Vixen LVWs

[Pixies]

Oh - the wife's going to kill me! I don't want to add up the total value...

Just need the 17mm now...

[Alan White]

A very nice line up reminds me of what I had a while back a stupidly sold on, we live and learn
Surely you will need 2 x 17mm?

My old line up, it had the XW 5 in the HP role, which is what I still have.
The 30mm was OK, but not as nice as the APM UFF 30 that I now own.

[Mr Spock]

I'm just missing the 3.5mm.

[Franklin]

19 hours ago, Alan White said:

The 30mm was OK, but not as nice as the APM UFF 30 that I now own.

Did the NLVW 30mm require a lot of in focus? I have the older LV 30mm but it will only reach focus with my achros, not enough in-travel with the EDs plus a 2" diagonal.

[Alan White]

It was a while back, it would not focus on the ED103, so must have been lack of infocus.
But on the Dob, it worked well, just not as crisp as the UFF 30mm or a Panoptic 27mm.
But mind you it is/was not as expensive as the other two.

[Stephenstargazer]

Is the Stella Lyra LER WA possibly a poor mans LVW ??🤫

I have had LVW 5, 13 for ages, will not part but went TV later. Also NLVW 30, which is quite different but OK for one not used much. Strange focus position, will get data*. Are any LVW really parfocal  ? One thing that TV do well.

 

*Focus position on NLVW 30: the starting point was an eyepiece with a known focal plane (eg 1 1/4" Televue on which the field stop is 1/4 " 6.3mm below the body). from this the LVW focal planes were measured to be:  LVW 5 - 8mm below, LVW 13 - 15mm below, NLVW 30 - 16 mm above the body joint with barrel. (I measured these some time back) 

That is the NLVW  30 will require 31mm more infocus travel than say the LVW 13. Given that a 2" mirror diagonal will already have a long optical length, it's no wonder that some scopes may not come to focus with the NLVW 30. (But mine all do 🙂!!)

 

Edited September 12, 2022 by Stephenstargazer
Added info on NLVW 30 focal position

[Don Pensack]

They are a more modern eyepiece with better coatings than the older LVWs.

I think you'd find them excellent.  They are from a superb Taiwanese manufacturer known for excellent apo refractors as well.

 

[Stephenstargazer]

i had a 90mm doublet of theirs (TS branded) which was optically excellent. The eyepiece specification seems similar to LVW. Will be interested to hear any comparison.

[Louis D]

10 hours ago, Stephenstargazer said:

Is the Stella Lyra LER WA possibly a poor mans LVW ??🤫

Here is Ernest in Russia's testing/review of the entire line as the Levenhuk Ra.

[TheLookingGlass]

Vixen LVW's have insanely excellent correction in fast scopes. Sure it's only 65° afov, but still good, even at F/4.

[Stephenstargazer]

The NLVW 30 is not much like the rest in many ways. I have just found out that if you pull off the strangely short eye cup it will fit a TV Dioptrix. Yet to see how this goes for me in the outermost fov but I do have sufficient eye relief to try.

And out of curoiosity found they also just fit on my regular LVWs (5&13). Less needed as mild astigmatism only shows at large exit pupils.

Edited November 22, 2022 by Stephenstargazer
Note about LVW added.