[dulwich.hill (James)]

Hi,

My son and I have just got into astronomy after buying a second-hand 6" Skywatcher refractor (F8) and we are now hooked!

However, after buying a new 15mm eyepiece and 2x Barlow from Bintel (their house brand), we soon realised that the eyepieces that came with the scope are pretty terrible.

We would like to buy 3 eyepieces that are excellent 'all-rounders' for planetary, bright nebulae and globular clusters (ie easy to find!). We would something like a 6mm, 12mm and 18mm. What would be best set to get if we put a reasonable budget for each? We can afford up to $200 per eyepiece.

I will buy them in the USA on my next visit, so our budget puts the Televue Radian almost within grasp, but a nagler type 6 just out of grasp (are either really worth it?).

So far the options I have distilled are:

* Televue Radian (6mm, 12mm, 18mm)
* Baader Hyperion (5mm, 13mm, 21mm)
* Baader Hyperion 8-24mm zoom
* William Optics SPL (6mm, 12.5mm, and a SWA 20mm)
* Meade series 500 UWA (6.7mm, 14mm, 18mm or 24mm)

I chose this list because these have good eye relief and most are parfocal.

It would be great to hear your views or experieces with any of these eyepieces (or suggest something different), but with SO MUCH information about eyepieces on the net, it really is difficult to determine what would be best for us and our refractor.

Many thanks

James