A Word of Caution!

[MalcolmM]

For anyone as ham fisted and accident prone as myself!

Looking at Jupiter, 4" frac with WO Binoviewers on an equatorial mount. To merge the images in the binoviewers I often have to loosen the locking screws on one or both the eyepieces.

I'm lost in the fabulous views of Jupiter and decide I'll look at Trapezium. Lovely, though no E or F star. I then manually slew round to look at Castor, the weight of the binoviewers, now at an angle to the vertical, cause them to spin downwards and before I can stop them, both my Tak Abbe 12.5 eyepieces fall out onto the paving slabs!

Both are slightly chipped (I'm devastated) but I think they are optically ok.

Lessons for me ... use alt/az mounts and the Maxbrights 🙂

Malcolm 

[Highburymark]

Sorry to hear this and hope they are indeed ok. It’s why some eyepieces have undercuts! I’ve had a couple of scares with rotating binoviewers over the years, and undercuts have saved the day.

[Saganite]

That happened to me last year, bino and both panoptic eyepieces hit the deck. The eyepieces received scratches  but I was more concerned for the collimation of the Denk binoviewer, which, thankfully , was fine.

This happened at the last occultation of Uranus by the Moon, and because It was cloudy and I had to grab the opportunity , I rushed to the front garden to set up and forgot to tighten adequately the diagonal holding the bino.

I did catch the start of the occultation  though..🙂

[Stu]

Sorry to hear that @MalcolmM, it’s a sickening feeling when something like that happens. A while back, I picked up an eyepiece case that I was sure was clamped [removed word], but it wasn’t….. horrible, but fortunately no damage somehow.

I would suggest replacing the WO binoviewers with MaxBright IIs! Clicklock holders and no messing about for collimation, they are just right every time.

[JeremyS]

Crikey Malcolm, sorry to hear that. 
I’ve also had damage in the past, and no doubt Will experience again, but the key thing is to learn from it and put it behind you. Kit is meant to be used.

Edited January 7 by JeremyS

[MalcolmM]

2 hours ago, Highburymark said:

Sorry to hear this and hope they are indeed ok. It’s why some eyepieces have undercuts! I’ve had a couple of scares with rotating binoviewers over the years, and undercuts have saved the day.

Don't mention the undercuts 🙂 I think the eyepieces are ok, just been watching the Io transit with them. Clouds stopped play! It was actually the Tak eyepiece holder that unscrewed partially under the weight of the Binoviewers. But I'll not hear a word against Tak accessories; 100% my fault 🙂

Malcolm 

[MalcolmM]

1 hour ago, Stu said:

Sorry to hear that @MalcolmM, it’s a sickening feeling when something like that happens. A while back, I picked up an eyepiece case that I was sure was clamped [removed word], but it wasn’t….. horrible, but fortunately no damage somehow.

I would suggest replacing the WO binoviewers with MaxBright IIs! Clicklock holders and no messing about for collimation, they are just right every time.

Totally agree re the Maxbrights. I was observing mono and thought I'd try binoviewers as Jupiter was so good. The WO with the 1.7GPC on the telescope end of a WO diagonal replaces the Tak diagonal/eyepiece, plug and play, no unscrewing bits, so I went for them. Normally if I want to use Binoviewers I reconfigure the back end with clicklocks and use the Maxbrights. I think they are much better optically, mechanically and in their useability. 

Malcolm 

[MalcolmM]

29 minutes ago, JeremyS said:

and put it behind you

I must admit to a brief thought of flip if they're bust I'll have to get a pair of TPLs ... or maybe the Masuyama MOPs. Every cloud ... 🙂

Malcolm