Nirvana eyepieces

[Grump Martian]

I have been after a 28 mm Nirvana eyepiece for nearly ten years. I have the adorable 16 mm old style with the adjustable eye cup. Old fruit has sold me his 28 mm Nirvana. So the little sister 16mm has now been aquainted with it's older brother 28 mm. Delightful

Edited August 12 by Grump Martian
Picture added

[globular]

I’m liking your chunky workbench and bench grinder. Is not a Scheppach BG200 is it?

[Grump Martian]

1 minute ago, globular said:

I’m liking your chunky workbench and bench grinder. Is not a Scheppach BG200 is it?

Correct. Plenty of horsepower. No grinding to a halt with tough metal.

[globular]

1 minute ago, Grump Martian said:

Correct. Plenty of horsepower. No grinding to a halt with tough metal.

 

Good choice sir. Oh and the eyepiece too lol 

[Pixies]

I have the 28mm - it's a great eyepiece. You do have to turn your head to use it, though! 

[Ags]

7 hours ago, Grump Martian said:

Correct. Plenty of horsepower. No grinding to a halt with tough metal.

Is it for dealing with eyepieces that don't make the grade? Zero tolerance!

[Grump Martian]

Hi Ags. The grinder is a counter balance for the heavy 28 mm Nirvana.

[hal9550]

Just wondering what you think of the 28? How does it perform? it would be for a fast F10 SCT 

[Don Pensack]

2 hours ago, hal9550 said:

Just wondering what you think of the 28? How does it perform? it would be for a fast F10 SCT 

At f/10, it's essentially perfect right up to the very edge.  

[Astronomist]

How well do you cope with that massive eyecup? I have the new version with a more normal sized non-adjustable eyecup, which is still quite large.

[hal9550]

8 hours ago, Astronomist said:

How well do you cope with that massive eyecup? I have the new version with a more normal sized non-adjustable eyecup, which is still quite large.

 

16 hours ago, Don Pensack said:

At f/10, it's essentially perfect right up to the very edge.  

Il tell you what it is folks - probably a touch of mission creep on my part - i was//am aiming to cover 82 degrees up to around the 20mm mark - but perhaps thinking of getting 1 PERHAPS 2 in the 20-30 mark- im just trying to get a feel for what is decent within that range. There is nothing morpheus beyond 17.5 - so candidates would be ES82 at 24mm and 30mm - this 28mm seems like a dark horse which i will keep an eye on (pardon the pun) - i know i can get these from Astroshop under a different brand sibling

 

But it is mission creep

 

In terms of eyecup placement Harry, i just took out some of my pieces - i have a wide range of different eyecups, from very large and long (my 2" Kellners)  to none at all, on some of the hyperions, and a silver top - Its not something that would impact a decision - iv never gawked at using an eyepiece due to eyecups - with the barely usable plossls which i really only take out occasionally, i tend to fold it back or temporarily remove it 

Edited Wednesday at 16:12 by hal9550

[Grump Martian]

On 27/08/2024 at 22:52, hal9550 said:

Just wondering what you think of the 28? How does it perform? it would be for a fast F10 SCT 

It's not so good with my Celestron C6. Great on my F 7 & F6 refractors. And really good on a 12 inch reflector.

[Grump Martian]

On 13/08/2024 at 00:55, Pixies said:

I have the 28mm - it's a great eyepiece. You do have to turn your head to use it, though! 

Slightly. But not a noticeable problem.

[Grump Martian]

22 hours ago, Astronomist said:

How well do you cope with that massive eyecup? I have the new version with a more normal sized non-adjustable eyecup, which is still quite large.

You get used to where to position your eye. I had a 30 mm Moonfish eyepiece once. It would always make the side of my nose sore no matter how I positioned my eye. This does'nt happen with the 28 mm Nirvana.

[bosun21]

The best reasonably priced eyepiece in the 30mm range is the UFF 30mm  They come in various guises like APM, Stella Lyra, Celestron Edge, Altair UFF. This is superior to the ES 30mm.

[Astronomist]

2 hours ago, bosun21 said:

The best reasonably priced eyepiece in the 30mm range is the UFF 30mm

I would be interested to see a direct comparison between this and the 28mm nirvana, which is only fractionally more expensive. I know they are both very well regarded eyepieces so it would be interesting to see if there is anything to choose between them.

[John]

I did a comparison between the 28mm Nirvana, the 31mm Nagler and the 30mm Pentax XW a few years back (the 30mm UFF was not available back then):

3bigeps.pdf

The ergonomics of the 28mm Nirvana might be it's drawback - the eye cup is almost a face cup due to it's size !

Today I'd strongly consider the 30mm UFF as well on the basis of feedback I've read on it from experienced observers.

[Pixies]

I'll have the Nirvana with me at Astrocamp next month. @cajen2 will you be bringing your UFF 30mm? We can have a shoot-out.

[bosun21]

My money is on the UFF.

[hal9550]

1 hour ago, John said:

I did a comparison between the 28mm Nirvana, the 31mm Nagler and the 30mm Pentax XW a few years back (the 30mm UFF was not available back then):

3bigeps.pdf 448.39 kB · 3 downloads

The ergonomics of the 28mm Nirvana might be it's drawback - the eye cup is almost a face cup due to it's size !

Today I'd strongly consider the 30mm UFF as well on the basis of feedback I've read on it from experienced observers.

Thats a really fantastic review John, thanks for that. As it stands im formulating a list of EPs at various focal lengths - once the list is complete (with back up options) il probably begin acquiring the new ones, and selling my own stuff

[Louis D]

4 hours ago, Astronomist said:

I would be interested to see a direct comparison between this and the 28mm nirvana, which is only fractionally more expensive. I know they are both very well regarded eyepieces so it would be interesting to see if there is anything to choose between them.

I've directly compared the original mushroom top ES82 30mm decloaked against the APM UFF 30mm.  Both are quite flat of field, but the ES82 has slightly more bloated stars across the field.  Also, the ES82 has the Nagler T5 design's ring of fire.  At night, this manifests itself as a chromatic splitting of bright objects in the last 10% to 15% of the field.  Jupiter had red and blue images that separated more and more the closer it got to the field stop.  There is none of this in the UFF.  It is just sharp stars to the edge.

The only reason I ever use the ES82 is due to the wider AFOV and slightly tighter eye relief that combine to produce a pronounced spacewalk effect.  If you always look at the center of the view, you'll never notice the so-so edges.

I would think the Nirvana 28mm would be very similar to the ES82 30mm since both are Nagler T5 clones.  It really depends on your use case whether the Nirvana or UFF is right for you.

I did compare the UFF to my Panoptic 27mm, and I thought the central stars were a tiny bit more pinpoint in the latter, but it was close nonetheless.  However, the tight eye relief and field curvature of the Panoptic are its main negatives that keep me from using it more.

[hal9550]

1 hour ago, Louis D said:

I've directly compared the original mushroom top ES82 30mm decloaked against the APM UFF 30mm.  Both are quite flat of field, but the ES82 has slightly more bloated stars across the field.  Also, the ES82 has the Nagler T5 design's ring of fire.  At night, this manifests itself as a chromatic splitting of bright objects in the last 10% to 15% of the field.  Jupiter had red and blue images that separated more and more the closer it got to the field stop.  There is none of this in the UFF.  It is just sharp stars to the edge.

The only reason I ever use the ES82 is due to the wider AFOV and slightly tighter eye relief that combine to produce a pronounced spacewalk effect.  If you always look at the center of the view, you'll never notice the so-so edges.

I would think the Nirvana 28mm would be very similar to the ES82 30mm since both are Nagler T5 clones.  It really depends on your use case whether the Nirvana or UFF is right for you.

I did compare the UFF to my Panoptic 27mm, and I thought the central stars were a tiny bit more pinpoint in the latter, but it was close nonetheless.  However, the tight eye relief and field curvature of the Panoptic are its main negatives that keep me from using it more.

This is where i will undoubtedly display my ignorance! What do you mean by De-Cloaking! Im assuming it has something to do with recessed lens placement which robs us of some eye relief? But i really assumed this was just a fact of life. And when doing my research i tended to deduct some ER from each ES82 eyepiece under consideration!

[John]

1 hour ago, hal9550 said:

This is where i will undoubtedly display my ignorance! What do you mean by De-Cloaking! Im assuming it has something to do with recessed lens placement which robs us of some eye relief? But i really assumed this was just a fact of life. And when doing my research i tended to deduct some ER from each ES82 eyepiece under consideration!

De-Cloaking refers to the removal of parts of the body of an eyepiece to make it less bulky and lighter. This is possible with some of the Meade, Maxvision, Celestron and ES eyepiece designs.

Edited Thursday at 17:09 by John

[Don Pensack]

The 30mm UFF has a flatter field, less lateral chromatic aberration, sharper edge of field stars, and a lot more eye relief than the 28mm 82°.

The 28nn has a 12%wider true field and a 20% wider apparent field than the UFF.  It is also 20% heavier though lightweight compared to the ES30x82 or the 31mm Nagler.

[Louis D]

2 hours ago, hal9550 said:

This is where i will undoubtedly display my ignorance! What do you mean by De-Cloaking! Im assuming it has something to do with recessed lens placement which robs us of some eye relief? But i really assumed this was just a fact of life. And when doing my research i tended to deduct some ER from each ES82 eyepiece under consideration!

The original ES-82 line had twist-up, bulbous eye cups:

As you can see, those "mushroom" tops made it difficult to get your head and nose in such a position as to be able to see into the eye lens because they were so wide and flat.  They did have one huge advantage, though.  No eye lens recession.  It was mounted basically flush with the metal top as you can see in the second image.  The outer rubber ring is what raised and lowered prior to decloaking.

Decloaking involved removing the twist-up eye cup.

Here's a group of decloaked Meade eyepieces from the same era also made by JOC (the maker of ES and Bresser equipment):

Here's a size comparison of my decloaked 30mm ES-82, 30mm (labelled 20mm as sold) Agena UWA 80 degree, 30mm APM UFF, and 27mm Panoptic.

Imagine how much bigger the ES-82 was before I removed the eye cup and about 11 ounces of weight.