Barlows on 80mm?

I own the Orion Shorty Plus Barlow and I dont find it to be all that useful on my vixen ed80sf. I have been getting better/brighter views by just switching Eps. Is this common with smaller scopes? I used the barlow alot with the 6inch newt and it really seemed to make a differance there. I am thinking of just selling the barlow now and getting yet another Ep that will get used.

I own the Orion Shorty Plus Barlow and >>>>I dont find it to be all that useful on my vixen ed80sf. I have been getting better/brighter views by just switching Eps. Is this common with smaller scopes? I used the barlow alot with the 6inch newt and it really seemed to make a differance there. I am thinking of just selling the barlow now and getting yet another Ep that will get used.
---

I use a barlow with my short focal length refractors, in a particular my ED-80. If I want to use higher magnifications than my 4.8 Nagler provides, 125X, then I use a barlow.

I do not see a loss of brightness or contrast when using the barlow but it is important to make any comparisons at equal magnifications/focal length because contrast, brightness and sharpness are strongly related to magnification.

Since the Orion Shorty Plus/Celestron Ultima barlow normally is in the 2.2x-2.3X range, comparisons can be a bit decieving unless the extra increased magnification is taken into account.

Jon