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200p + Teleview Virginity


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Well hey all,

I am just about to head out on a monster observing session *hopefully*, for what feels like months since clear skies.

Anyways, from the large advice from this forum I will be buying a Skywatcher Skyliner 200P Dobsonian.

I understand it comes with stock eyepieces which are normally naff from my experience. I am ready to buy some Televues! I have read on and on about 200p threads and televue plossls.

I have decided on the 200p as a combination of just being able to fit it in my corsa, and it allows my spare care for some Televues (they are the best after all arent they :), well apart from pentaxes or something i heard...)

I have also bought a couple of maplins cases for the kit, yay for spending saved money on good stuff :(:p So naturally I would like to do the same for my eyepieces, which leads me here.

Which eyepieces should I get? The televues simply are irresitable while in this current 20% off promotion. Is there a specific online shop people can recommend for the EPs? I was thinking of going with telescope house.

Is a 3 or 4 eyepiece set going to work out better do you think? I was considering one 2" wide field eyepiece and 3 others all 1.25" perhaps a small, middle and relatively wide ranges of magnification.

I cannot stress how excited I am to get some quality eyepieces that will really improve my observing ;)B)

Oh and one other thing, I think I understand field of view. It doesn't have anything to do with magnification, it just lets more view in around the cluster for example? So I would have to manually nudge less if the field of view was wider...?

Are the teleview plossls going to have enough fov or should I save more etc for whatever the next brand up is?

A big thanks goes out to the advice givers, jahmason, branuk, kef and moonshine etc and everyone else who can help me, thanks.

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Yes the wider your field of view is the less you will nudge the scope. Just place the object just outside your FOV and watch it glide accross.

Your idea of 4 eyepieces sounds good. I would get a wide field 2" eyepiece of about 28mm. Then three 1.25" eyepieces of about 21mm, 13mm and 8mm. Look at the Baader Hyperions.

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Yes the wider your field of view is the less you will nudge the scope. Just place the object just outside your FOV and watch it glide accross.

Your idea of 4 eyepieces sounds good. I would get a wide field 2" eyepiece of about 28mm. Then three 1.25" eyepieces of about 21mm, 13mm and 8mm. Look at the Baader Hyperions.

Thanks Doc, do you think it would be worth stepping the 2" up to 30mm+. Just so more exit pupil etc.

Why the Baader hyperions? Is that personal preference to Televues or do you get more FOV or optical quality for your money ....?

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While Tele Vue eyepieces are some of the best, there are many other good ones out there as well. Do be aware that a really expensive eyepiece does not show you anymore - you just get slightly nicer views of what you can already see.

By all means get some but don't believe that they will cast some magical spell over your observing making invisible things visible and such like :)

This comes from a firm Tele Vue fan but the way - I just wanted to inject a note of realism :(

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Why the Baader hyperions? Is that personal preference to Televues or do you get more FOV or optical quality for your money ....?

A plossl gives you 50-52 degree FOV whilst the Hyperions mostly give 68 degrees.

I have the 200P dob and the wider FOV is very welcome.

My 2p :)

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Hi Adz, congratulations on the new kit! :p

I would also suggest the Baader Genuine Orthoscope's for high power planetary and Lunar views, I am sure others will agree, they are certainly a lot cheaper than most TV ep's, I tried out my 1st ortho recently and was very impressed with the views given on the Moon! :)

Will be out soon to test it again :(

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While Tele Vue eyepieces are some of the best, there are many other good ones out there as well. Do be aware that a really expensive eyepiece does not show you anymore - you just get slightly nicer views of what you can already see.

By all means get some but don't believe that they will cast some magical spell over your observing making invisible things visible and such like :)

This comes from a firm Tele Vue fan but the way - I just wanted to inject a note of realism :(

I have a fair few TVs as well and think this a well balanced assesment. They cannot be be beaten but whether they can be equalled or not I don't really know. You would need a lot of back to back testing to find out.

Olly

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TV plossl's are good and the views are good, however they are still a plossl. If eye relief is an issue at the lower end, this may be something to consider.

TV plossl's come in 8mm, 11mm, 15mm, 20mm and 25mm offerings. I know there is a 32mm but not sure if that is 1.25 or 2". With these as the options guess that 8mm, 11mm, 20mm are a fair spread. Although I might go for the 25mm over the 20mm. Just to have the wider field of view.

So if you go looking for an eyepiece smaller then 8mm it will have to be another model, although TV have Radians (?) at the smaller focal lengths and about twice the cost of the plossl's. So the same general appearance if you want a set that match visually.

The TV plossl's are reckoned to be OK on f/5 scopes, some have said they do OK on f/4's.

Although nice in a case, keep the boxes. If you decide to change to say TV Radians in the future then the boxes are expected when selling TV plossl's.

Concerning alternatives, the only way to find out is to buy one and see how they operate on your scope. That means spending money. The Baaders have a good name, not sure of the focal lengths available. I have Antares W70's which I find good. The WO SWANS I have are not rated for f/5 scopes and there are just a few focal lengths.

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Thanks for all the advice everyone. I had a monster good observing party last night (I shall do an observing report up soon) and a few things really became clear to me after reading your replies.

FOV is everything ha ha. When always manually moving a dob you really want to be gaining a good understanding of how easy and where to move the axis. Obviously the optical perfomance is taken into account loads, but at least I really understand why these Ethos cost so much then - 100 degree fov!!

While Tele Vue eyepieces are some of the best, there are many other good ones out there as well. Do be aware that a really expensive eyepiece does not show you anymore - you just get slightly nicer views of what you can already see.

Thanks for the heads up, I am completely aware of the effect it will have. You summed up what I am looking for in the last line, nicer views of what is already present. I am not expecting miracles of change, just eyepieces that can provide much more ease of use for myself, dad and friends that are always coming and going the telescope.

Last night even with Saturn at 10mm, I had to keep adjusting the scope every time someone wanted a look. It was a pain in the bum. I know I should expect this buying a none Goto or auto dobsonian, but I actually chose it because I would like to spend a lot of the money elsewhere. I also like the thrill of the chase ;) Like when I stumbled across M1 after 2 hours of searching and nearly giving up. I felt like I had run a marathon! :):(

I would also suggest the Baader Genuine Orthoscope's for high power planetary and Lunar views, I am sure others will agree, they are certainly a lot cheaper than most TV ep's, I tried out my 1st ortho recently and was very impressed with the views given on the Moon!

Thanks Nexus, I looked these up but they seem to have a small 40 degree fov? Surely at a power of say 7mm, you are constantly battling the movement of the earth?

TV plossl's are good and the views are good, however they are still a plossl. If eye relief is an issue at the lower end, this may be something to consider.

TV plossl's come in 8mm, 11mm, 15mm, 20mm and 25mm offerings. I know there is a 32mm but not sure if that is 1.25 or 2". With these as the options guess that 8mm, 11mm, 20mm are a fair spread. Although I might go for the 25mm over the 20mm. Just to have the wider field of view.

So if you go looking for an eyepiece smaller then 8mm it will have to be another model, although TV have Radians (?) at the smaller focal lengths and about twice the cost of the plossl's. So the same general appearance if you want a set that match visually.

The TV plossl's are reckoned to be OK on f/5 scopes, some have said they do OK on f/4's.

Although nice in a case, keep the boxes. If you decide to change to say TV Radians in the future then the boxes are expected when selling TV plossl's.

Concerning alternatives, the only way to find out is to buy one and see how they operate on your scope. That means spending money. The Baaders have a good name, not sure of the focal lengths available. I have Antares W70's which I find good. The WO SWANS I have are not rated for f/5 scopes and there are just a few focal lengths.

Thanks Capricorn. The scope is f/6, which is handy here for helping decide whether eyepieces are going to cope or not. I don't think I can justify more than around £100 for each of the eyepieces so a radian is probably out of the question. As is he panaview steve.B)

Man there are so many to consider. Skywatcher, televue, antares, william optics, baaders. Just when I thought I might be settled on one, a new name manages to rear its head :p

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If I understand you right, you have a budget of around £400, for 3-4 eyepieces? Also, you'd prefer a larger FOV so as not to have to spend so much time following.

The first thing that springs to mind is an 8-24mm Hyperion zoom. These are £170 new, and they will provide 50-150x in your scope. At 8mm, the FOV is a very nice 68°, but it shrinks down to 50° at 24mm. I have one for my f/6 scope and it's fantastic and covers most of my needs on its own.

Additional to this I would suggest a widefield 2" eyepiece between 30-40mm (stick to the lower end of that if you are older). A 32mm or 38mm Panaview at £80-90 will fit into your budget and will be okay at f/6, a 34mm Antares W-70 will save a few £s, but will be a little more fuzzy round the edges. However, if you can stretch to a 35mm Aero at £130, or go all the way for a 35mm Panoptic, you will notice a great improvement in the views.

Lastly, for high powers, something between 5-7mm would be sensible. Obviously, at higher powers the movement of the earth becomes increasingly evident, so a larger FOV is useful. The new TMB clones are very well regarded, very cheap, and have an acceptable 58° - definitely worth considering. The original TMBs are also on the above link, as is the 5mm BST explorer - for the money, very well regarded too.

Hope that's been of help. Any questions you have about anything I've said, just fire away :)

Andrew

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All help has been great thanks a lot guys.

The hyperion zoom looks very interesting. I have been doing lots of research on hyperions in general and they offer a great alternative to televues, at a better price.

The zoom must compromise on something compared to buying the separate magnifications instead? I have picked up that much from photographic lenses.

My decision is just that I cannot work out whether to buy televue plossls in this promotion or second hand higher models, ie radians? Do the models up just offer larger fields of view is that it?

Or perhaps an ortho for close work on planets, from Baader. But then I read that they have terrible eye relief which I cant be doing with.

Perhaps I didn't make my usage very clear. I want to work through the different catelogues that other observers do on here ie lunar 100, messiers.

But I also will need these eyepieces for my friends. I would absolutely love for them to have the wow factor and for one of my friends just be blown away by what they are experiencing, I know I do all the time.

Also shouldn't the highest power have the best field of view, not the other way round? When I am viewing saturn close for example, I dont want to move the scope every second :D

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Remember the smaller the focal length, the higher the magnification! Yes, at higher powers, larger TFOVs are more useful to track objects, but at lower powers, they're also nice as you can feel more immersed. This is a matter of personal taste though.

IMHO the only compromise in the Hyperions is mainly FOV. 50° isn't considered to be very wide. Optical quality is equal to the single f/l Hyperions at 8mm. At 20-24mm the field stop (black border) isn't very sharp, and there is some field curvature, but on the whole, it's a great eyepiece.

Plossls have even smaller eye relief than orthos at the same focal length (for both designs, eye relief increases with focal length). Also remember that TeleVue plossls stop at 8mm. For the longer f/ls, the eye relief will be generous though. The different TeleVue models offer different advantages besides FOV, for example, the Radians all have 20mm eye relief. On the whole though, larger FOVs will cost more for the same optical quality.

HTH

Andrew

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I've got a smattering of Meade 4000 eyepieces, various celestron, etc and a 13mm Ethos. Out of all of them I use the Ethos the most as it has the same field of view as a 25mm plossl, but a bigger in-eye image so everything is easier to see... despite the eye-watering price I've never regretted buying it. Its so versatile.

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Thanks Andrew and Trull. Trull I would die for an ethos but I seriously don't have that kind of money :D

Andrew when I think about the current televue promotion I see it as a waste to miss out on this opportunity. I dont like the sound of what you say about the edge stop with the Baader zoom at 20mm. Surely for the same £170, I could get 3 TV plossls like the 8, 15 and 25mm. Although everyone says the 32mm is a peach so that as well maybe.

I would also like to buy a coronado pst solar scope in the future, for a basic solar observation kit. Would the televue range of plossls be okay for that?

Many thanks

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I would also like to buy a coronado pst solar scope in the future, for a basic solar observation kit. Would the televue range of plossls be okay for that?

Many thanks

Yes, they would be good. The PST seems not too demanding on eyepieces - I used a low cost 16mm plossl with the one I had and it worked fine.

The Baader 8-24mm zoom is a nice tool to use with the PST but I prefer fixed focal length eyepieces for nighttime use.

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Andrew when I think about the current televue promotion I see it as a waste to miss out on this opportunity. I dont like the sound of what you say about the edge stop with the Baader zoom at 20mm. Surely for the same £170, I could get 3 TV plossls like the 8, 15 and 25mm. Although everyone says the 32mm is a peach so that as well maybe.

Hi Adam,

The effect is only noticeable at 24mm, and TBH I've only noticed it in daytime use. I've knocked up a kind of simulation of the effect observing a grey background. Of course with a dark background the effect is neither as noticeable, nor as important. A lot of users don't use the 24mm setting at all as you get about the same true field at 20mm.

Anyway, I don't doubt that the TeleVue plossls will be better optically, by a small margin, but you will have to change eyepiece when changing magnifications, and you will get 50° across the range.

Andrew

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