Hoppin' thru the maze of galaxies near the North Celestial Pole on Saturday nite at the Kisatchie Star Party I happend upon NGC 4565 by accident with the 31mm Terminagler thru my well worn C14. I upped the power to the 21mm Pentax XL and immediately noticed that more power was in order. In went the 14mm Pentax XL but it was immediately apparent that the image had dimmed to the point where substantial detail was lost. Thereupon I launched an eyepiece testing marthon to find out at what point detail was maximized before too much image brightness was lost.
For general information, NGC 4565 is a showpiece, long, very narrow edge on spiral with a bright round core and a rather conspicuous dark lane running nearly the length of the galaxy.
Tested eyepieces included of course the 21mm and 14mm Pentax XL's; 26mm, 21mm, 20mm, 17mm, 15mm and 13mm TeleVue Plossls; 19mm TeleVue Panoptic, 24mm, and 16mm Brandons; 20mm and 16mm Clave' Plossls and also of course an 18mm UO HD Ortho.
As indicated, it was easy to bracket the best eyepiece somewhere between 21mm and 14mm. I have been testing the UO HD's for a while on planets and had really decided that they were very bright but also tended to wash ou planetary detail and especially coloring as compared with the regular UO orthos, Brandons and RKE's. Filters are probably especially in order for planetary viewing with the UO HD's.
Being almost halfway between 21mm and 14mm and also being very bright made the 18mm UO HD a natural to try and it did not disappoint. It was the clear winner. To my eyes, it exhibited a much brighter galaxy core, revealed a substantially longer galaxy and exhibited substantially more dark lane detail than any other eyepiece tested. The 17mm TeleVue Plossl was in a solid 2nd place followed by the 16mm Clave' Plossl tightly bunched with a host of others to my judgement. Many of the tested eyepieces, to my surprise and disappointment showed no core brightening at all and no trace of a dark lane. The 18mm UO HD has earned a place in my No. 1 eyepiece case to fill the hole in my Pentax XL's for viewing small, faint fuzzies. I suspect that it will work well with most SCT's.
I'd be curious to know if anyone has had similar or different experiences. Clear skies!
For general information, NGC 4565 is a showpiece, long, very narrow edge on spiral with a bright round core and a rather conspicuous dark lane running nearly the length of the galaxy.
Tested eyepieces included of course the 21mm and 14mm Pentax XL's; 26mm, 21mm, 20mm, 17mm, 15mm and 13mm TeleVue Plossls; 19mm TeleVue Panoptic, 24mm, and 16mm Brandons; 20mm and 16mm Clave' Plossls and also of course an 18mm UO HD Ortho.
As indicated, it was easy to bracket the best eyepiece somewhere between 21mm and 14mm. I have been testing the UO HD's for a while on planets and had really decided that they were very bright but also tended to wash ou planetary detail and especially coloring as compared with the regular UO orthos, Brandons and RKE's. Filters are probably especially in order for planetary viewing with the UO HD's.
Being almost halfway between 21mm and 14mm and also being very bright made the 18mm UO HD a natural to try and it did not disappoint. It was the clear winner. To my eyes, it exhibited a much brighter galaxy core, revealed a substantially longer galaxy and exhibited substantially more dark lane detail than any other eyepiece tested. The 17mm TeleVue Plossl was in a solid 2nd place followed by the 16mm Clave' Plossl tightly bunched with a host of others to my judgement. Many of the tested eyepieces, to my surprise and disappointment showed no core brightening at all and no trace of a dark lane. The 18mm UO HD has earned a place in my No. 1 eyepiece case to fill the hole in my Pentax XL's for viewing small, faint fuzzies. I suspect that it will work well with most SCT's.
I'd be curious to know if anyone has had similar or different experiences. Clear skies!
