Eyepieces from the US?

Hi,

With the recent talk of eyepieces here and the US currency deciding it wants to be on par with the Ruble, it seems like a good time to go shopping.

Like many people here I Imagine the best eyepieces I have, are the $99 box of eyepieces that meade mad on offer for the past couple of years.

So what eyepieces would people here reccomend?

I guess it depends on what you specifically want to see and what scope you have, but even so I'd like to get an idea of what people thinks is worth buying. Feel free toguage answers into pricebands too btw! I havent won the lotto so lets say 3 catagories of <$100, <$200, >$200.

Cheers,
~Al

Personally, I'd recommend holding onto your Meade eyepiece, especially the shorter focal length ones. They're pretty good for planets.

As for deep sky, I'd highly recommend getting one really good "workhorse" eyepiece that'll provide a magnification of roughly 100x. 100x is a nice level of magnification that provids plenty of detail in DSOs but without having too narrow a FOV. For me, I bought the 17mm T4 Nagler and find it excellent, The advantage also is that "sometime" (I've been saying that for a while now! ) when I can afford it I'll invest in a much larger scope. These tend to be fairly fast, as do small refractors. For these you need top quality eyepieces. Investing in these eyepieces will allow future options with your telescope choices.
Personally, I spend most of my nights with just two eyepieces (the two naglers). Reason: sometimes it's best to stop fidling with lots of eyepieces, swapping one in, taking one out etc. Sometimes it's best to just look at the object that bit longer and not to worry about which eyepiece to try on it next.

As for where to buy, I'd highly recommend Astromart.

As I got a cheap binoview receintly, I'm pairing my meade 4000s, since they're going cheap now and will be gone soon.

I dont have the patience Michael has (waiting in astromart for a good deal) so I also got one of these superwide field eyepieces.
That'll do for me for now.

Dave,

I have a wide suite of eyepieces and would strongly recommend the TeleVue Plossls. My 20mm and 55 mm TV Plossls are workhorses and make it into the diagonal for each and every session.

At the same time, I would like to recommend the TV "grenades". I have PanOptics and Naglers and they are serious eyepieces. When the seeing is good and I am in a position to push the power to absurd levels, out come my grenades! With the massacre of the US dollars, this would be a wonderful time to get the great eyepieces.

Some very underrated eyepieces are the Orion Ultrascopics. I have a complete set of these and love them to death. They are high contrast and razor sharp. They are coated eyepieces from Japan under the name of "Ultrascopic" and are priced around $100 (some focal lengths above $100 and other lengths slightly below).

Anthony.

I read a recent review in one of the US mags (S&T or Astronomy) that reviewed the new TMB's. If I remember rightly they came of very well. And I think as a set, they're designed to be parfocal.

www.handsonoptics.com/astronomy/tmb/tmb.html

They seem reasonable value too.

But a word of caution for anyone considering purchasing from the US - and I really don't mean to rain on anyone's parade - you may be liable for import duty and VAT on purchases over a certain amount. Now, its not clear what that amount is but I think its 100 odd euro (its something like that for gifts etc). So, you need to factor in +4.7% (I think) for import and then +21% on the whole amount. And get this, these percentages apply to your packaging, shipping and insurance costs. Talk about rip off Ireland :evil:

You can of course take a chance but do not be surprised if your eagerly awaited package is delayed by customs pending an additional payment from you...

As many of you know, I have been researching this lately - it seems that the best solution is to buy from within Europe. If you pay the VAT of the EU country the items come from, there are no import or VAT duties payable. e.g German VAT is only 16%, UK is 17.5% etc etc.

There are of course 'other' ways to purchase and get his equipment but I wouldn't know anything about that :shock:

Hope this helps or at least gives it to you straight.

Dave

Dave,

The TMBs DIDN'T fair that well at all. Although the authour said they were good, he didn't find any real difference between these and other good quality plossls. The reaction was such so that alot of people (read:owners) got upset about it on many of the astronomy chat websites and sales plummeted after the review.