Posts Made By: Donald Durbin

Your replies actually scare me.

None of you told me that I was crazy to even think of such a thing.

I put my Meade 152 ED OTA on a scale. This was with the dew shield, lens cap, focuser motor, Meade 2" diagonal with a 1 1/4" adapter and plug, and the Meade 50mm finder attached.

The total weight was 25.75 lbs.

Don Durbin

Hi Kate,

I have used my 1.25 Black Nights on a 70mm Skywatcher Refractor and on my ETX-90.

To use a 2" binoviewer you would need a telescope with a two inch focuser. In the case of an SCT like your C90 you would need at least a two inch visual back.

I think for use with a C90 the better choice would be the 1.25 Black Night binoviewers or the new Burgess binoviewers. I understand they are selling for $199. That's a hard price to beat.

BTW, The 2" Siebert binoviewer is not a contraption, it is a very well made 2" compliment to the smaller 1.25 Black Night units. The 2" Siebert Elite is the most advanced binoviewer on the market today.

I have enclosed a photo of the two units side by side. On the right is a standard Black Night unit. On the left is a 2" 45mm Black Night Elite.


I replaced the image with one using a camera tripod and no flash. This is a truer image of both units appearance.

Don Durbin

I tried for a shot of M42 with the LPI imager. I guess they call it LPI for a reason. I got a shot of the moon somewhere near the terminator. Don't ask me where, the camera has a very narrow field of view. This was taken through the right holder of the 45 Elites. This is not a stacked image. The mount was not tracking that well and has no guide input. This is a single image shot.

Don

John,

I am located 222 miles from Detroit. MapPoint says 3 hours and 42 minutes. So its not worth getting on a plane for. You could drive it just as quick.

A Friday or Saturday night would be best. I am out of town on business the week of December 13th, so the weekends immediately before and after that are out.

Send me a private message with your email address and I will send you MapPoint directions.

Don Durbin

Hi All,

This week saw the arrival of three new pair of 2 inch eyepieces for use with my new 2" binoviewer.

The first was a pair of Siebert 2" 36mm Observatory Series eyepieces. I was pleased when I found the weight of the pair is only 19 Oz. That's over 4 Oz. less than the pair of Celestron 26mm E-LUX eyepieces. I found the Siebert 36mm eyepieces to be very sharp. They give spectacular wide views. Especially when used with a 45mm Elite binoviewer. The best performance so far has been when using them with my Celestron 9.25 SCT. I have not used them with my Orion Atlas 8". I am hoping the performance is as good as with the C9.25. Of course the 8" Atlas will need the Multimag OCA to come to focus.

The other two pair of eyepieces this week came from Gary Russell. I had sent Gary and email after I saw him selling a 2" 22mm SWA Konig on another site. Gary made me a matched pair of 22mm SWA Konigs and a pair of his 11mm SWA Konigs. The 11mm pair of SWA Konigs were heavier than I expected. They weighed in at 20.2 Oz. Actually heavier than the Sieberts 36mm eyepieces. The pair of 22m SWA Konigs weighed 10.8 Oz.That is similar to the weight of my other Garry Russell eyepieces. Gary did a good job matching the eyepieces for binoviewing. I saw no need to use my diopter adjustments with either pair.

The conditions tonight were not very good. Their was a very light film like layer of clouds and a lot of upper atmosphere turbulence. Saturn's rings rippled like they were made of cheap plastic in a high wind.

The eyepieces that gave the best views of Saturn tonight were the 22mm Gary Russell SWA Konigs. The 11mm were too high powered for the conditions. The Siebert 36mm EPs left me wishing for more power.

I decided to check edge performance on all three pairs. I did this both in the binoviewer and in Cyclops mode. I shifted stars to the edge of the EPs and looked for any distortion. I found the Siebert 36mm Eyepieces to have excellent views to the edge. The Gary Russell SWA Konigs were also very good.

I also own a pair of 12mm type 2 Naglers. I decided to compare views of M42 the Orion Nebula between the 12mm Type 2 Naglers and the 11mm Gary Russell SWA Konigs in Cyclops mode. This should have been an unfair contest. I used the best of the two Naglers. I was shocked to see how well the SWA Konigs compared to my Naglers. I had to refocus between the two eyepieces but the views when focused were very similar. I think the Nagler held the edge, but I gave $220 for the used Nagler and $70 for each of the brand new 11mm Gary Russell's.

At $80 a pair for the 22mm SWA Konigs and $140 a pair for the 11mm Konigs they are a really good buy.

One thing to keep in mind would be that the condition were not very good. Maybe if conditions had been a little better the Naglers would have had an edge. 8O

Did I mention it was a wee bit cold tonight?

Don Durbin

Here is a shot of the Siebert 45mm with Siebert 36mm Eyepieces and the Siebert Multimag configured for Newtonian mode.

John,

On my 8" Atlas I sometimes need a little more out travel on the focuser. I have found the easiest solution to be to just add a 2" extension. These are available from a number of sources.

Also if you like the Siebert 36mm as a single eyepiece, you should see what it is like looking through two of them on a 45mm Elite binoviewer. 8O

It would appear that "actively working with" is not quite the case.

Harry Siebert has withdrawn his original post.

I apologize for propagating unconfirmed news.

I currently have a Denkmeier Power Switch on order and I own a Siebert 2" Binoviewer. This sounded really great to me.

Don Durbin

Gary Russell made me two pair of matched 2" SWA Konigs for my 2" binoviewer. There were 22mm and 11mm. I think they are great, especially the 11mm.

Gary matched the eyepieces so well that I could not find any difference in the focus point between either of the 11mm or the 22mm EPs.

I have a C9.25 and I also own a pair of 12mm type 2 Naglers. One of the Naglers is in a little better shape than the other. I used that Nagler in Cyclops mode and compared the views through it with the views through the 11mm SWA Konigs that Gary made for me. The Nagler of course had a wider field of view.

I had M42 in the C9.25. I switched back and forth between the Nagler and the Konigs four or five times. I looked for some fine detail that I could see in the Nagler that I could not see in the Konigs. I could find nothing. Interestingly the size of M42 looked equal between the two Konigs and the Nagler.

I also own a pair of 2" 19mm and a pair of 2" 16.8mm Gary Russell SWA Konigs. I purchased those off astromart from different people at different times. They are not matched but I can equalize them with the diopter adjustments on my binoviewer. They also work very well when adjusted properly.

I think Gary Russell EPs are a great buy. If you have a binoviewer, Gary will even make you a matched pair.

Don Durbin