Posts Made By: Jeff Porter

Just an experience I though I would share.

Halloween night I set up my two telescopes, one pointed on Jupiter and the other on Albeiro. That way the kids could get a treat other than Mike and Ikes at my house. A number of the kids and their parents had never looked through a telescope before. Obviously they did not take a lot of time, but I did get a few "wows" and a number of "thank-yous."

Overall it was a lot of fun.

I was curious if anyone can share their experience on using this Meade line, and how it may compare to the TeleVue Powermate series.

I use the Meade 4000 series with a basic 2X barlow in my 10" XTI dob. I prefer a longer eye-relief, and under 15mm I start to feel a little cramped. I was thinking of upgrading to Naglers and Powermates (buy once cry once), but the CFO says we need new carpet first. As a result I have been thinking of adding the 3X TeleXtender for high-power observation for now.

Any thoughts??

Newtonian reflector. Blowing towards or away from the mirror??

I am looking to upgrade my eyepieces to the T6 and possibly to the Ethos line. I can find the eye relief of both sets, but I have not been able to find anything on the diameter of the eye lens.

Any info would be appreciated.

Thanks.

Recently I had my first experience using a O-III filter in the city, and was blown away at the contrast it provided when viewing planetary nebula.

My question for this group is if the filter would have any significant benefit on contrast when used at a dark sky site?

My expectation is that the filter would have little effect since the site is a "dark sky" location, so the only light to filter would be the stars within the field of view.

I have the Orion XT10i and started with the Meade 4000 Series set plus the Orion 10mm and 25mm Plossl eyepieces that came with the scope.

This was enough to really get a taste for what the hobby offers without making a large investment. Over time I found that most of my observing was done with the 9.7 12.4, 15, and 25mm eyepieces, usually in combination with the barlow for higher magnification since I prefer a little more eye relief. I also tried the color filters a few times, but I found them distracting and quickly put them away and have not touched them now for more than a year.

I was lucky that my Orion came with a 25mm plossl since the jump from 15mm to 32mm in the Meade set is so large. I thought that the Orion Plossls were a little bit sharper and had better contrast than the Meade, but the difference was marginal. Overall this set-up gave me good views of planets and the messier objects which I focused on as a beginner. Overall I was very satisfied with my purchase.

However, I have recently stepped up to using Televue eyepieces and Powermates. These provide a richer contrast and better sharpness. The Televue glass gave me my first real experience of having objects snap into focus, whereas before I found myself tweaking the focus looking for that last bit of detail. I also experimented with the Powermate and Meade Plossls and discovered a big improvement in image quality over the #126 barlow that came with the set.

Considering that the set comes with six eyepieces, but that you may only really use three or four of them and you have a large gap from 15 to 32mm, and a mediocre barlow, I would recommend on passing on the set and purchase a few eyepieces and a better barlow in the focal lengths you will most likely use. Eyepieces with a 60+ field of view or more will especially be helpful for higher magnification since you have to track objects by hand across the sky.

Televue Radians are on sale this summer. There are many other 60+ eyepieces that fall into this group for less if the budget is tight, and there are always the Astromart classifieds. The focal lengths mentioned by Dave look good to me.

I do not profess to be an expert on different eyepieces since I have have only used the one set and my Televues. What I did learn with my experience is that it is better to spend you $$ on a few quality eyepieces and a good barlow rather than your $$ on glass and filters that may not get used.

I gave my set to my 9 year old son to use with a 6" Orion dob I picked up used a year ago. They perform much better in that scope considering that it is an f/8 rather than an f/4.7.

Great pics, brought back memories of a visit I had there when I was a kid.

I think that this is the scope they use to get the pictures that they put on the box of the scope at W-M.