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Old 19-02-2008, 12:10 AM
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erick (Eric)
Starcatcher

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Join Date: Dec 2006
Location: Gerringong
Posts: 8,548
If you search, you'll see some on this site who love their higher magnifications (not mentioning any names, sab). It would be nice to have 420x in your eyepiece case. It won't be often that seeing is good enough, and you also have to remember that, at that magnification, Saturn zooms across your field of view, so you need nice smooth motion to keep returning it to the field of view.

Saturday night, I had my 6m in a Televue 3x barlow in my 12" f5. If my calculations were right, I was at 750x - Yikes! The seeing wasn't really up to it, but I was looking at the crater Plato and surrounds and later on at Saturn filling much of the field (or so it seemed) and enjoying trying to track with the dob. When that magic night of good seeing comes along, I'll be ready.

I also have the GSO 2" ED barlow. I'm no expert and not particularly fussy (yet!) - so it seems fine to me.

Going to longer focal length eyepieces - As I recall, depending on scope performance, you reach a point where the secondary and spider become visible in the eyepiece when focussed on the stars (Help me here expert people). I know that a GSO 40mm in my 8" is OK in the dark, but during daylight, the secondary and spider are clearly in the view. So you'll need to experiment with some borrowed eyepieces. What you may prefer, instead of a longer focal, is a greater apparent field of view. There are 80 deg 30mm eyepieces at the cheaper end of the market. Sure they are not great, but not completely hopeless. Maybe try one of those?
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