RE: [Utah-astronomy] Eyepiece recommendations?
Michael & Kim, Thanks for taking the time to respond. I understand about exit pupils and the math behind focal lengths and such, but what I don't understand are the relative advantages of the various eyepiece designs on the market. Nagler vs. Plossl, that sort of thing. I agree that only a few eyepieces are needed. I've done more star parties than I can count with just one 17 mm Plossl and one 40 mm Plossl. Adding the 30 mm Ultrascopic was (pardon the pun) a real eye-opener. Naglers are impressively wide-angle, pricey, and heavy. Is there anything else that performs almost as well but doesn't cost a fortune? If not, then I just want to know that. Plossls are light, small, and cheap. What's intermediate between these and a high-end Nagler or Radian? Is there such a critter? Is an Orion Lanthanum an acceptable substitute for a Nagler, or will nothing less than the real McCoy suffice? I appreciate your opinions & recommendations. Seth
Seth Less expensive eyepieces like the ones recommended by Kim work fine and in some cases better than Naglers for long focal length telescopes (over F/8). For planetary performance the fewer the optical elements the better provided the eyepiece is well made such as higher end plossls. The Nagler excels for fast (f/5 or less) scopes but is often inferior for planetary performance sometimes introducing false color on bright objects such as I have observed with 16 mm Naglers. Any eyepiece with a 65 degree or more field will work well for a space walk view on long focal length telescopes. In my opinion if your scope is f/8 or more you are wasting money on Naglers and will get less light throughput and false color on bright objects. But for fast scopes the Naglers are great. I own five Naglers as well as several plossls, Pentax, Panoptics and Meade Ultra wides. My favorite eyepiece is still the old 14 mm Meade Ultra Wide for fast scopes. Clear Skies Don Colton -----Original Message----- From: utah-astronomy-bounces+djcolton=piol.com@mailman.xmission.com [mailto:utah-astronomy-bounces+djcolton=piol.com@mailman.xmission.com] On Behalf Of Seth Jarvis Sent: Tuesday, August 29, 2006 3:57 PM To: Utah Astronomy Subject: RE: [Utah-astronomy] Eyepiece recommendations? Michael & Kim, Thanks for taking the time to respond. I understand about exit pupils and the math behind focal lengths and such, but what I don't understand are the relative advantages of the various eyepiece designs on the market. Nagler vs. Plossl, that sort of thing. I agree that only a few eyepieces are needed. I've done more star parties than I can count with just one 17 mm Plossl and one 40 mm Plossl. Adding the 30 mm Ultrascopic was (pardon the pun) a real eye-opener. Naglers are impressively wide-angle, pricey, and heavy. Is there anything else that performs almost as well but doesn't cost a fortune? If not, then I just want to know that. Plossls are light, small, and cheap. What's intermediate between these and a high-end Nagler or Radian? Is there such a critter? Is an Orion Lanthanum an acceptable substitute for a Nagler, or will nothing less than the real McCoy suffice? I appreciate your opinions & recommendations. Seth _______________________________________________ Utah-Astronomy mailing list Utah-Astronomy@mailman.xmission.com http://mailman.xmission.com/cgi-bin/mailman/listinfo/utah-astronomy Visit the Photo Gallery: http://www.utahastronomy.com
Seth, I'll echo the "try before you buy" mantra here too. Especially since one person's opinion may not match your own experience. For example, I once did a side-by-side comparison of a 22mm Panoptic and a 21mm Pentax (IIRC), and much preferred the view through the Panoptic. Lowell years later told me had just the opposite experience with his scope, and traded away all his TeleVue eyepieces for Pentax. In my 16-inch f/6.25 dob, my very favorite is the 22mm Nagler; it pretty much lives in the focuser. In my 6-inch f/8 newt, an inexpensive 20mm Erfle is my favorite, but it doesn't work so well in the 16. I also love the 16mm Nagler in the 16inch, and it also works very well in the 6. For planetary work, ploessls and orthos can't be beat (less glass is indeed better). One very memorable Halloween some years ago, when seeing was excellent, Debbie Whitaker and I were cranking up the magnification of Jupiter with her 15-inch Obsession, and we both found that her TV ploessls gave cleaner images than her Radians, and her old ortho a slightly cleaner image even than the ploessls. The tradeoff there of course is narrower field of view and far less eye relief. While I love my 35mm Panoptic for wide-angle views, I took a look at a far cheaper, comparable 2-inch design a couple of years ago (don't remember the brand) that Lou Griffith (lives in Ogden) owns. I remember thinking it performed nearly the same, for about 1/3 the price. I'll email him and find out the brand if you're interested. I know Chuck Hards likes his UO Koenigs as well, and they're relatively inexpensive. My $.02 __________________________________________________ Do You Yahoo!? Tired of spam? Yahoo! Mail has the best spam protection around http://mail.yahoo.com
Seth-- You've had a lot of opinions so far, and it's difficult to disagree with much of what's been said (although my 13mm Nagler gives splendid views through my F/10 C8). Most of my viewing is with a 10" F/4.5 dob, and I can tell you the wide field of a Nagler is quite helpful if you're tracking by hand. As far as an intermediate between a plossl and a Nagler, there are actually quite a few choices these days. A number of eyepieces offer 68-70 degree fields. The University Optics Konigs are in that category, I believe. Orion has a few, as well. Harry Siebert ( http://www.siebertoptics.com/ ) makes a few (I spent a little time with one of his 9mms and it wasn't bad. Butt-ugly, though). I own a 19mm Celestron Axiom. It was a favorite until I got the 13mm Nagler. One thing that's true for the Axiom--and possibly true for many mid-priced widefields--is that they can be mighty soft at the edge of the field. That's not so bad if you're using much of the field to frame your object of interest. The Meade widefields that Don Colton likes are excellent eyepieces at a little bit higher price. Meade actually refreshed that line recently. But you know, plossls aren't bad. The basic optics are well-known, and a moderately-priced plossl can stand up very nicely to a more- expensive widefield for detailed viewing. Oh, one other line you might look as is the Celestron Ultima line. They've been described as sort-of plossl, sort-of Erfle. I've got a 35mm (too much for any of my scopes), a 24mm and a 7.5mm. The smaller pair are both very nice. Televue plossls are also nicely-priced. Oh, and so far as Naglers being heavy, that's certainly true for most of the 2" monsters. But the Type-6 Naglers are mainly 1 1/4 and they're a LOT lighter. Michael
Michael & Kim,
Thanks for taking the time to respond.
I understand about exit pupils and the math behind focal lengths and such, but what I don't understand are the relative advantages of the various eyepiece designs on the market. Nagler vs. Plossl, that sort of thing.
I agree that only a few eyepieces are needed. I've done more star parties than I can count with just one 17 mm Plossl and one 40 mm Plossl. Adding the 30 mm Ultrascopic was (pardon the pun) a real eye-opener.
Naglers are impressively wide-angle, pricey, and heavy. Is there anything else that performs almost as well but doesn't cost a fortune? If not, then I just want to know that.
Plossls are light, small, and cheap. What's intermediate between these and a high-end Nagler or Radian? Is there such a critter?
Is an Orion Lanthanum an acceptable substitute for a Nagler, or will nothing less than the real McCoy suffice?
I appreciate your opinions & recommendations.
Seth
_______________________________________________ Utah-Astronomy mailing list Utah-Astronomy@mailman.xmission.com http://mailman.xmission.com/cgi-bin/mailman/listinfo/utah-astronomy Visit the Photo Gallery: http://www.utahastronomy.com
Michael Carnes MichaelCarnes@earthlink.net home.earthlink.net/~michaelcarnes
participants (4)
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Don J. Colton -
Michael Carnes -
Richard Tenney -
Seth Jarvis