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A visual astronomers toolkit .....

John

By John
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John

John

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Goodness knows how many eyepieces I've been through to get to this set :shocked: - but this bunch really seem to do the business for me now :lol:

7062_normal.jpeg

(click to enlarge)

The filter is a Baader UHC-S and the EP's are (L to R) Top row: 4.8mm Tele Vue Nagler Type 1, 7mm Tele Vue Nagler Type 6, 9mm Tele Vue Nagler Type 6, 13mm Tele Vue Nagler Type 6. Bottom row: 2.5x Tele Vue Powermate, 2x Celestron Ultima Barlow, 16mm William Optics UWAN, 24mm Tele Vue Panoptic and finally the 30mm Kokusai Kohki WideScan III.

John

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Albireo380

Albireo380

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I have a 9mm televue - fantastic EP. I also have a KK Widescan III 30mm EP. This is also great for observing. M31 looks cracking in a 12" Dob.

I guess you sold the House, Wife, Children, Dog etc for that lot then? :shocked:

Tom

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John

John

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Great collection. Did you put it together through trial and error, so that these are the ones that work best in your scopes?

There is some "science" behind these. My scopes are alt-az mounted and undriven so I find that eyepieces with a wide field of view are helpfull as objects stay in view for longer. My scopes are also of shortish focal length (F/6.5, F/6 and F5) so I knew that I'd need good quality EP's to keep sharpness as far across the field as possible.

For the 2 inch eyepiece, with my scopes 30mm was about right to keep the exit pupil a sensible size - it was then a case of getting a decent wide field one and the Widescan III at 84 degrees seemed to make sense. A Nagler 31mm or a UWAN 28mm would be an improvement of course but also a lot more pennies for an eyepiece niche that I don't use that often.

I was an early convert to Tele Vue having bought some of their plossls back in the late 1980's and found them excellent both for build and view quality.

The other thing I've found is that quality equipment holds it's value - if I do decide to sell then I can reasonably expect to recover a large % of my outlay as long as I keep the item in good nick. All but 1 of my eyepieces was purchased 2nd hand so the depreciation was already take out of them.

Of course I'm now wondering about the Tele Vue Ethos (Ethi as there are 2 available now ?) - but that would require an invesment of at least twice, or three times as much as my most expensive EP purchase to date - not to be taken lightly !. From what I've read I'm not convinced that the 13mm Ethos would provide me with views 2-3x as good as my 13mm Nagler T6 - I could be wrong though :shocked:

John

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coliea

coliea

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Very nice collection of eyepieces John.

Could I ask where you picked up the 30mm Kokusai Kohki WideScan III? I haven't come across these before (noobie me) and a quick Google throws up a store in Kyoto. Are they retailed in the UK?

Best

Col

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John

John

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Very nice collection of eyepieces John.

Could I ask where you picked up the 30mm Kokusai Kohki WideScan III? I haven't come across these before (noobie me) and a quick Google throws up a store in Kyoto. Are they retailed in the UK?

Best

Col

I picked up mine 2nd hand from a guy who writes the occasional review for Astro mags. They used to be sold here:

http://www.brayimaging.co.uk/Astro/eyepieces.html#KK

but I'm not sure that Bray Imaging are in business any more. Mine did not cost anything like that much :shocked:

The 30mm's are quite rare in the UK I think - the 1.25 inchers come up from time to time (13mm, 16mm and 20mm) and are pretty good in medium to longer FL scopes. The 13mm in particular is considered to be a viable budget alternative to a 13mm Nagler.

John

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John

John

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Great eyepiece collection.Just like Col not heard off the 30mm Kokusai. How does it compare to the 30mm moonfish?

I've not directly compared the 30mm Widescan III with a Moonfish 30mm but I believe that they are pretty similar except for the slightly wider FoV of the Widescan III (84 deg V's 80 deg). Heres a review which might be of interest which does make that comparison (at least with a Moonfish clone) and with more expensive glass:

http://www.cloudynights.com/documents/widescans.pdf

John

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John

John

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Thanks John - I'll add "Kokusai Khoki" to my eBay astro stuff search :lol:

Yep Col - it's a really catchy brand name isn't it :shocked:

There are chinese clones of these about which I reckon would be pretty close in performance terms - some branded Cape Newise were advertised on UK Astro Buy & Sell a while back at a bargain prices I recall.

John

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