What is the highest magnification you have gone to.

[Hans Tucker]

Well I finally received the last two eyepieces to complete my Takahashi LE collection, a HI-LE 2.8mm & LE 10mm. Just playing around with numbers I figured I could push my APOMAX 130 f/12 refractor to about 560X with the HI-LE 2.8mm.

I remember reading a user of a TEC MC250 f/20 claim to have push his scope beyond 800X and getting stable planetary images of Jupiter & Saturn. He acknowledge that the seeing conditions were perfect, a rare event.

What is the highest magnification that you pushed your scope to?

Also, good to see Takahashi eyepieces finally coming with dust caps attached.

[Steffen]

On double stars that require it (such as HR 560 in Cetus) I have gone up to 600x with my 6" f/12 Mak. On planets I believe it stops getting better in my scope at about 360x or so.

Cheers
Steffen.

[AG Hybrid]

On a night of spectacular seeing. I was able to get my 12" up to 559x on Saturn without image degradation. Mind you, I don't have tracking so it was moving through the eyepiece like spherical race car.

[brian nordstrom]

:) On one of the best nights I have ever seen that I was lucky enough to have great gear out , this was up in Darwin , 806x on Saturn using my M210 and 3mm TV radian and as Adrian says I was using an Ioptron IEQ45 that was tracking flawlessly , it looked like the best ground based photo I had ever seen ,, once in my lifetime experience that night ,,,,, so far .
Brian.

[The_bluester]

The highest I have gone to is 412x one great night for about 15 minutes, best views I have ever had of Saturn. That was at the ASV Messier star party about four years ago. I have not even got that EP any more unfortunately. I should get a similar FL one to replace it, just in a Plossl for planetary now rather than the Nagler I used to have for the wider AFOV.

[el_draco]

I used a 4 mm ortho on a 740mm F 4.5 newtonian, ONCE, about 25 years ago. :D Thats a mag of 825 ish. :eyepop:

I had a stable air cell go overhead and spent over an hour frolicking around the Tarantula. It was beyond words;; never ever forget how much of a WOW hour that was. :thumbsup:

I reckon top mag since then would be around 300X... Still pretty amazing at times

[Suzy]

Not on my scope, but I had an unforgettable moment at Terry's (Lovejoy) place using his 12" dob- he split Antares at 800x. And there it was, a tiny green speck! I've always wanted to see its companion. :prey2:

[raymo]

Slightly off topic, but I was able to split Antares several times with my
6" Skywatcher Mak, and am constantly surprised that I can find no sign of the companion with my 8" f/5, or 10" f/4.7 Newts.
Suzy is quite right, apparent bright green.
raymo

[HCR32]

480X for me Hans. That was with a 130mm f9.25. Image of Jupiter was stable but the the lack of aperture and small exit pupil will limit the brightness in this case planet to the point where contrast fall of the cliff leaving you with a bland feature and colour lacking view. I'm in the same boat as you with this one, I've got a 2.5mm ep just for the collection more then the practicality. Not having it would always be a thought of buying it. You have done the right thing by adding it to the stable.

[Wavytone]

~1800X.

9" f/16 refractor with 2X Barlow and a 4mm eyepiece. Target was Mars.

[RB]

Did you find it?

:lol:

[GrahamL]

I had a night , not long ago actually with my 12 " , raging jet stream overhead , were a small bit of clear air drifted by, I got to close to 400 x I think and ran out of eyepieces every step up in magnification was just that .
Went in and made a cuppa ,,,,,gone :)

[pgc hunter]

Highest routine magnification I managed was 600x with my 8" dob on a few select nights on Planetaries, the moon and Uranus.

I had it up to 857x one truly exceptional night viewing small bright planetaries.

Here is the report from that night, those seeing conditions have not been repeated since. http://www.iceinspace.com.au/forum/showthread.php?t=86258

[OzStarGazer]

NexImage, no binning.
I am not sure how much it is "exactly", and I can only use no binning when the turbulences are minimal, but the craters looked pretty big!

[barx1963]

Highest I normally go to is 317x, more than enough I find.
Did try using a 4mm EP with a 2.5X Powermate in my old 12" that gave 937x!! Fun to see Jupiter almost whizz across the field.

Never had any luck at higher than 317x so never try these days.

Malcolm

[ausastronomer]

I used to get exceptional seeing at my house at Killarney Vale on the Southern edge of Tuggerah Lake looking to the north across the lake, from time to time. The temperature of large bodies of water is very stable over short time periods which can lead to excellent seeing conditions above them at times. The best I have done is 1050X in my 18" Obsession (5mm Pentax XW 2.5X Powermate) I have achieved this on about 4 occasions between 2006 and 2010. I was able to use 750X (7mm Pentax XW 2.5X Powermate) on average 2 or 3 times per year. The normal upper limit there was between 250X and 300X. I was also able to run my 14" SDM to 800X (5mm Pentax XW 2.5X Powermate) from this location on about 5 or 6 occasions. Targets observed were Mars, Saturn, the Moon and Sirius.

Unfortunately my local seeing conditions in Kiama due to the close proximity of the escarpment to the coast are usually very poor and I jump for joy if I can get over 300X on anything in any of my 3 telescopes.

Cheers,
John B

[xelasnave]

One day I set up the 150 refractor, 1200 fl, with 2 3x barlows and a 2 x barlow and took photos of ants 60 mtrs distant.
I was surprised how good the images turned out.
I did not use it for astronomy however.
Also used a 6 mm ep and was impressed.
I doubt it would have worked at night on the Moon and never tried.

[astronut]

A few years ago, with a crescent moon, I experimented with very high mag.

I used my 12" Lightbridge and a 2x Siebert Ultra barlow, a Siebert 9mm ultra e/p + a 5X Powermate for a magnification of 1693X.

It was a very steady night, and the image was exceptionally steady. I felt like I was orbiting The Moon in an Apollo capsule.:eyepop:

[Satchmo]

Its all a bit sketchy and personal talking about max magnifications ! People tolerance for loss of image sharpness seems to be much greater on fairly high contrast monochromatic objects like the Moon , Mars and Saturn. If your seeing conditions are `diffraction limited ' and your vision is good the maximum useful magnification is around 1X per mm of aperture - in other words a 12" reflector will be showing a visible first diffraction ring on fainter stars at around 300X , and there will technically be no more information accessible in the image . Despite the fact that you are not actually seeing any more detail your tolerance for magnifying the image may go way beyond this particularly on the aforementioned high contrast objects and if your vision is below par. Depending on the seeing artefacts there is certainly going to be no gain in going over 50 X per inch.

Its a really interesting if not quite subjective topic ! I think I used to push my 70mm ( 2.75" ) Flourite refractor up to about 100 X per inch on the Moon to impress my friends :)

[astronut]

Mark, I don't normally go over 400X with my 12".

I just wanted to see what the result would be, and I was pleasantly surprised with the result. :)

[strongmanmike]

Had some fun one steady night at Mt Stromlo using the old 9" Oddie refractor (:sadeyes: :prey:) we pushed it over 1000X on Mars at oposition and the planet filled the field..very cool :thumbsup:

Generally I agree with what Mark said though

Mike

[ralph1]

'Only' 250X for me but I regularly wish I had the eyepieces to go higher. The telescope is 130mm. For me there is a noticeable improvement jumping from 1X to 2X per mm of aperture.

[barx1963]

There is quite interesting article that is in the March issue of Sky & Tel (the US version) that is available as an electronic version, on just this subject.

Malcolm

[ariefm71]

Mark, definitely a 10" f/6 planetary newtonian with Suchting or Zambuto mirror can do much better than 250x magnification :)



You seem to have the same scope as mine!

[Vegeta]

500x for me, I coupled my 2x Barlow with my 6mm Orion edge on. I've only ever used that combination twice now. The seeing conditions were perfect. One night on Jupiter, and the other night on Saturn. The view was unbelievable!!! It's rare that seeing actually allows that couple:eyepop:

[Satchmo]

Arie , my point was that even in superb seeing lets say you are pushing to 1000X on Saturn or the Moon it is empty magnification. If 250X on the trapezium stars ,for example , is revealing the first ring of the airy pattern ( if you have normal acuity ) then you are definitely not going to see anything more particularly by increasing the magnification . If the seeing is not so good ( airy pattern not stable) and your eyes not so good , you might see the airy pattern structure a little more clearly at 500X ( 50 X per ich for a 10" ) but that is nothing to do with the quality of the telescope telescope .

Discussions of highest magnification reached are highly subjective and experienced based. When someone claims to have reached 100X per inch with an XYZ mirror `without image breakdown ' I laugh a little because I know that with good optics and seeing diffraction structure is pretty well visible at 25X per inch and higher magnifications than this are rather empty and subjective.

For me , the point of 'image break down' is where I can see an airy pattern around stars , so if at high magnification the seeing doesn't allow or the optical quality is not there , a high magnification `without image breakdown' is not any indicator of optical quality to me.

[ausastronomer]

Hi Mark,

I don't really agree with this entirely. While I fully understand what you are saying, the point for me is that higher magnification (to a point) makes the already visible detail easier to see, due to the increased image scale.

You might be able to read everything on a car license plate at 30 metres but you can read everything a lot easier at 15 metres, where it all appears twice the size it did at 30 metres.

Cheers,
John B

[N1]

I've found this to be quite true myself. Aperture in mm usually gives the optimal power for the telescope, but not necessarily for the observer ;)

Not much point in detail bein shown by the scope, but so small that I can't see it. That's where a little "empty magnification" does wonders.