Cheapish 5-6mm eyepiece

[Solanum]

When I first got my scope I started a thread asking for advice on what eyepieces to aim for in the future. The best advice of course being to wait and see! http://www.iceinspace.com.au/forum/s...ad.php?t=18554

I replaced the 15mm Plossl, because it had dodgy coatings making it unusable, got a 14mm ED from MAS (sold under a few other names at higher price), which I find easy to use - like the eye relief and large objective, but do find it has internal reflections with very bright objects.

Then I got the MAS 30mm Ultrawide, which has distortion at the edge of the field (scope under F5), but does the job very nicely.

I'm reasonably happy with the 25 and 9mm Plossls, but I find the 6mm almost unusable, the lens is minute and your cornea has to be within about 4mm of the glass to see anything. So what should I replace it with? Budget about $100-$200max. Or should I wait until I can spend more?

I'd rather not do the latter, 'cos I have plenty of other things in my life to spend money on as well, and don't know when I could justify more on this, plus I'm fairly happy with the other eyepieces I've got, which obviously aren't the greatest - though I wouldn't turn down a few Naglers if given to me!!!

To extend the above even further, I was thinking along the lines of TMB Planetary ($150) or Vixen LV ($175). Any others? Either of these better for my scope? Both got decent eye relief? Good sized lens to look through?

[MarkN]

You'll find specs for the BurgessTMB planetary EPs here:

http://www.burgessoptical.com/EPs/EPSpecs.html

I have the 4, 5 and 7 mm bought on the 3/2 offer. Still, even at around $150 each they represent good value. A good ortho or plossl might just shade them on planets but not by much.

The ER and 60 deg. AFOV are big points in their favour.

Mark.

[Starkler (Geoff)]

Originally Posted by Solanum

To extend the above even further, I was thinking along the lines of TMB Planetary ($150) or Vixen LV ($175). Any others? Either of these better for my scope? Both got decent eye relief? Good sized lens to look through?

Those are the two that I would suggest in this price range.

The tmb/b has usable eye relief and around 58-60 degree fov. The shortish eye relief I find gets it quickly fogged up from my eyeball in this winter weather.
The LV has generous eye relief but only a 45 degree fov so it might be problematic in an undriven scope. It seems to have less light scatter than the tmb/b