Are you a swopper or a sticker ?

[spaceboy]

I admit to being one of those folk who spends a large portion of the nights observing swopping out eyepieces. I even purchased some ES100° eyepieces in the hope this would change but even so I find an urge to swop eyepieces every five minutes to see if the addition in magnification or the larger exit pupil will reveal something I may have missed.

My favourite ep has to be the TV 3-6 zoom saving me a night of fumbling in my ep case. I just wish there was a 7-31mm 82° zoom on the market.

 

[Space Hopper]

A definite swapper in my case.........

 

[John]

You might be interested in the Leica ASPH zoom 8.9mm - 17.8mm zoom. It has a 60-80 degree field and top notch optical performance by all accounts - think Pentax XW or similar quality. Expensive but it does replace a number of eyepieces.

When I'm deep sky observing, particualrly galaxies, I tend to use just a couple of eyepieces for the whole session (usually the 21mm and 8mm Ethos). For targets that demand higher magnfications I tend to be a "swopper" as I find out what the seeing conditions will stand and what delivers the best view.

 

 

 

[Alien 13]

When I used to look through a scope I stuck to one eyepiece, this was way before the days of the tinternet and I was finding my own way around the sky. The reason I did this was to give me a sense of scale from what I observed, all done with a Charles Frank 6 inch on eq pillar mount.

Alan

[Peter Drew]

A Speers Waler zoom has a constant 80+ degree field. If you can find one.  

[Timebandit]

Hello. As a collectionist then I suppose I would be classified as a swopped. But I am not sure this is strictly true.

It depends a lot on the targets I am considering going after that night. What scope i will be using, the dob or the refractor and the seeing conditions of that particular location and atmosphere conditions. I usually have a pretty good idea depending on the above what eyepieces i need.

If using the dob for clusters and dso. Probably start off with the 20mm nagler then goto a 10mm or 7mm Pentax xw. If using the dob for planetary then start off with a 10mm Pentax xw then swop to higher magnification progressively until I have reached the limit of  seeing conditions ,to  its limits.

The refractor I mostly use for moon or planets, therefore start with the 20mm nagler and then jump straight in at 9mm Ortho or plossl and again push it down to the 4mm rg meade or vixen 4mm nvl

But if I am binoviewing planets or moon ,I am terrible at swooping at the moment, start with the 32mm televue plossl pair. Then to the 25mm plossl. Then to the 10mm plossl and finish off with the 8mm televue plossl pair. I could do with another pair of hands really when doing this. And the old eyepiece case is in a right state until I sort it out at the end of the sessions, putting the eyepieces back in their correct slots

Obviously I do try to limit my swaps ,but a lot of the time overall it depends on my choices of targets and the all important seeing/atmosphere conditions. Then again half the fun of being a collectionist is trying to get the best possible view of the target with the eyepieces at hand ?. 

 

 

 

 

[Charic]

One of my eyepieces should be just right on the night so I'm a swapper.
Its not just  magnification but the field of view and  image scale of the target in relation to its surrounding that matters.

[spaceboy]

9 minutes ago, Charic said:

One of my eyepieces should be just right on the night so I'm a swapper.
Its not just  magnification but the field of view and  image scale of the target in relation to its surrounding that matters.

Should that be sticker ??

Yes framing the object can also be the cause of much of my swopping.

[Paul73]

Swapper. Definitally a swapper.

Wide field 100° for finding and groups of objects. Then fidling about to find the optimal mag / Fov. Although, I am a big fan of the wide field mooch across the heavens.

John - you are a thoroughly bad influence. "Leica" is not a name to casually drop into a thread..... Are they really that good?

Paul

 

[Charic]

maybe!....i should have added, .........." until I find it?"............ but then comes the next target?  same process! 

[Moonshane]

I am naturally a swapper I think but I am trying to give it up.

[Charic]

23 minutes ago, Moonshane said:

I am naturally a swapper I think but I am trying to give it up.

That's a thought?
Although having so many EPs  offers  more options/variables, If I'd  just had three EP's the Skyliner's rack would be full all the time, and little else to carry about!
I've 24 EPs in total, 15 of them covering  3.2, 5, 6, 6.4, 8, 9, 9.7, 10, 11, 12, 15, 18, 20, 25, 32 the rest are duplicates of a focal length, with varying ER/afov.

I always felt I wanted/needed a Plössl set,then set my heart on the Starguiders,  and now I almost have a set of TeleVue, untested, Delos to hand, and only one more needed to be truthfull, but you know me, I will have the (partial) set before long ( not really interested in the 3.5 or 4.5mm) and still not sure of their outcome, will have to wait and see?

So yes, giving up is an option by limiting the collection, but then maybe the loss will creep back in?

[andrew63]

46 minutes ago, Charic said:

That's a thought?
Although having so many EPs  offers  more options/variables, If I'd  just had three EP's the Skyliner's rack would be full all the time, and little else to carry about!
I've 24 EPs in total, 15 of them covering  3.2, 5, 6, 6.4, 8, 9, 9.7, 10, 11, 12, 15, 18, 20, 25, 32 the rest are duplicates of a focal length, with varying ER/afov.

You appear to have a gap between the 6 and 6.4   

andrew

[Stu]

1 hour ago, Paul73 said:

Swapper. Definitally a swapper.

Wide field 100° for finding and groups of objects. Then fidling about to find the optimal mag / Fov. Although, I am a big fan of the wide field mooch across the heavens.

John - you are a thoroughly bad influence. "Leica" is not a name to casually drop into a thread..... Are they really that good?

Paul

 

Yes they are. They have their weaknesses, double stars are not a strength for some reason but for planetary, solar and lunar they are top notch. I combined mine with a Zeiss Abbe Barlow to give focal lengths suitable for planetary use, down to 3.5mm equivalent. Saves swapping out eyepieces to fine tune for the seeing.

[Stu]

I've refined my solar setup now so that I don't play around too much. I use the binoviewer and just add one or two extension tubes depending upon the seeing conditions, nice and simple  

[Pig]

I used to be a swapper but now I use dedicated eyepieces dependent on the target, 21 & 8mm Ethos for the stars, the 5mm XW for lunar and 35mm Baader Eudiascopic for solar

[Rick Towns]

I am mostly a "sticker" - but then I only have 6 eyepieces in my case: 6 mm Ortho, and 8, 11, 15, 20 and 32 mm Plössls, so usually there are a few swaps at the beginning and then steady as she goes with the "right" eyepiece. I try to observe a fairly long time to get those good moments of steady seeing and really enjoy the view - usually 15-20 minutes per target. Sometimes longer if I'm really getting a lot out of it.

[YKSE]

I'd rate myself as sticker.

When in dark site for hunting faint DSO, 40mm, 31mm and a zoom is all I need 99% of the time. a coverage of 68x to 240x (exit pupil 4mm to 0.9mm). There're just not so many nights with good suitable weather I can plan a trip, I rather prefer to make best of the time for more observation than switching EPs.

Switching EPs for me are doing day time or half cloudy night measurement, or bright Moon nights for some light-hearted bright DSO work.

[Charic]

1 hour ago, andrew63 said:

You appear to have a gap between the 6 and 6.4   

andrew

Nice one!

Was not my intention to have 'every' focal length, just the way its panned out over time!

[estwing]

The bigger the mirror the less you swap

[Paz]

I started out a swapper but the more experience I get under my belt the less eyepiece changes I seem to be doing in a session. I've done a moon session recently where I stuck with the same eyepiece for the whole session.

[Roy Challen]

Swapper. Not much point having loads of eyepieces then using just one! Although I concede the fact that I do stick with the right EP for the job...once I have found the right EP for the job....then swap again a little bit later!

[bomberbaz]

I tend to plan my sessions with stellarium and use the telescope/ocular tool to find what I believe will be the right one to frame a given object and then write it down in my viewing list.  That said, I often find myself toying around with different sizes in an effort to tease out that bit extra detail.

[SonnyE]

I'm a sticker.

But in my defense, I'm an EAA.

Because I like to do Astrophotography. So my observing is on my computers, and taking images.

I do use a 20X, 70 degree illuminated eyepiece at times. (Flip Mirror Imaging box)

[Highburymark]

On 23 September 2016 at 20:00, Paul73 said:

Swapper. Definitally a swapper.

Wide field 100° for finding and groups of objects. Then fidling about to find the optimal mag / Fov. Although, I am a big fan of the wide field mooch across the heavens.

John - you are a thoroughly bad influence. "Leica" is not a name to casually drop into a thread..... Are they really that good?

Paul

 

As Stu says, it is. But although the Leica zoom effectively replaces a caseful of top notch widefield EPs, I could never trade in my other fixed f/l eyepieces and consign myself to a non-swapping future. To me that's part of the love of astronomy - eyepieces continue to surprise in different scopes and under changing conditions.