Somebody must have tried this.

I posted a question here and on the eyepiece forum about the Surplus Shed 38mm Erfle - but no answers at all. Has nobody tried out this eyepiece? Do I have to be the guinea pig? What about other Surplus Shed eyepieces? How is their QC on "unused" products?

Thanks,
Charlie

Being an incurable cheapskate I'll try to answer this one. I have not tried the 38mm 2" Erfle but I do have the 38mm 1.25" Erfle SurplusShed eyepiece (no longer available). I have had generally good luck with Surplusshed eyepieces. They seem to be generally good deals, but this is not UO or TeleVue quality stuff either, some surfaces coated and some not, expect a few internal reflections looking at the moon, teeny flaws in the glass, etc. My most-used low-power eyepieces are SurplusShed eyepieces, or Rini's bought through SurplusShed. But I've had a lemon too amongst the cheapest ones.

Here's my lineup, all are 1.25" barrels:

38mm SurplusShed Erfle (no longer available) -- Great low-power eyepiece, great eye relief, reasonably good field integrity, my favorite "finding" eyepiece and low-mag general eyepiece.

29mm SurplusShed "Erfle" -- I put Erfle in quotes because the field just doesn't seem big enough to me for any sort of widefield eyepiece. But optically it seems pretty good and sharp. It's a nice low-power lunar eyepiece for me.

25mm Rini Modified Ortho (no longer available) -- at $15 this was the deal of the century as far as I'm concerned. Edge sharpness is rotten, fairly severe field curvature, but the field is ENORMOUS, Nagler-esque, and hey, it's 15 lousy bucks!! My current favorite deep-space eyepiece for immersive effect. Note that this eyepiece was bought through SurplusShed but not made by them though.

25mm Rini Modified Plossl -- good field, good sharpness, good general low-power eyepiece. (sharper than the modified ortho but much smaller field)

9.5mm SurplusShed plossl. At $17 just useable, this one was a disappointment for me, I eventually decided to remove the optics (upon disassembly they appeared damaged, scraped) and now use it for a collimating eyepiece in my dob. Have heard from other sources that quality control is a bit spotty. Sometimes you get what you pay for.

For my higher-powered ranges (7mm to 16mm) I use Sieberts and Konigs, but for low power these cheapies seem fine and are generally a good deal.

Just call me the Frugal Astronomer.