200p Planetary Eyepiece

[TopHouse]

I'm in a position to buy a nice planetary eyepiece for my 200p, I was thinking of the baader, either hyperion or orthoscopic, I was considering the 5mm in either of these, anyone have experience of either of these or can throw others into the mix?

Thanks

[pvaz]

The baader orthoscopic haves excelent contrast and light transmission which helps you to get any detail the seeing conditions allow.

As a down side, the field of view is narrow and it haves a very short eye relief wish makes it not so comfortable to use . Very hard to use if you need glasses to observe. I have no experience with the hyperion but judging by the specs it should give you a more confortable EP but loose a bit of light transmission as it haves more glass elements and maybe some loss in detail too.

University Optics orthos (Circle-T in uk) can be a bit cheaper then the baader and are known to be good too.

[Astro_Baby]

I have a 5mm Hyperion and consider it a bit of a dud. The 13mm is great - in fairnewss to the 5mm its better than a Plossl cos I find the eye relief on Plossls a real problem and I'd guess an orthoscopic might be as bad.

I was reccomended a WO SPL eyepiece for budget planetary - might be food for thought for you.

[TopHouse]

OK, go on, what's a WO SPL then? Ahh, William Optics I do wish you'd stop talking in code!

EDIT

hmm, they only seem to be in 3, 6 and 12.5 mm though, would a 3 be a bit much for my 200p?

Just seem some pentax ones, think i'll be giving those a miss!!

[Andrew*]

I had the 200P for a while and I used 5mm most often, but on good nights I used 4 and even 3mm eyepieces from time to time when the seeing was good.

My favourite high power eyepiece I used in that scope, if you can stretch to it, was Televue's 3-6mm zoom. Offers fair 50° FOV, views are excellent and rival most orthoscopics, but the best thing of course was the zoom function, which allows you to tune the magnification to suit conditions. I really miss that and am seriously considering buying it again. It becomes much cheaper when you realise that you are getting at least four excellent eyepieces in one small convenient package!

Orthos have better eye relief than plossls, but they still get quite tight at 4mm. Circle Ts are a good budget option, and Baader better, but steeper.

If you want eye relief AND good views AND don't want to pay much, the Planetary eyepieces from TMB/Burgess (now out of sale) and Telescope Service are brilliant. I use the 7mm version at the moment and I love it. They have generous 58° FOVs and good eye relief, and really don't give up much to orthos.

Hyperions will be okay, but they have lots of elements and won't give highest contrast or sharpness. The real-life differences will be very slight, and you will gain from more luxurious wide-FOV and more eye relief, so they're not a bad choice either.

Andrew

[Andrew*]

That's right, the disadvantage of WO's SPLs are their very limited range. A shame as they could do well if they had a good spread as they are quite well regarded.

3mm isn't worth breaking the bank for as you won't use it on most nights due to its "optimistic" magnification!

[Astro_Baby]

Sorry - yes I should have said it was Williams Optics. I'd deffo say that 3mm is too much. I was thinking of the 6mm. When I moaned about the Hyperion once the SPL 6mm was suggested.

[TopHouse]

The televue is beyond budget, was looking for possiby a 5mm and now am really stuck, the telescope service look to good to be true, anyone else use these.

if it helps, i wear glasses for distance & tv etc, but not for reading, in fact i have to take the buggers off to read, I usually whip them off to look in the scope, but then have to swip them back on again if looking naked eye as i see [removed word] all! This is getting complicated lol

[Andrew*]

I know what you mean about the Telescope Service ones. They are cheap, but seriously - they are good! Recently it has been nigh on impossible to get them in the UK. TMB are in between models, wishing to bring in a new style of Planetarys, but with the originals out of production. They used to be about £50 new in UK. You still find them second hand going for about £40. I haven't read anything to suggest that the TS version is anything but identical optically to the original TMB ones.

They offer tremendous bang-for-buck, and the views will rival cheaper orthos.

One reason they may be so cheap is because when they came out there was a significant issue involving internal reflections. This issue was sorted out both by repairing already-bought eyepieces and eliminating the problem at the factory. However, the reputation hung around and they lost popularity due to it.

In short, I love mine and for what it's worth, it's simply not worth selling!

I hope I've got my facts right here, so if anyone begs to differ, do not hesitate!

HTH

Andrew

[John]

I've tried a couple of the Telescope Service Planetary HR's (the ones with blue decals) and I agree with Andrew, very good quality eyepieces. I was going to add "for what they cost" there but actually they are very nice eypieces period. I tried their 5mm "back to back" with a Tele Vue Nagler 5mm and, with the exception of the width of the field of view, the sharpness, light transmission and contrast were just as good as the Nagler - which costs 4x as much !.

[TopHouse]

OK, so they have this thing where you choose 2 from Andrews link above, now i'm blumming stuck again!!! which two!! I'm thinking for planetary the 4 or 5 is the limit with a 200p, but which one of those! and after that i was thinking the 9. I'm also looking at a Tal x2 barlow, all these decisions are hard work.

[Andrew*]

How about 8mm and 5mm? The 8 can be barlowed to give 4mm 125x, 200x and 250x is an excellent range to keep you going for high power.

And the Tal barlow is a good bet. Here we have two examples of excellent value for money... nay - three! The 8" newt is a wonderful all-rounder.

Andrew

[lunator]

Tophouse

Just to throw something into the mix

If you for for the orthoscopic eyepieces you can get them secondhand for around £25. This would allow you to get a couple and not break the bank

Cheers

Ian

[TopHouse]

[removed word] [removed word] [removed word]!!! there's always more spanners to throw in lol

[Andrew*]

Good call Ian. However, I've been seeing increasingly less (???) comnig up for sale S/H recently. Definitely worth pouncing on them though if you see them.

[TopHouse]

@ Andrew, when i bought my scope i bought the antares eyepiece kit, the 20 and 25 that come with the skywatcher don't compare, in the kit, the 32mm, 17mm and 12.5 mm i like, the 6mm i aint too sure about, it's the dog out of the kit. Thing is, would i notice much difference between say barlowing the 8 or just using a 4, funnily enough i was swaying sort of 4 and 9 on those eyepieces.

[TopHouse]

OK, I had to do a bit of travelling today so dropped into Rother Valley Optics, had a chat with Ian, and due to my being a glasses wearer and having an astigmatism he recommended the Baader Hyperion 8mm with the two extension rings 1 x 14mm and 1 x 28mm that take it to 6mm and 5mm and 4.3mm So, I bought it, with the rings, have i made a good choice? Oh, I also bought a Telrad, can't wait to try it.

[Andrew*]

It's a bigger, heavier eyepiece, it has more elements, and I personally find screwing and unscrewing parts in the dark a bit frustrating.

However, it's a well regarded eyepiece and it has a larger FOV, more eye relief and 4 magnifications from one eyepiece is pretty good going.

I think it'll do you just fine

Andrew

[dweller25]

have i made a good choice?

Yes

[Wurzil]

I know what you mean about the Telescope Service ones. They are cheap, but seriously - they are good! Recently it has been nigh on impossible to get them in the UK. TMB are in between models, wishing to bring in a new style of Planetarys, but with the originals out of production. They used to be about £50 new in UK. You still find them second hand going for about £40. I haven't read anything to suggest that the TS version is anything but identical optically to the original TMB ones.

They offer tremendous bang-for-buck, and the views will rival cheaper orthos.

The TS planetary eyepieces are available from modern astronomy

Eyepieces @ Modern Astronomy

Ive orderd my 5mm one and have spoken to Bernard (really nice guy) who runs the shop and he has loads of them in stock (mine is in post this morning - cant wait!). £54 quid by the way.

Warren

[Andrew*]

Right you are Warren, thanks for that. I actually meant that the TMB version are hard to come by. I'm not sure what's holding them back in releasing the rest of the line of new Planetary's. Only the 6, and more recently, 9mm have been available...

Cheers

Andrew

[Wurzil]

aaah - after i ordered mine, I got an email from modern astronomy saying it would take them a few days to get them in stock, then i saw your post and I got worried, so I called the shop to see if they were definitely getting them in!! (They came in to shop yesterday - posted to me today). Just thought Id clarify in case anyone else got the wrong idea.

Warren