Eye Pieces for 250P Dobsonian

[AndyUK92]

Good afternoon everyone!

Can anyone recommend some Eye Pieces for my telescope?

i wouldnt mind catching views of the odd nebulae and i want decent images of planets etc... my budget per eyepiece would be £40 but i would be willing to increase it depending on how good it actually is. I look forward to hearing your feedback!

Cheers guys.

[ronin]

For around £40 each I suspect the recommendation will be the BST Starguiders.

They are £49 from Skies the Limit and appear to operate well at f/4.5 ish. Most scopes seem to get limited to f/5 so not that many faster.

Plossls are likely out of consideration, some like the TV will be OK but not sure of ones like GSO. Someone may have Vixen's and be able to say how they are at faster then f/5.

The BST's are sold by others, but by the time you account for P&P (Free with StL) thenStL come out about the least cost.

Nebula will want 50x to 60x to fit some in so you will need the 25mm or 18mm for those.

The 8mm seems to get good reports as well as the 12mm for a good general purpose.

[JamesF]

The 250P isn't very kind to cheaper eyepieces because of its fast focal ratio so your choices are a bit limited.

I'd be tempted to look out for used Tele Vue plossls.  They're not too expensive though perhaps a little over your budget and should work well.  They also hold their value better than many, so if you later decide that you want eyepieces with a wider field of view (quite possible with this scope) then you could probably sell them at broadly similar prices to what you paid.

James

[Qualia]

For general DSO viewing, I feel you don't need more than three eyepieces. For my 10" f5, for example, I generally observe and sketch with wide field (72º) eyepieces offering around 50x, 90x and 125x. Coupled to a decent Barlow (or Powermate), you've then got  50x, 90x, 100x, 125x, 180x and 250x which should suffice for most clusters, galaxies, nebulae, and general lunar and planetary work.

If it took your fancy, for white light solar viewing the 50x will also be ideal and all you'll need is Baader's Visual Solar Film from First Light Optics which is extremely effective and cheap.

If you decide later to really get into planetary and lunar observation, you will probably find that it helps to have a good run of high power eyepieces. Depending on the evening, seeing conditions etc, even the difference of just 1mm in focal length - about 10% to 15% difference of magnification - can be surprising. But the good news is the eyepieces themselves do not need to be widefields, so you can buy cheaper Orthos and there's no hurry to build the collection all at once. Again, by way of example, in my own case if I fancy doing a bit of concentrated planetary, lunar or 'getting-in-there' observing of a deep sky object, I use 5mm, 6mm, 7mm, 9mm and 12mm Orthos. 

There's certainly no need to go spending loads of money to get decent eyepieces and on this account your best bet is to scan the secondhand market. Nevertheless, extracting budget from the equation and purely looking at some of the the most popular eyepiece options available the following get rave reviews time and time again:

Tele Vue

Pentax

Explore Scientific ES68, 80 and 100

Meade 5000 UWA

William Optics UWAN's

Vixen SLV

Skywatcher Nirvanas

Orthoscopic like Baader's Genuine

X-Cels LXs

BSTs

I cannot comment on most of these eyepieces mentioned but at the end of the day, I feel it makes more sense to not buy a load of eyepieces but instead, save for two really cracking, quality glass eyepieces with a magnification around 90x and 125x, a decent low power eyepiece and Barlow that will hopefully last you many years.

[JamesF]

I love my Baader Genuine Orthos (on Rob's list), but I think with this OTA I'd caution against them despite the fact that they do work well in it.  The field of view is just very small compared with many others you could buy and it's a bit odd to have a great wide-field scope and then stick teeny-weeny field of view eyepieces in it.

That said, the 18mm BGO is one of my favouritest eyepieces ever.  If I saw another come up for sale at a fair price I'd have to fight very hard not to buy it just so I could then buy a binoviewer and use them as a pair

James

[AndyUK92]

Thanks for the feedback everyone,

Qualia, what are the specific eye pieces you use?

[Qualia]

For general DSO observing I use Delos 14mm & 10mm. These offer 2.8mm and 2mm, 0.8º and 0.5º TFOV respectively. If I want to power them up I use a TeleVue x2 Barlow. Having used them for a number of years, I can also see the virtue in getting something like a 13mm Ethos and then for higher powers perhaps an 8mm Delos or 7mm XW. Expensive, but these type of things should last a very long time.

As James suggests, Baader's Genuine Orthos are also cracking eyepieces. I have managed to build a set over the years and with the 10" love using the higher powers on planetary, lunar and double stars. They obviously have a number of draw backs (eye-relief, small field of view) but this is amply made up with sheer quality of image.

For lower powers, I use a 19mm & 24mm Panoptic. These are also lovely eyepieces and have a nice wide field but I feel if you don't mid swopping between 1.25" and 2" eyepieces, something like a 20mm Nagler would suit a 10" more.

With all that said, you really don't need more than a couiple of choice eyepiece. Something like a 14mm and 10mm with a TV Barlow have done me proud for a good number of years and I still haven't exhausted their possibilities nor pleasure.

[John]

I think, for your budget, trying to get hold of a couple of BST Explorers / Starguiders would be the best option. They are relatively well corrected in fast scopes considering their price and have a semi-wide field of view which is nice with dobsonians.

When new they are a bit more than your budget (£49 ish each).

The alternative that JamesF suggests of Tele Vue plossls is also a good one because Tele Vue eyepieces are designed to work well in scopes as fast as F/4. The trouble is that they new cost is well above your budget so you would need to find them used. They cost around £45 used but get snapped up quickly when they come up at that price. I recentlly sold a few which went in just a couple of hours !

Generally wide field, cheap (£40 is very much at the economy end) eyepieces don't mix well with fast scopes like yours but the BST Explorer / Starguiders are an exception to this.

Quaila's taste is excellent but you will need to at least triple or quadruple your budget per eyepiece for the Delos or Panoptics.

The Baader Genuine Orthos mentioned here are very fine but have narrow fields of view (as do all ortho eyepieces) which can make tracking an object at high power more of a chore with a dobsonian.