10.5mm televue plossl

[ving]

I'll soon be recieving a 10.5mm televue plossl (in about a week) and I am soooo looking forward to it. While GSO EP are recognised as being quite good I cant wait to get my hands on an EP that is supposed to be premium.

the big question is, do you guys want a review of the EP and if so what would you like to see in the review. I am quite happy to do one for the website mike but I need to know what you want in it.

while I dont have another 10.55 EP i do have a 9mm I can compare it against if that is part of what you guys want.




ps: mike, the review i did for the GSO SW 2" 30mm can be added to your reviews page if you want. just tell me what you want to add to it.
http://www.iceinspace.com/forum/showthread.php?s=&threadid=639

[Starkler]

I think a review comparing it to the 9mm would be very worthwhile for those who wonder what the differences are between a garden variety ep, and a quality ep.

[Striker]

Yep go for it Ving...we need reviews.....keep them coming...

[iceman]

Nice one Ving, you getting this EP for your planetary/doubles viewing? Where are you getting it from and how much did it cost?

Have you got a barlow to get a nice 5mm mag? What barlow do you own?

I'll be very interested to hear your comparisons to the 9mm gso plossl, same as what i've got. A review will be most handy and I can help you out with the type of info needed in it, cause by then i'll have finished my review of the andrews ED eyepiece.

[ving]

ah! I was wondering what happened to the ED EP :)

I'll use the EP for planetary and double viewing but its not why i got it. It was really out of curiosity.
being the 10.5 its of the older series of TV plossls, the new one is 11mm.
I've got a gso 2x barlow to use with it, and while its quite good I'll probably end up getting something better one day.

I didnt tell cheryl i was getting the EP... i got into trouble when i got home ;)
:P

[iceman]

Where did you get it from? Was it new or 2nd hand? How much was it?

<small>now you can't ignore those questions this time :P</small>

Isn't it nice to get in trouble from the missus when you splurge on an astro purchase :) :mad:

[ving]

lol, not much trouble. "your supposed to be saving david!". well what can i say... I like to spend money on the love of my life :P
nice to know who wears the pants in my household :evil2:

it was second hand from ebay and cost about $60 US (bargin me thinks) :)

[iceman]

Nice price! Can't wait to hear how it performs.

[iceman]

oi Ving!

How is it?

I'm looking to get a planetary eyepiece of my own and have read some good reviews about televue plossls. Have you had a chance to use yours yet, or has it not arrived yet?

[ving]

no not yet mike. I purchased it last thursday i think it was... It'll be posted this week from the US.
trust me, as soon as i look thru it there'll be a post the next day :)

televue plossls are supposed to be amoung the best plossls so I am looking forward to it :)

[ving]

must be arriving soon, its raining. :(

[Dave47tuc]

The 10.5 is a very nice eyepiece, I use to have one.

Bit small on eye relief but very sharp. Enjoy:D

[ving]

sure is dave!
just recieved it last night and heres a very quick review (more detailed review to come).

date: 24.3.05
time: 2200 hrs
moon: full as!
seeing (1-10): between 1 and 2
visual limiting magnitude: about 3
EP used: 10.5mm TV pl and GSO 9mm pl

the construction of the TV is good and strong. my piece is 2nd hand and is in great condition. its of the older series as the replacement i believe is 11mm.
Eye relif is very small, which doesnt bother me but it didnt come with an eyecup which means that I had to cup mu hand around it to stop stray light from coming in (which i did for the 9mm too anyhow). Also I found that my focuser didnt have enough outward travel to focus and I needed to lift the EP about 1/2 cm to get it to focus :(
My colimation was way off and i had a bugger of a time fixing it but got there eventually. anyhow, off to testing..

my first post of call on this night of terrible viewing was saturn and stright away i notice a difference in the views. The TV had much greater contrast darkening the surrounding sky without sacrificing any in the view of the planet (which was waving and weaving in the field of view). the skies looked blacker than the GSO which was considerable greyer. as the seeing was bad it was hard to focus enuff to get any detail from saturn or jupiter of which i saw the bands and little else.

star testing. I hit rigel next and easily split, tho because of the seeing it was once again hard to focus and I certainly didnt get a fine point of light i am accostomed to.
sirius was a boiling mass even with an aperture mask. gah! this is the worst nights viewing ever!

m42/43, now here we go. in the TV m42 filled the FOV nicely with dark(ish) green nebulosity. M43 shone brightly (for m43) at the edge of m42 with averted vision, and dimer straight on. the trap shone brightly (4 stars) and the er... mouth is it? was very distinct. the wings filled the field of view. The GSO just wasnt up tothe task. m43 was a very faint blob and the whole m42 was fainter not as sharp nor as contrasty.

conclusion: this will be a very intersting piece to use under better seeing conditions. it is high contrast and sharp (or it would be under better seeing). a soft eyecup would be very advantageous. Its a shame that i have to sit it out from the focuser and lock it in place too. does anyone know how this would effect the magnification?

anyhow at $60 US I cant complain :)

[ving]

any more info required ?
oh and hows the ED review going mike?

[RAJAH235]

Ving, for the focus problem, why not use a spacer, that will stop the E/Pc going so far into the tube? Find the right Diam.plastic tube, cut it to length & fit to E/Pc. :D L.

[ving]

will do, when i get around to it :)

[Starkler]

Im surprised to hear that you have to lift it out of the focuser Ving.
Wherabouts in the focuser travel range do your gso plossls focus?

I had a Celestron Ultima 12.5mm (sold to Frosty) which is said to be on a par performance wise with the TV plossls, but focused at a similar point to a standard plossl.

[ving]

considerably further down, say 5-6 turns for the 9mm down from the top.

[iceman]

Ving, i've uploaded a new file to the files section (http://www.iceinspace.com/?files), from the astronomy_shootouts yahoo group. It's an "eyepiece shootout guidelines" file which has a list of things to look for and check for when doing an eyepiece review.

If you're still keen to review the TV 10.5mm plossl (which would be most cool if you could), you could do another review under the stars taking into consideration the guidelines in that file, and write it up in a word document, appropriately sectioned etc with some pics of it as well.

Would also be interested to read about it's planetary/lunar/double-star performance when barlowed, on a night of good seeing.

Thanks

[iceman]

Also if you want to re-do your review of the GSO SW 2" 30mm with i'm sure more experience and more nights of use with it, in combination with the things to think about in that file, that would also be most cool. :)

Thanks David.

[ving]

no probs. can you send me some good seeing? :confuse3:

used this EP on eta car lastnight before the clouds rolled in. some of the best ciews i have ever seen of this obj!

[davidpretorius]

how is your plossl going Ving, have you had a good night seeing to test it???

I am looking obviously at a tv plossl or radian????

[ving]

to be honest davo, i use the celestron ultima 7.5 and 15mm GSO SV most and rarely use the 10.5 TV.
It is a good EP tho. :)

oh and it says hi :hi:
:P

good to see that quote in your sig back, so heart warming :)

[davidpretorius]

why?

is it that it is a 10mm, or do you need great seeing.

would you use a 7mm TV plossl more over the ultima????

[ving]

its just the size davo. 7.5mm and 15mm... I dont really go in between much. I do sometimes tho, so dont get me wrong there... it does get used.

as for TV vs ultima, I dont have a 7mm TV to compare the ultima to. I understand they are of simalar quality tho and it comes down to preference. I have seen someone on here post that the TV felt too "warm" in comparison, I have no idea what this means.

if the seeing isnt up to the 7.5 i'll opt for the TV 10.5 tho... or just not look at planets... you know its funny but last night i used the TV 10.5, ultima 7.5 and series 500 6.5 and the 6.5 gave almost as good views as the ultima! just as sharp but not quiet the contrast... weird

[33South]

Glad to see this thread re-surface, missed it earlier was before I joined.
I've got one of these (1".25) havent used it for years, gonna try it in the ED80 tonight (eternal optimist).

As I recall it had a nice flat field with good edge definition but I found it hard to use because eyepositioning was very critical (maybe my eyes).
Might bring it to Lostock for the car boot sale, as you see Im in love with my 8.8UWA.

[astroron]

I took the 16" out tonight for about three hours, seeing about 7-10 transparency 6-10 due to some haze about 15deg above the western horizon, I tried out my recently purchased 5mm Celestron X-Cel, I found that with bright objects like Venus and Mars there was annoying internal reflections, the views of Mars were not as sharp as as in my 7mm Celestron Orthoscopic, but the eyerelief is much greater in the 5mm X-Cel, I also found that at certain angles I was getting some glow from bright Mars behind and to the right of me when I was looking to the south, I had to cup my hand to the side of my face to cut this out when I was looking at faint galaxies.
This eyepiece is brilliant for galaxies, at 365 X mag it was a pleasure to view faint galaxies for S/N, much more easy on the eye than the 7mm Ortho, and there was lots of detail in quite a few galaxies, Ngc 1365 was a treat with both spiral arms and most of the stars in the galaxy that are on the Thompson Supernova Search Charts where seen.
I will be only using this eyepiece for looking at faint stuff in the future, and use the Ortho for looking for detail on Planets.
I bought the X-Cel from Darren (dhumpie) and I think it was overall a good investment.astroro :thumbsup: :astron:

[dhumpie]

Glad you liked the ep Ron. I find that with the cheaper ep's, the glare and flare seem to be the main problems (despite Celestron claiming that the barrel and the retainer rings are blackened for superior contrast!!!). I had the same problem with my 6mm Expanse clone. But for deep sky they are really had to beat. I have had the best views of 47 Tuc, Omega Centauri, M22, M4, Pavo glob, Ara glob and even the "propellar arms" of M13 through my C6. Also the tarantula showed why its called the tarantula through this ep. I would have kept it if I had used it more often. My C6 can only do so much......

Darren