Posts Made By: Tom Trusock

"Wondering if anyone has bino apparatus on a TV101."

Mike, I used em on a genesis SDF. Same focal length. (I've also used em on a TV102, ED80, Pronto, and a dozen other small scopes.) With the SDF they give great widefield views. The only issue I had was that I keenly felt the want for more aperture on DSO's.

Tom T.

Great idea - who cares what you looks like if it works....

(You *are* already married, right? )

Tom T.

Gerald

Cute....

Another michigander here... Up here in da tumb, we had clear skies 2-3 nights last week (I got out twice), and it looks like it might be decent for tonight and tomorrow night as well....

BTW - have you found the Michigan_astronomy yahoo group yet?

T

Tom, I've done a rather extensive comparision of supermonos and t6 naglers. I actually did a write up on supermonos vs the nagler zoom over on CN.

Summing up: On the best nights, I found the supermonos to be superior in contrast and throughput, but since I typically observe with undriven scopes, personally I opted for naglers and their MUCH larger AFOV instead.

As Nils would put it - my nudge tolerance is kinda low.



Tom T.

I've used em both, like em both.

Wound up going with a pair of 30mm ultimas only because I was able to find them slightly cheaper.

Tom T.

In my 15" f5 and my 8" f5, I wasn't all that fond of the 25's, but thought the 19's were nice.

Tom T.

I have a sky commander and argo navis. I've also owned various tangent boxes (Celestron, JMI, etc...)

The two best units IMO are the SC and AN. Either will get you there. The AN is newer, larger and has more bells and whistles. It does have a lot of the features that the SC lacks - however as others have commented - it's huge! For a small scope 10 and under, I'd choose the SC no questions asked - mainly because of the sheer size of the AN. For a larger scope I'd probably opt for the argo.

Both units work well.

Tom T.

For the curious, further details (as to the site sale) can be found here:

http://www.cloudynights.com/reviews5/sale.htm

Tom T.

Where did you see it listed as a "Semi-Apo"? I've only seen it called an achromat.

They do have a very nice low cost ED triplet that just landed on my desk the other day but it's a little more than $250....

T

I've had all of those and a 20 t2 to boot.

The 17mm t4 is one of those "special" eyepieces that seem to hit a near perfect spot in Al's line up. It's a classic for sure. The 22 t4, while an excellent eyepiece, just isn't *quite* sharp to the edge in many scopes. The 20 t5 is a nice lightweight design which is extremely contrasty and has probably become my most used eyepiece. The one drawback to the t5's is the "ring of fire" effect - but this (for most folks) is rarely (if ever) an issue.

The 20 t2 is a nice eyepiece, although light transmission is a bit lower than most of Al's current line-up. OTOH, it's a real beast size and weight wize. I preferred the 22 t4 to the 20 t2 because of the size and weight.

If weight, exact focal length, eye relief and cost aren't a concern, my preference would probably be 17 t4, the 20 t5, 20 t2 then 22 t4.

My primary line up is currently:

40mm widefield, 26mm t5 nagler, 20mm t5, 13t6, 9t6, Speers 5-8 and nagler 3-6.

I've "settled" on these after extensive use of most of the other naglers on the market as a best fit for my scope and my observing styles.

YMMV.

T