Suggestions for a beginner

[Back40]

I know, you are probably getting tired of all these "new guy" questions, but here we go. I just received a Celestron 8se which is an sct with a FL of 2000 mm. It came with the standard Celestron star diagonal and a Celestron 25mm plossl. We have only had a couple "clear" nights since I received it and I am anxious to start seeing new things. Imaging is way down the road for me, so not intrested in that right now. I want to be able to view the moon and the planets. I did order a Celestron variable polarizing filter also. What would be some good eyepieces for this type of viewing. BTW, been looking at a Meade 8.8 uwa but idk if this would help me for what I am wanting to do. Thank you so much for your attention  and time to help out. 

[Beardy30]

I’ve just been advised by FLO to look at the 9mm Celestron X-Cel LX eyepiece. and some filters would be good I just got the same scope last week 

eyepieces/celestron-x-cel-lx-eyepiece.html

 https://www.firstlightoptics.com/light-pollution-reduction/light-pollution-filter.html 

 https://www.firstlightoptics.com/light-pollution-reduction/baader-neodymium-filter.html 
 

[Louis D]

With a 2000mm focal length, you'd be pushing the magnification to very high levels with a ~9mm eyepieces (2000/9=222x).  Sky conditions may not often allow for that level of magnification.  I would recommend staying between 75x and 150x for now.  You've got the lower end covered with the 25mm Plossl for now, so I'd look into getting a 12mm to 14mm eyepiece for the upper end.  The 12mm Astro-Tech Paradigm is pretty decent for $60, especially in an f/10 scope.

Edited April 20, 2020 by Louis D

[Dr Strange]

Louis is right. At that focal length pushing power isn't always the best option. Having owned the 8SE myself I found that the Explore Scientific (ES) eyepieces (EP's) are going to give you the most bang for your buck. And will work with any scope you may upgrade to or add to your lineup. For the 8SE I would recommend the ES 14mm 82* EP. It is going to make you move your entire head to see the barrel of the EP which is nice because it makes you feel like you fell into the telescope and are swimming in space. It is £138 so it is not cheap but in this hobby as with anything else you get what you pay for. I had the entire line of the 82*'s by the way except for the 30mm. At 24mm it is like the Holy Hand Grenade in size, and can be used in place of a club to defend yourself so for me it too was a bit big. My most used of them were the 18mm (you will need a 2" diagonal for this) and the 14mm. I compared the ES EP's to the Tele Vue Naglers and the ES held their own.

The only reason I have the Naglers now and sold the ES's was because here in the US vendors will sell the Tele Vue EP's at dealer cost at certain times of the year. They do this because Tele Vue incentivizes dealers with free product if they sell certain target numbers of EP's and other equipment. So for a dealer if they hit a certain number of EP's sold they get free products that is worth more to them than the profit they would have made on the EP's they sold at dealer cost. Since that was a deal too good to pass up I sold my ES EP's and bought Tele Vue. Had that deal not been on the table I would still be using the ES's. 

FLO is a great place to buy the EP's. Even though I am in the States I use them when I can't find something over here or they have something I need. They are fantastic to work with and very knowledgeable plus they are price competitive so you can't go wrong. Here is a link to the EP:

https://www.firstlightoptics.com/explore-scientific-eyepieces/explore-scientific-82-degree-series-eyepieces.html

[Dr Strange]

Sorry forgot to add one thing. You may want to view the moon at its various phases before you open/order that polarizing filter. If you are like me, you will not want to dim and/or distort the shades of grey and white the moon looks when you use a filter like that. I would rather go moon blind (temporary blindness from a white spot in the eye from the brightness of a almost full or full moon) than face that. So I just suck it up and deal with the moon blindness for a few moments. 

[Ags]

A low-power 32 mm plossl is cheap and worth buying to get the maximum field of view for a 1.25" diagonal. I would look at a 15 mm plossl for higher power. As an alternative to the plossls the next step up would be BST Starguider eyepieces - they show more sky for the same eyepiece focal length. Next one up from that would be the Nirvana 16 mm. 

https://www.firstlightoptics.com/ovl-eyepieces/ovl-nirvana-es-uwa-82-ultrawide-eyepieces.html

That would give 125 magnification and show an area of sky slightly larger than the full moon.