Eyepieces from the US?

Michael - I think the issue was around the fact that owners and/or TMB had proclaimed that their new eyepieces 'blew the competition out of the water' as regards contrast. The reviewer rightly disagreed with that assertion. However, the eyepieces performed equally as good as the comparison eyepieces (Vernonscope Brandon, Clave, and TV plossls) on planets.

I think the owners were victims of this overenthusiastic hype from whatever source and thought that their new monocentric was the bees knees - when it was really just as good as other good eyepieces. No better, no worse.

I guess the advice to anyone buying eyepieces is try and get a review and then compare prices - a simple sum will then point you in the right direction.

By the way, I don't have TMB's or even a (lovely) TMB refractor so I've no 'position' to hold here. And I'm glad you came back with an alternative view of the article. But all in all, they got 4 stars out of five, which for a Sky and Telescope review is pretty good. I don't think I would have a problem purchasing them if planetary viewing was my cup of tea and the price was the same or cheaper than the plossls mentioned in the article.

At some point, I know I'll be in the market for new eyepieces and I'm dreading the day when I'll have to decide what I'll spend my hard earned dosh on. Come to think of, this really is a damned hard hobby! I can't imagine what all the newbies to this board think they might be getting into!

As a word of comfort then, you can get as much pleasure out of this hobby with your own eyes and no equipment as you can with a system costing you tens of thousands of euro - or even a super value ETX from Lidl!

Cheers

Dave

Guys,
I tend to agree with both of you with regards the TMB eyepieces, S&Ts review was honest and not surprising.

The TMB monocentrics were overhyped, they are excellent planetary eyepieces but so are many other eyepieces, and those other eyepieces have good at widefields while the monocentrics do not.

The monocentrics might have been the only good planetary eyepieces 100 years ago, but not these days and thats the point that alot of people missed.