Posts Made By: Pat Rochford

Drop me a line at [email protected] and we can talk about fixing you up with a 22Nagler for a good price.

Bill,

I'm guessing that the 26 Nagler won't require the visual Paracorr. It's field lens diameter is 35mm, smaller than the 35 Panoptic's 38.7mm ... which is not vignetted by the regular Paracorr. I recently bought the visual Paracorr in preparation for acquiring the 31 Nagler, but since the 26 is about to be born, I have instead ordered one of them (much better exit pupil match with my F/4 mirror). Had I known Al was going to come out with the 26 a while back, I could have saved a chunk of money. Oh well....

Pat Rochford

Gary,

I believe the Paracorr will increase the focal length by 15% regardless of what it's placed in front of.

The use of a BinoVue without the barlow will require several inches (five as I recall) of in-travel to reach focus. Depending on what type of telescope you have, you may not be able to reach focus without the barlow.

Pat Rochford

Hi David,

I just recently experienced your 31N/26N dilemma. I used a 31N in my 24" F/4 from a very dark site (Chiefland, FL) and immediately fell in love with it. Decided right then and there that I would buy one as soon as I could afford it. This eyepiece was just right for me.

Then of course, along comes the announcement of the 26N and the exit pupil issue (I'm 47) begins to introduce doubt into my plan. Spending six-hudred dollars on an eyepiece is a situation not to be taken lightly.

I called or wrote to just about everyone who's opinion I valued and got just about a fifty-fifty split on which eyepiece would be best suited to me. But there was one particular suggestion that made the most sense, and in the end that's the one that helped me make up my mind.

This person, well known and somewhere in my age bracket, uses a 35 Panoptic on her 20" F/4, knowing that it produces a nearly 9mm exit pupil. However, even though it cuts down the effective aperture of the scope, it provides an incredibly wide field for those objects that just cry for "the big view".

And of course it becomes the ultimate "finder" eyepiece. But, once the object is located, you are most likely going to jump to considerably higher magnification in order to darken the sky background and make the object large enough to see details within it. The 26N would not give you as large of a field of view initially (as the 31N), nor would it provide a substantial increase in object size or darken the sky background like something in the range of a 12mm to 16mm eyepiece.

As I said, the suggestions out there seem to run evenly for both, but looking at it in this light made the most sense to me. I ended up buying the 31N and I believe it will remain in my eyepiece case for a very long time. Good luck on your decision.

Pat Rochford

Tony,

I have the 31 Nagler and my friend Rod Mollise has the 35 Panoptic. Both produce outstanding views, in my opinion, but eye placement in the 31 is less critical than with the 35. I presume this is primarily due to the longer eye relief of the Panoptic (24mm) vs. the Nagler (19mm).

I chose the 31 Nagler over the 35 Panoptic for two reasons. (1) I use it mostly with my 24" Dob which is un-driven, so the 82 degree apparent field allows more time to view before having to nudge the scope and (2) at F/4 (F/4.6 with the Paracorr) the 35 Panoptic would produce a larger exit pupil than I care for.

Rod on the other hand has a Nexstar 11 which is driven, so the 68 degree apparent field of the Panoptic is less of an issue. And at F/10 exit pupil is certainly not an issue either.

I guess what I'm trying to say is that one might be a little more favorable to you than the other, depending on what kind of scope you have.

Pat

Hi Bob,

I installed a Dob Driver II on my 8" F/7.5 over five years ago and it still performs very well. A year or so ago I discovered that the cover to the hand paddle was loose. Apparently a couple of the anchors (for screws) built into the cover had broken. I called Tech 2000 and explained the problem, at which time they said to send it back to them. I received it back in short order with a new cover. There was no charge.

The only change I've made to the mount since first installing the kit was, to take the (supplied) azimuth roller bearings back off and re-install teflon pads as I had originally installed on the mount. It moves much smoother now when "hand guiding" without the driver.

By the way, on nights which permit 300X (rather frequent here on the Gulf Coast), there is no noticeable vibration in the eyepiece (eyepieces actually, I use a Bino Vue). I ordered the DD II with the high resolution motors/gears which costs a bit more, but well worth it in my opinion.

Finally, I find using the Bino Vue in this guided alt-az mode very comfortable (as opposed to rotating the tube on a German mount when moving around the sky). And the ability to pan around the Moon at high power is also a nice extra.

I would not hesitate recommending the Dob Driver II as long as visual observing is your intent. If you have some sort of imaging in mind, you may want to consider an equatorial platform instead.

Pat

Andy -

I bought one of these for a 10" truss Dob that I built for my son. Here, in my opinion, are the pros and cons:

Pros - half the price of a Telrad or Quickfinder ($19.95)
- weighs only 5 ounces
- uses 2 AA bateries
- looks very nice on a scope

Cons - does not pulse
- rings are almost too close together
- eye position is more critical than Telrad

I have absolutely no regrets in purchasing it.

Pat