New Televue Eyepieces - DeLite

barx1963 (Malcolm) · #1 18-04-2015, 11:04 AM

TV have announced the new DeLite range of EPs. Interesting!
Lightweight, all 1.25", 62deg AFOV, and 20mm eye relief.

Being launched at NEAF (Scott, make sure you go have a look!) and available later this year.
http://televue.com/engine/TV3b_page....k#.VTGs0fmUeSo

Malcolm

wavelandscott (Scott) · #2 18-04-2015, 11:40 AM

I am putting them on my list...I am sure they will be nice. Not sure of their purpose...

Kunama · #3 18-04-2015, 12:56 PM

A Radian by any other name

MortonH · #4 18-04-2015, 01:17 PM

Or like the Pentax XF.

FlashDrive (Poppy) · #5 18-04-2015, 01:31 PM

Quote:

Originally Posted by Kunama

A Radian by any other name

That's what I thought to ..... a Radian in disguise ....

Col....

Allan · #6 18-04-2015, 01:43 PM

At last, a TeleVue eyepiece I don't need to buy.

PlanetMan · #7 18-04-2015, 03:41 PM

I knew it was only a matter of time before this was going to happen and Televue would bring back the Radians under a different name.

As good as the Delos are there various attributes where the old Radians are actually better - size,cost, on axis etc

MortonH · #8 18-04-2015, 06:05 PM

Quote:

Originally Posted by PlanetMan

I knew it was only a matter of time before this was going to happen and Televue would bring back the Radians under a different name.

As good as the Delos are there various attributes where the old Radians are actually better - size,cost, on axis etc

The Radians lagged behind Pentax on light throughput. With the Delos line Tele Vue caught up in that respect. Assuming the Delos technology is being used in the Delite range they should be a good step up from the Radians.

I'm quite happy with a 62º AFOV so these seem quite attractive.

However, Bintel has them listed for pre-order with a price of $379 which puts me off a bit (and is double the price of a used Radian).

FlashDrive (Poppy) · #9 18-04-2015, 06:36 PM

... Bintel Price $379.00 .... I'll stick to my Vixen LVW's @ $299.00.
TeleVue products are getting ' way out of hand ' in $$ value since the AU$ dropped in recent times.

eg: 24mm Panoptic now retails at ~ $450.00 ea + Postage. ( I remember when they were $329.00 ea.... not that long ago either )

Col.....

MortonH · #10 18-04-2015, 06:41 PM

Quote:

Originally Posted by FlashDrive

... Bintel Price $379.00 .... I'll stick to my Vixen LVW's @ $299.00.
TeleVue products are getting ' way out of hand ' in $$ value since the AU$ dropped in recent times.

eg: 24mm Panoptic now retails at ~ $450.00 ea + Postage. ( I remember when they were $329.00 ea.... not that long ago either )

Col.....

Yeah, I'll be waiting a year or two until some used ones become available. Or at least till they're on sale.

astroron (Ron) · #11 18-04-2015, 07:25 PM

Can't seem to find any space to accommodate any of those eyepieces as my eyepieces start at Nagler 3.5, 6mm radian,9mm nagler 13mm Nagler 17 mm nagler 21mm plossl 30mm Celestron ultima and a University optics 55mm .
I would like something in between the 21mm and the 30mm but as I am not a low magnification observer am not that bothered at the moment.
Cheers

Allan · #12 18-04-2015, 08:22 PM

Check the eye watering price of a 21 Ethos now at BinTel, $1209.

FlashDrive (Poppy) · #13 18-04-2015, 08:47 PM

Quote:

Originally Posted by Allan

Check the eye watering price of a 21 Ethos now at BinTel, $1209.

..... for an extra $31.00 , you can buy a Takahashi FS60CB OTA.

Col....

Allan · #14 18-04-2015, 10:45 PM

Quote:

Originally Posted by FlashDrive

..... for an extra $31.00 , you can buy a Takahashi FS60CB OTA.

Col....

That's pretty much what I was thinking.

Profiler (Profiler) · #15 19-04-2015, 12:22 AM

Quote:

Originally Posted by Allan

Check the eye watering price of a 21 Ethos now at BinTel, $1209.

And now for the really bad news - all economic forecasts apparently predict the AUD$ to continue going down - so these prices are here to stay and will most likely continue to rise.

Profiler (Profiler) · #16 19-04-2015, 12:30 AM

Quote:

Originally Posted by MortonH

The Radians lagged behind Pentax on light throughput. With the Delos line Tele Vue caught up in that respect. Assuming the Delos technology is being used in the Delite range they should be a good step up from the Radians.

I'm quite happy with a 62º AFOV so these seem quite attractive.

However, Bintel has them listed for pre-order with a price of $379 which puts me off a bit (and is double the price of a used Radian).

Perhaps someone more adept on IT than me can find the original post by "ausastronomer" (John Bambury) who undertook a very thorough review of the Radian alongside a whole bunch of other eyepieces including the Pentax XW - the results were surprising and his conclusion was that the XW was overall only better by a slim margin. On some other individual characteristics the Radian was better.

Bottom line - he considered the Radian to be no slouch and an excellent EP well worth having.

Allan · #17 19-04-2015, 07:40 AM

Another good comparison was done by Alvin Huey in the US. He hunts the faintest of the faint fuzzies and for him light transmission is the primary requirement in an eye piece. He ranked his ZAO's at the top of his list followed by Delos, Ethos then XW's. I was impressed that he could see a difference between the Delos and Ethos on light transmission.

Kunama · #18 19-04-2015, 08:17 AM

Quote:

Originally Posted by Allan

Check the eye watering price of a 21 Ethos now at BinTel, $1209.

How to spend $1209????

Vixen LVW5mm + 8mm + 13mm + 17mm = $1100 that left me $109 which bought me 2 bottles of Penfolds Bin407 and still had a bus fare home.

4x 65ºAFOV = 260º of comfortable, parfocal, relatively affordable viewing.

I guess I won't be buying any more Televues. Paying $379 for an eyepiece that will effective imitate the LVW doesn't make much sense just because it has green writing and is made in Taiwan.

Profiler (Profiler) · #19 19-04-2015, 09:28 AM

Quote:

Originally Posted by Allan

Another good comparison was done by Alvin Huey in the US. He hunts the faintest of the faint fuzzies and for him light transmission is the primary requirement in an eye piece. He ranked his ZAO's at the top of his list followed by Delos, Ethos then XW's. I was impressed that he could see a difference between the Delos and Ethos on light transmission.

My thoughts as well - at this level I am often hard pressed to see differences as essentially they are all excellent eyepieces - or maybe I am simply half blind

MortonH · #20 19-04-2015, 10:03 AM

Quote:

Originally Posted by Profiler

Perhaps someone more adept on IT than me can find the original post by "ausastronomer" (John Bambury) who undertook a very thorough review of the Radian alongside a whole bunch of other eyepieces including the Pentax XW - the results were surprising and his conclusion was that the XW was overall only better by a slim margin. On some other individual characteristics the Radian was better.

Bottom line - he considered the Radian to be no slouch and an excellent EP well worth having.

Found three threads where John compares Radians to XW and XF.

http://www.iceinspace.com.au/forum/s...ad.php?t=97793

http://www.iceinspace.com.au/forum/s...ad.php?t=96040

http://www.iceinspace.com.au/forum/s...d.php?t=117304

You're right, the Radians are good and worth having. He comments that the 6mm Radian has better off-axis performance than the 6mm Delos on double stars, etc. I didn't see any comments on performance on faint objects.

I also noted his comment about the 8mm Radian vs the XF 8.5mm "the 8.5mm Pentax XF outperforms it by a small margin in every single optical performance criteria".

There's also a detailed comparison of the XF12mm and 12mm Radian on CloudyNights. The Radian was notably less effective than the XF on faint galaxies.

http://www.cloudynights.com/page/art...entax-xf-r1393

But the upshot seems to be that phrases like "small margin" and "slight difference" seem to crop up regularly in these comparisons.

Going back to my earlier comment on price, the DeLite eyepieces will cost double the value of a used Radian, but certainly won't have double the performance.