Eyepieces

Meade 6.7mm Ultra Wide Angle 1.25"

This one was a Christmas present from my father. (Thanks pop!) Its probably one of the most amazing lenses out there. I was stunned when I took a look at the moon with this thing; the detail is beyond description and the FOV is just amazing at 82º.

It also does a neat little tick. Most higher power ultra wide angle eyepieces are extremely wide angle lenses with a miniature barlow on the end. This is exactly the case for the 6.7mm UWA. You can unscrew the bottom of the UWA, effectively removing the "barlow". In this case the 1.25" metal tube that threads the eyepiece into the holder on the 26mm Meade Series 4000 Plössl that comes with every Meade telescope can be used on the 6.7mm UWA. I have yet to figure out the magnification without the barlow this has come in handy in the past. You'll see some edge distortion but then again it was never meant to be used that way!

Meade 26mm Series 4000 Plössl

Incredibly this underrated little wonder is one of my favorite eyepieces. There is a lot of glass on this over produced little gem, it has a great FOV for a plössl and a fairly undistorted field towards the edge. Definitely an eyepiece I'd like to keep... I now have 2 of these as I bought an extra for use with the bino-viewer.

Garry Russel 16mm UW Köng 1.25"

Picked this one up on AstroMart. If you're not bothered by short eye relief this is a fabulous eyepiece and this one has rapidly become one of my favorites. A huge FOV with the only drawback being that you really have to get your eye in there to enjoy all of it. There is some distortion at the edge of the field but I find it in no way bothersome. Stars are pin point in the center and the lens coatings reflect red and purple.

University Optics 12.5mm Orthoscopic 1.25"

I fell in love with orthoscopics with this eyepiece It is stunningly sharp and unfortunately only limited by its 40º FOV. (I can't wait to take it for a spin on M57 later this year.) It was great on the planets but its been raining so hard I never had a chance to use it for eyepiece projection with the CB245. Well, maybe next winter... This is another eyepiece I doubled up on for the bino-viewer. Its got a nice power for closeups of the moon and planets in both my scopes.

University Optics 6mm Orthoscopic 1.25"

Having enjoyed the 12.5mm so much I decided to invest in a shorter focal length orthoscopic for the planets. I've only had one night to test this eyepiece so far and even then the weather wasn't very cooperative. Undaunted I sat waiting for the sucker holes and swapped it back and forth with my Meade 6.7UWA lucky enough to have caught a transit on Jupiter and the GRS swinging around into view. Besides the huge difference in fields of view I found the UWA only marginally sharper under the conditions. I'm still waiting for the sky to clear after a spree of astro purchases but I think I'm not going to have another shot a Jupiter again this winter...

TeleVue 19mm Panoptic

I absolutely love this eyepiece. This is the first TeleVue product I ever purchased and now can't wait to afford more! All I can say is that this eyepiece is everything people say it is. The FOV is impressive and pinpoint to the edges and the 19mm focal length is very close to the 'sweet spot' for many scopes. I'm definitely in the market for a 10mm Radian and a 35mm Panoptic....

TeleVue 35mm Panoptic

.... And here it is! This was a demo eyepiece from a local vendor because of a dent in the metal from a drop. (upper right hand on the bezeled edge) I took one look through it in a TV85 and "Hey, uh... How much do you want for this thing?" just dropped out of my mouth! 10 mins later I walked out of there with as great deal. I've tested this ep since both in the C5 and C9.25 and the views are astounding and the damage is purely cosmetic. Owning 2 Panoptics has definitely started an itch to sell off some other eyepieces! The field of view in these makes going back to plossls annoying and orthos painfull. *sigh*

Meade Series 4000 9mm Cordless Illuminated Reticle eyepiece with X-Y

This is for use with an off axis guider. You center a guide star between the two crosshairs and do your best to keep it there throughout the exposure. It is also very useful for polar / drift aligning the telescope and a great help in collimation. I was very lucky and managed to pick one up a second hand in _great_ shape on Scopetronix "Web Specials" page for 95USD!

Celestron 32 mm Plössl 1.25"

Got this at an Astronomics clearance sale for about 40 bucks. It is one of my least loved eye pieces based solely on its eye relief which is way too long for me. I find myself constantly chasing the image around and dealing with blackouts and kidney bean effects. If I used my eye glasses to observe I'm sure the eye relief would be a boon but lately I've been hunting around for some sort of rubber ring about 2cm tall to act as an eyecup...

Diagonals, Barlows & Filters

Intes Mirror Diagonal 1.25"

I received this yesterday and got the usual tease of being allowed to chase down a few stars in the middle of all those sucker holes but tonight as I type a cataclysmic amount of water is coming down. From what little I saw last night I must say I deserve the rain! The diference from the stock Meade diagonal in almost beyond description. The Intes has an incredibly well built all metal construction with a brass compression ring as not to leave marks on the eyepiece barrel. The mirror is stunningly reflective and I can't see any deviation in collimation with and without the diagonal. Something that surprised me was in holding up a diagonal to each eye and pointing them at a flourecent light. I discovered that the Meade prisim actually gives everything a slight brown / yellow tinge! I now plan to retire the Meade diag to a productive life as a dust cap! ;o)

TeleVue 5x PowerMate

I bought the Powermate for use with my webcam for planitary imaging. Haven't had a chance to use it for that puropse yet. First impressions are great though. Like most TeleVue stuff its built tough as nails and the captive set-screw is a feature I think I'm going to love.

Meade Series 4000 2x Apochromatic Barlow Lens

I bought this when I only had 2 lenses so I could get a wider range of magnifications but nowadays I only bring it out to plug my webcams into it. I'm definitely not a barlow fan maybe because of the crappy, crappy barlows that came with my first department store type telescope. I always feel that at the very least there's a lot more dust in the way...

That said though this thing has been simply indespensible for imaging with the webcams. I hope to one day grab a 3x or higher barlow for imaging...

Meade Narrowband Nebula Filter 1.25"

I've had very few opertunities to use this thing. So far only on M42 and while some more detail was visible the diference wasn't dramatic. I have read though that this filter really shines under darker skies by increasing the contrast on fainter nebulas and that the Narrowband is a perfect match for the Dumbell. Cant wait!

Orion Variable Polarizing Filter

I bought this as even in the C5 the full moon could be almost painfully bright. This filter consists of 2 pieces of polarized glass that are free to rotate against each other. When each filer is polarizing light in opposite directions there is a huge reduction is the amount of light that can pass through. Note that the filers can never cutoff 100% of the light or anywhere even close so never try to use one of these as a solar filter. The filter does impart a blueish color but I don't find it bothersome... Better than what I used to get which was being blind in one eye for 10min after a quick peek at the moon!

Orion color filter set

Graciously donated by Michael McNeil who had no use for them anymore. These 3 little filters have come in quite handy, especially the 80A Light Blue for teasing out surface detail on Jupiter. I love to bring these out and experiment with them even stacking them on brighter objects like Venus. Here's a great page with info on filters.

Roger W. Tuthill Solar Skreen Mylar Solar Filer 8"

A full aperature mylar solar filter from Roger Tuthill. The filter is not bad visually, but as far as phtotography is concerned all I've managed to get is some pretty blurry sun spots. I don't yet know if its me or the filter, but I'll probably wind up buying some phtographic density Baader solar filter from Astro-Physics and tape it onto the Tuthill filter cell which is great.

Rodger was a really generous with me on this purchase. I ordered this about a year before his death and had just ordered the mylar from him because I was strapped for cash at the time. He sent me the mounted filter version at no extra charge - about a $50 diference. Thank you sir!