Posts Made By: Doug Smiley

I will probably be placing my Intes MK67/Orion Argonaut Maksutov for sale on Astromart in the coming weeks. It will be the OTA with the 7X35 finder plus a Rigel Quickfinder and Orion dewcap. Everything is in excellent shape and the scope seems to be in perfect collimation. The padded carrying case is included. What would be a fair price to ask for this setup?

Those super widefield eyepieces provide visually stunning views of deep sky, but often I find that I'm removing the expensive Nagler or Panoptic and dropping in a Plossl of the same or similar focal length because I can see more detail with it. A few nights ago I was observing the Veil with a 6" Mak and UHC filter. The monster 35mm Panoptic gave a breathtaking view of the nebula,but I thought I'd try my $34.95 40mm Plossl from Adorama just to see what the difference in the image would be. The field of view was claustrophobic and the l-o-n-g eye relief was a pain in the butt, but I could see lighter striations running through the Veil that were not visible in the Panoptic.My point is, as wonderful as the Nagler and similar eps are, the simpler and less expensive eyepieces such as Plossls,orthos,RKEs and whatnot should be in the deep sky observor's ep case too.
Doug Schmidt

Wondering where this fella is---we served on the USS Nereus(AS-17) back in the 1960's. We both worked in the optical shop, and even tho I was not an astronomy buff at that time I remember that Norman was. Later in Phil Harrington's book on binocular stargazing I saw a photo of Norman with a giant set of binocs he had built. Hey Norm, you still kicking? [email protected]

I had the opportunity to observe under excellent skies recently using a 120mm F5 refractor with a 35mm Panoptic (17X) and UHC filter. Just to the east of Deneb was a huge field of nebulosity glowing with an icy subdued incandescence. It was absolutely one of the most gorgeous sights I have seen in three years of stargazing. I am thinking that it had to be the N.A. nebula,(which I had never before seen) but what I saw was larger even than the 3.6 degree true field of the Panoptic. Isn't the N.A. nebula only 1.5 degrees across?

Is one of these better than the other in terms of image contrast and light transmission (disregarding the slight variance in magnification)?

Is this a job that a reasonably adept person could do for a rainy day project?

I have the Skywatcher 120mm f5 refractor. Lunar and planetary images can be very good up to 175X or so with a high-end eyepiece; I am curious if they could be even better with one of these anti-fringing filters.

Last night I tried out this anti-fringing filter on my Skywatcher 120mm f5 refractor. The moon,two nights past first quarter, and Saturn were my targets. Eyepieces used were a 4mm Radian (150X), and a 2.5mm Vixen Lanthanum (240X). Seeing conditions were fair with some "rippling" of the images. The moon without the filter at 150X was plenty contrasty with lots of detail. Naturally there was some violet coloration. With the V_Block in place, the violet hue was replaced with a yellow-green color. I could detect no increase in contrast and the image was not as sharp as without the filter. Switching to the Lanthanum without the filter the false color was much more noticeable, but the craters and mountains were still quite sharp. The overall image color was more pleasing with the addition of the filter, but still, I did not see any increase in contrast, and I could especially see at higher magnification that the lunar details were softened by the addition of the filter.
Using the same eyepieces and the V-Block on Saturn, the results were pretty much the same as with the moon: the only differences I could see that the filter made were a slight yellow-green hue, and the image was not as sharp as without the filter. This is a brand-new filter; examined under a bright light and an 8X loupe it appeared to be very clean. I really see no reason why the filter should reduce resolution in the image unless the filter glass is not perfectly plano-parallel, or is not seated squarely in its mount. I could see no evidence of this latter possibility on close examinaton of the filter. Then again, the filter is manufactured in Korea and the finish of the cell at least is not on a par of what one would expect from Japan or China. Anyone else used one of these with better results than I had?

Are the Orion HighLight Plossl eyepieces a good value for the money? Are they optically better then the Sirius line of Plossls? How do they compare with the Meade 4000 Plossls made in Japan?

Any opinions comparing the views thru the Pentax 3.5mm XW with those of the 3.5mm T6? I'm curious about how the two compare on lunar & planetary observing. The eyepiece would be used in my 4.7 " f5 refractor for 171X. The scope handles 150X (4mm Radian) with ease, so the extra magnification won't be a problem.