Chris]

Lovely enthusiastic report Shaun, and very brave being out in the sticks on your own ( I get nervous if I hear a noise in my own garden!) I consistantly hear so many good things about these EP's so they must be that good.

argh! must try and resist and wait for the Vixen SSW's to launch    

[Pig]

From what I hear they are still the "standard" to which other wide fields are measured, rumors of very low scatter and high contrast float about with respect to the XW's- they are purged and waterproofed to boot! Nice choice Shaun- I'm glad I'm not the only one who copies John  

yes John does tend to be right about these things

Lovely enthusiastic report Shaun, and very brave being out in the sticks on your own ( I get nervous if I hear a noise in my own garden!) I consistantly hear so many good things about these EP's so they must be that good.

argh! must try and resist and wait for the Vixen SSW's to launch    

Thank you Chris.... I am a bit of a chicken when it comes to remote locations. However, it is a farm where we go and the farmhouse isn't so far away that I couldn't peg it there if needed

[Astro_Baby]

I have a 30mm XW which has never even had first light yet after almost 2 years

[Pig]

I have a 30mm XW which has never even had first light yet after almost 2 years

Wow.... that's madness..... is it for sale 

[John]

I have a 30mm XW which has never even had first light yet after almost 2 years

These are out of production now I believe. Folks seem to be prepared to pay quite large sums for them over in the USA.

[Highburymark]

They sound fantastic Shaun. I've not had the privilege of trying an XW yet.

[faulksy]

never looked through one but hear great stuff about them..nice report.

i thought you had looked through mine at dobfest or was sgl10. next time hay calv

hi shaun i only have the 5mm and its amazing, its a ortho with good eye relief and 70* fov love it. quite tempted with the 3.5mm myself but holding out for a ethos

[alan potts]

Mike do you have another scope, I would have thought 3.5mm was a bit powerful for a 14 inch even with the optics you have on yours.

[John]

Mike do you have another scope, I would have thought 3.5mm was a bit powerful for a 14 inch even with the optics you have on your.

I have the XW 3.5mm and the 5mm. The 3.5 is just as good as the 5 but does not get used in my 12" dob often at all. It's a peach in my ED120 refractor though

[alan potts]

I have never had the 10mm to play with but the 7mm 5mm and 3.5mm are cracking eyepieces in every way. I was not mad about the 14mm and for me it was not quite up to the Delos but the short ones dare I say, are just maybe, by just a tad, by the skin of my teeth better than Delos. I think I saved myself a visit from the Spanish Inquisiton by saying another pair of eyes may find it the other way, otherwise i would be in the cumfy chair.

At this level it's so difficult to call, I bet even from night to night the findings could be different I found and reported this with the 17.3mm and the 15mm Plossl on Jupiter, detail one night was better on one the next night visa versa.

Alan 

[John]

I believe that the 14mm and longer focal length XW's have field curvature that is opposite to that which the short focal lengths in the range have. In some scope designs this means that the longer focal length ones don't do quite so well because their field curvature adds to that inherant in the scope optics while the shorter focal lengths cancel it out.

I believe these effects are slight though.

[alan potts]

John,

That's how I read it there was a need to slightly refocus to get the edge sharp, not much but enough for me to off load. The Delos longer ones have a little edge distortion I think this is the cure to the Pentax issue, so it's one of the other. With XW's really being designed for daylight use maybe the field curvature is the better option.

I have offloaded my longer Delos now as well 8mm and 12mm and up, I took part in the Derek Diet and gained pounds :eek: !

[faulksy]

Mike do you have another scope, I would have thought 3.5mm was a bit powerful for a 14 inch even with the optics you have on yours.

hi alan, quite often i use calvs nagler zoom at setting 3 and its brilliant especially on planets. i also used to have the meade image amplifier and used my 6mm delos and that worked fine as well. ok this is not everynight but very often. i can remember dan k looking through it at jupiter and said it was like a image. a 3.5 is around 450x , but im sure you know that