Lunt 20mm HDC

[jetstream]

6 hours ago, Paul73 said:

Hericy !!!! The E21 not Top Dog!! 

I wonder if everyones still talkin' to me?

Oh well, not much sense doing a review/comparison if I don't report what I see.

[Stu]

3 minutes ago, jetstream said:

I wonder if everyones still talkin' to me?

Oh well, not much sense doing a review/comparison if I don't report what I see.

Of course we are Gerry! You probably have the best skies of anyone on this forum, or at least equal to, so we definitely listen to what you say!

[jetstream]

7 minutes ago, Stu said:

Of course we are Gerry! You probably have the best skies of anyone on this forum, or at least equal to, so we definitely listen to what you say!

Whew!

I know there are brand loyalties out there but I'm only loyal to my eyeballs and what they show lol!

Last night gave a unique set of circumstances -very high transparency and superb seeing, the little 90mm SV APO gave an excellent view of Saturn- all the way up to 262x with the HR2 2.4mm, man I never thought this scope could do this so well!

[Piero]

Great job Gerry!  I am looking forward to reading your next comparison on galaxies now!   

I really like my 20mm Lunt HDC. Happy to hear that it is working very well under your exceptionally good skies using a well corrected fast telescope. 

 

I know I said this many times already, but weight is another aspect where the 20mm Lunt wins hands down against the 21mm Ethos. 

[jetstream]

2 hours ago, Stargazer McCabe said:

The 9mm is equally impressive.

I'm very interested in your thoughts on this, actually on how deep the 9mm will go. If there is a 10mm BCO available to compare it to it would be nice.

[Stu]

1 hour ago, jetstream said:

I know there are brand loyalties out there but I'm only loyal to my eyeballs and what they show lol!

No point not telling it how it is!

My problem is that I get so few opportunities under good skies that I just want to observe with what I've got, not spend time switching between kit to see which is best.

That's why I love the fact that I know my White Light setup is as good as it gets, I just look and enjoy, knowing that I've got the best setup I can get.

I enjoyed my 20mm 100 degree ES and the 30mm 82 degree so these Lunts look very interesting too, and at a great price!

[Pig]

I am sure there is a connection with Lunt & ES, during my visits to various astronomy shows I've noticed one of the guys behind both stalls has been the same guy. I once asked him, when I was looking at the big ES Dob on one stall and then the Lunt stall about half an hour later, if they were the same company and his response was just a big cheesy grin,

I am sure he just changes his T-Shirt from an ES to Lunt !! It reminded me of the Tommy Cooper hat routine ? 

 

Edited July 16, 2017 by Pig

[PeterW]

Goodie... just picked one up myself for my ultra fast experiments. Who'd have thought  I'd even buy another glass eyepiece! Skywatcher have discontinued the myriad so Lunt and teleskop service are the only options left.

Gerry, 24" is a nice scope size, bit "slow" for those big nebulae? Looking forward to your observing reports.

 

peterW

[jetstream]

5 hours ago, PeterW said:

Goodie... just picked one up myself for my ultra fast experiments. Who'd have thought  I'd even buy another glass eyepiece! Skywatcher have discontinued the myriad so Lunt and teleskop service are the only options left.

Gerry, 24" is a nice scope size, bit "slow" for those big nebulae? Looking forward to your observing reports.

 

peterW

Congrats for the purchase and yes the 24" is a tad slow for large nebs, but at this size it is just not the tool for them anyway. I'm dialing in my 200mm f3.8 and this shows the big nebs extremely well. The 24" will be VG for the Veil, Crescent, Triffid and much more- actually some of these will unbelievably good. The fact is that most f4 or sub f f4's run a SIP's or paracorr that ups the ratio f4.5ish anyway- and I plan no paracorr.

 

edt: Peter while I may not use a paracorr I'm planning for one- ie around the 30ES - f4.5 CC'd will give an f5.2 (more if we include the CO) for a usable exit pupil of 5.8 with this EP. These days I plan scopes around my favorite eye pieces and exit pupil sweet spot.

Edited July 16, 2017 by jetstream

[PeterW]

Poor SIPS users... I am planning on using the ES HR coma corrector... get all the focal ratio the mirror has... needs some focus in travel, which you can get by chopping truss poles. I agree you select the scope round the EP and exit pupil. The 20mm is the longest I'm ever going to need unless I take eye expanding drops! (Which aren't any use).

 

Peter

[jetstream]

47 minutes ago, PeterW said:

Poor SIPS users... I am planning on using the ES HR coma corrector... get all the focal ratio the mirror has... needs some focus in travel, which you can get by chopping truss poles. I agree you select the scope round the EP and exit pupil. The 20mm is the longest I'm ever going to need unless I take eye expanding drops! (Which aren't any use).

 

Peter

What scope do you have now Peter?

[PeterW]

8"f4 imaging newt. A 13"f3 mirror that needs scope round it and dreams of making an <f3 6". The 20mm is for the widest and richest views with mark 1 eyeball. I normally use my 80mm jumbo finder for big neb hunting, but that's not mark1 eyeball.

[jetstream]

The 8" f4 should be VG for this- what is the secondary size? I got the 200mm f3.8 down to 31.5% with 63mm secondary and it illuminates just fine visually. I sucked the focus in though, reducing "L", if you know what I mean. The 75mm it came with was too much for my liking.

That 13" f3 will be excellent if the optics are good- you will get a nice CO% on that one. This is roughly what an 82mm sec will give at 25% CO-from Mels program.

"Off-Axis	Illum.	Light Loss
0.00 mm	100.0%	0.00 mag
2.00 mm	100.0%	0.00 mag
4.00 mm	100.0%	0.00 mag
6.00 mm	100.0%	0.00 mag
8.00 mm	99.87%	0.00 mag
10.0 mm	98.27%	0.01 mag
12.0 mm	96.05%	0.04 mag
14.0 mm	93.56%	0.07 mag
16.0 mm	90.91%	0.10 mag
18.0 mm	88.18%	0.13 mag
20.0 mm	85.38%	0.17 mag
22.0 mm	82.55%	0.20 mag
24.0 mm	79.70%	0.24 mag
26.0 mm	76.84%	0.28 mag"

---

Edited July 16, 2017 by jetstream

[PeterW]

The central obstruction affects diffraction which is not an issue at low power and the collection area. I have a 3.1" and 4" secondary candidates, I'm erring on the side of the larger one. Keeping the optics clean and hoping that the surfaces are smooth.... i.e. No micro roughness (not that its easy to diagnose or do anything about... repolish?!)are also issues that will affect contrast performance as well as extreme straylight defeating with baffles and paint.

 

Peter

[John]

Fascinating reports Gerry

The only reason that I've not commented is becuase I've been away since Thursday so missed all the fun !

My Leica zoom arrives tomorrow so thats going to be very interesting to compare against my Ethos / XW's mix over the coming weeks

Sounds like the Lunt contains subtly better optics than the Myriad / WO XWA's so perhaps not a clone or made to higher standards ?

Good to see something that will take on the Tele Vues without asking for more £'s / $'s and even leaving a few in the bank for other purchases

 

[Louis D]

21 hours ago, PeterW said:

Poor SIPS users... I am planning on using the ES HR coma corrector... get all the focal ratio the mirror has... needs some focus in travel, which you can get by chopping truss poles. I agree you select the scope round the EP and exit pupil. The 20mm is the longest I'm ever going to need unless I take eye expanding drops! (Which aren't any use).

 

Peter

I believe it was Eddgie over on CN who I was reading uses a dedicated Baader MPCC optimally spaced via spacer rings on his 31mm TV Nagler T5 to achieve widest field views without increasing focal length on his dob.  Since it induces spherical aberration at higher magnifications, it's not appropriate for anything other than photography and low power visual usage.

[jetstream]

1 hour ago, PeterW said:

The central obstruction affects diffraction which is not an issue at low power and the collection area. I have a 3.1" and 4" secondary candidates, I'm erring on the side of the larger one. Keeping the optics clean and hoping that the surfaces are smooth.... i.e. No micro roughness (not that its easy to diagnose or do anything about... repolish?!)are also issues that will affect contrast performance as well as extreme straylight defeating with baffles and paint.

 

Peter

Everyone has there own ideas about some things and the effect of CO is one of them. My thoughts are based on what my eyes tell me which mirrors what a very experienced "mentor" has told me about these scopes. I have no where near the knowledge or experience of this person so I'm just tagging along so to speak. If the CO% is not an issue then there is no sense discussing it.

I'm very interested in the performance of your f3 newt and how it performs with the 20mm Lunt HDC.

 

[jetstream]

58 minutes ago, John said:

Fascinating reports Gerry

The only reason that I've not commented is becuase I've been away since Thursday so missed all the fun !

My Leica zoom arrives tomorrow so thats going to be very interesting to compare against my Ethos / XW's mix over the coming weeks

Sounds like the Lunt contains subtly better optics than the Myriad / WO XWA's so perhaps not a clone or made to higher standards ?

Good to see something that will take on the Tele Vues without asking for more £'s / $'s and even leaving a few in the bank for other purchases

 

Hi John! were you on holiday?

The Lunt works very well for me and I have no idea about their optics vs the Myriads. These days I sit back and wait for reports (for years if needed) and see what filters through about certain ones. A few things surfaced- "deeper" and "more contrast than ES" grabbed my attention. Every Ethos has bested my ES- but the ES are really good don't get me wrong. Another thing I watch is who uses things... I know for a fact that some people will not use some equipment if it is sub par- regardless of cost.

At first I looked at the Lunt's coatings and thought-"oh yeah, they look just like ES/Naglers..." but the 20mm sure does work!

I often wonder, but don't know, if certain vendors can cherry pick the best of the lot with glass- pretty sure SV rejects a bunch of Chinese lenses and keeps the good ones for their scopes as an example. Thing is where do the rejected lenses go? (or what scopes are they put in?...)

[John]

My little holiday included viewing the Doomsday Book, one of the 4 Magna Carta copies in existance and visting Isaac Newton's birthplace so a very enjoyable and stimulating trip

I do think that manufacturers produce a number of quality gradings which are available to selected brandings depending on the size and value of their order, specficiations etc, etc. We can make guesses where the other stuff ends up !

 

[jetstream]

50 minutes ago, John said:

viewing the Doomsday Book, one of the 4 Magna Carta copies in existance

I would like to see this someday- there is so much history where you are, I'm envious!

[John]

4 minutes ago, jetstream said:

I would like to see this someday- there is so much history where you are, I'm envious!

Lots of interesting history where you are as well Gerry, as my wife and I found when we visited Canada last year. Really enjoyable trip - we will be back !

[jetstream]

36 minutes ago, John said:

Lots of interesting history where you are as well Gerry, as my wife and I found when we visited Canada last year. Really enjoyable trip - we will be back !

Maybe a look through the 24" John? I might be ready by then lol!

[PeterW]

Mr Eddgie has gone off glass ep like I have. I have the baader mpcc, might try it in the 8" and the 20mm, maybe delay selling it till I have the ES unit.... I have a habit of selling stuff and then regretting it. I seem to have cured myself of aperture fever... now a speak freak instead!

 

Peter

[niallk]

Fascinating findings Gerry  thanks for writing up the report.

The resale value of Ethos EPs might be about to take a very serious hit - d'oh! Those Lunt EPs are very well priced indeed.

[jetstream]

There is no question the Ethos is top notch but for an eyepiece to even come close to its performance is an achievement and the Lunt exceeds this achievement IMHO. I personally love low power Hyperwides, now I just need an excellent 25mm 100deg... maybe we can all email Markus with some hopes and dreams lol!