I am two years into this hobby. And, like many others I have been learning about and upgrading and accumulating stuff. Among these are eyepieces.
How many do you have? Are you happy with the mix?
What is your plan for eyepieces? Let me share some of my journey and see how this maps to yours.
I have a total of 21 eyepieces, 8 are actively used and 13 in the "not currently used" box. About 12 of those came with scopes. I actually had 5 more but they departed with scopes I have given away.
Having handled a bunch of different sizes, types and qualities and brands what this has done for me is given me enough background to appreciate what I have and to feel that I now have the mix I want.
I think I have just about hit my optimum mix on eyepieces now that I added the Baader Hyperion Zoom to the kit and filled in a gap with the Meade 5.5. I Really don't need anymore.
I have 3 active scopes:
- Orion XT8i - 1200 mm FL
- ETX 80 - 400 mm FL
- ETX 125 - 1900 mm FL
For each scope I have:
One or two low power/wide angle matched to each scope
For XT8i it is 2" 70 degree 38 and 25 mm.
For ETX 80 and ETX 125 it is a 32 mm plossl
For all scopes - I like my 8-24 zoom eyepieces for the midrange. I often barlow the zoom for high mag. (love the zoom)
For XT8i mostly - I have 3 82 degree, 8.8, 6.7, 5.5 mm, because of the manual tracking.
My ETX scopes are Goto with tracking so I really don't need the wide high power eyepieces. Zooms work fine.
So a kit of 5-6 plus a barlow will now meet all needs for any scope and often I only use 1 wide, the zoom and a barlow for the evening.
So, where are you in your eyepiece journey? Have you reached a great mix or do you feel you need to add something else? If so, what are you planning to buy and why?