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Denkmeier first impressions
I went to the local FedEx Saturday to pick up my new Denkmeier binoviewers. Saturday night was beautiful out, but we had some good friends over that we haven't seen in a month, and we were having too much fun to do any observing that night. Tonight's seeing was mediocre. Nonetheless, I had to go out with the Denk's and my XT8.
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Anyway, here are my first impressions:
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I purchased the Big Easy package. The Big Easy is a set of the Denkmeier Standard's, but they lack the SCD holders (which let you focus each ep separately). They do have self-centering and locking holders instead of set screws, which is a nice feature. The Big Easy package also comes with an Optical Corrector System to reach focus in any newtonian and refractor, as well as working in any SCT. Other specs; Weight: 20oz. IP distance: 50mm - 75mm. Clear aperture: 26mm. The fit and feel to these binoviewers is great. Very nicely machined and solid, the movement of the parts is tight and precise. I know that these are Deinkmeier's lower end binoviewers, but nothing about them is cheap looking or feeling. I also bought the optional locking aluminum case. This thing has enough padding that you could drop them off the roof of my 2 story house onto the lawn and not do any damage to the contents, though the case might dent up a bit. Did I try this? Umm.... no, I'm not as stupid as I look (honest!) But trust me, there is a lot of padding. There is also room for a few ep's in the case too.
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Tonight's skies were fair.... bit of haze, and scattered clouds. XT8 telescope, 25mm plossls. Just to avoid repeating myself I'll say here that for each of these targets I kept switching back and forth between the binoviewer and a single eyepiece. Granted, with the binoviewer the view was magnified 1.4 times, but I played around with an ep & barlow combo until the magnification was close to the same with a single EP as the binoviewer.
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First target? Saturn. Very nice, considering the sky conditions. They say that binoviewers make things appear almost 3D, and Saturn lived up to expectations in this respect. Using both eyes I could see a dark band on the planet that I didn't notice with one ep. I will say that the binoviewers tend to dim down what you see a little bit. With one ep I could see two more of Saturn's tiny moons than I could see with the binoviewers.
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Next target, M42. Again, the nebulosity wasn't quite as bright in the binoviewers. What the binoviewer made up for in the "Wow" factor made up for the slight loss of brightness. The cloud looked just like that, a cloud that you see in the sky. It didn't look like a flat image of a cloud, but more like a puffy nebula cloud. Yeah, I was impressed to say the least.
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OK, this is a weird one here.... While looking at the Beehive Cluster I could almost swear that you could tell that some stars looked closer to us than others. I know that it was nothing more than my mind playing tricks on me, there is no way possible this could actually happen. However the tiniest, brightest stars just looked closer. Did it look this way when I pointed the scope at a few other Open Clusters? No. Like I said, just my mind playing tricks on me, but it just looked so cool!
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Seeing was rapidly going down hill soon after this point, so I called it an early night. I can't wait to see the moon in these puppies! First impressions after 2 hours of use on a mediocre night? These things are worth every penny I paid for them.
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On its own (without any optical correctors that you need to reach focus in most Newts and refractors), it's still over $AU1200.
