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BST Starguider 3.2mm and Astrotech Paradigm 3.2mm.

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#1 Princess Leah

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Posted 10 October 2024 - 06:58 PM

Some of the experts on CN state these are the same eyepieces. They are listed 60 AFOV and 58 AFOV respectively.

If they are the same, what is the correct FOV? 59 degrees!

 

I am looking to buy an eyepiece of such focal length to compare with a Barlowed 6mm.

Is there any other low price (sub £100) recent additions to the EP market worthy of consideration?

 

Many thanks Leah.



#2 Oldfracguy

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Posted 10 October 2024 - 07:36 PM

Hi Princess,

 

These are both made by the same company, Barsta (BST), but they are definitely different eyepieces.  The ones that resemble the old TMB Planetary eyepieces, the BST Planetaries:

 

101_2829.JPG

 

are 58° AFOV and average about 16 mm of Eye Relief.  The Dual ED StarGuider / AT Paradigm eyepieces use ED glass and have a 60° AFOV, and also average about 16 mm of Eye Relief in those shorter focal length sizes:

 

101_1687.JPG

 

 

There is a running CN thread on the 3.2 mm versions of both of these eyepieces:

 

https://www.cloudyni...mm-vs-bst-32mm/

 

In my experience, either one would be fine to compare to a Barlowed 6 mm eyepiece.  Of course, the real question is what 6 mm eyepiece are we talking about here; and to some degree the Barlow being used as well


Edited by Oldfracguy, 11 October 2024 - 01:08 PM.

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#3 Princess Leah

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Posted 11 October 2024 - 02:06 AM

Thanks David.

I was reading that post, but didn't realise it was still current. If I have any questions I will post there.

PS I was Barlowing a Celestron  X-cel LX 6mm , with a Xcel Barlow (lightweight outfit).


Edited by Princess Leah, 11 October 2024 - 02:06 AM.


#4 Jon Isaacs

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Posted 11 October 2024 - 02:25 AM

Having owned both the 3.2 mm Paradigm and the 3.2 mm TMB Planetary simultaneously, I'm not sure if they are the same eyepiece optically. They were similar in performance.

 

In terms of off-axis sharpness, I'm quite sure the 6 mm XCel LX will be sharper in a fast scope.

 

Jon


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#5 Princess Leah

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Posted 11 October 2024 - 03:51 AM

Thanks again.

I'm impressed by the 6mm Celestron. However was disappointed when Barlowed.

I'm currently getting a better view of Saturn with a 80mm F11 Vixen achromat.

Maybe I need a better 1.25 inch Barlow.

I have a 2 inch Barlow. I should compare that. However I like a lightweight outfit when traveling. 



#6 Jon Isaacs

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Posted 11 October 2024 - 03:58 AM

Thanks again.

I'm impressed by the 6mm Celestron. However was disappointed when Barlowed.

I'm currently getting a better view of Saturn with a 80mm F11 Vixen achromat.

Maybe I need a better 1.25 inch Barlow.

I have a 2 inch Barlow. I should compare that. However I like a lightweight outfit when traveling. 

 

What telescope are you comparing the 80 mm F/11 Vixen to?

 

I've owned quite a number of Vixen and Mizar 80 mm F/11s. They did OK on the planets but never performed as well as the William Optics 80 mm F/7 Megrez ll FD..

 

Jon


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#7 Princess Leah

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Posted 11 October 2024 - 08:18 AM

So the 'Vixen' is a Canadian Omcon 80mm F11.3.  I compared it with my CF 80mm triplet (F6) and my Equinox 80 F6.25. I thought the Equinox was the best until I used the Barlow. I have also tried the cheaper Celestron Omni Barlow.

 

 I would like to get a better song out of the short ED scopes at higher magnification and pass on the achromat to my nephew.


Edited by Princess Leah, 11 October 2024 - 08:20 AM.


#8 Princess Leah

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Posted 11 October 2024 - 08:21 AM

Omcon

Attached Thumbnails

  • post-473247-0-22735700-1716918292~2.jpg

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#9 Oldfracguy

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Posted 11 October 2024 - 09:12 AM

What telescope are you comparing the 80 mm F/11 Vixen to?

 

I've owned quite a number of Vixen and Mizar 80 mm F/11s. They did OK on the planets but never performed as well as the William Optics 80 mm F/7 Megrez ll FD..

 

Jon

I have also had one of those Vixen 80mm f/11 achromats:

 

101_0902.JPG

 

 

That scope faded fast above about 150x magnification, but it sure was nice to look at.  A 6mm eyepiece was about the shortest focal length I could use before the views deteriorated quickly.  Saturn needs higher magnification than Jupiter, at least 140x I would say.  I agree with Jon that these better 80mm ED refractors are much better for viewing the planets, as well as details on the lunar surface.


Edited by Oldfracguy, 11 October 2024 - 09:15 AM.

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#10 Princess Leah

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Posted 11 October 2024 - 12:40 PM

Not with my Barlow, they aren't.

 

I'm not sure if Barlow's and me are on the same page.

 

I will try my 2 inch telecentric Barlow, with the 1.25 inch adapter.



#11 Jon Isaacs

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Posted 12 October 2024 - 01:43 AM

So the 'Vixen' is a Canadian Omcon 80mm F11.3.  I compared it with my CF 80mm triplet (F6) and my Equinox 80 F6.25. I thought the Equinox was the best until I used the Barlow. I have also tried the cheaper Celestron Omni Barlow.

 

 I would like to get a better song out of the short ED scopes at higher magnification and pass on the achromat to my nephew.

 

The 3.5 mm TeleVue Nagler maybe what you're looking for. 

 

Jon


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#12 Oldfracguy

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Posted 12 October 2024 - 02:39 AM

A couple hours ago I was looking at Saturn through an Altair Starwave 80ED-R using a 3.5mm eyepiece.  Later I had been looking at Iota Cassiopeia using an Explore Scientific 3x Focal Entender and a Fujiyama 7mm Orthoscopic for 240x.  I left that eyepiece/"Barlow" combination in and turned to the South to view Saturn.  Not only could I see detail in the almost edge-on rings and some banding on the planet itself, I could pick up intermittently another one of the moons I couldn't see using the 3.5mm eyepiece at 160x.   The quality of the Barlow does make a difference, but also the Strehl ratio and residual Color Blur of the scope.  Either of those ED scopes will have a residual Color Blur due to unfocused light that is much less than the 80mm f/11 achromat, so it would be expected they will provide sharper images of Saturn at the same magnification as the 80mm f/11 achromat.  I think it looks very much like the Barlow in use might be the source of the degraded images.


Edited by Oldfracguy, 12 October 2024 - 09:35 AM.

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#13 Princess Leah

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Posted 12 October 2024 - 06:01 AM

Think you might be right. The ES telecentric Barlow clone should confirm this.

Last night I was using an ES 62 5.5mm and I think it was even better than the Celestron 6mm 'on-axis.' Better transmission/sharper.

Barlowing my 9mm ES 62, resulted in a poor image.

 

More colour blur yes with the achromat (although it's very subtle even at 160X) but I think it may have superior spherical correction and baffling.

 

Problem is - it's raining again.

 

PS I think the Vixen you had is Chinese made. It's possible the earlier Japanese 'first scope' have better optics.



#14 Oldfracguy

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Posted 12 October 2024 - 09:43 AM

Think you might be right. The ES telecentric Barlow clone should confirm this.

Last night I was using an ES 62 5.5mm and I think it was even better than the Celestron 6mm 'on-axis.' Better transmission/sharper.

Barlowing my 9mm ES 62, resulted in a poor image.

 

More colour blur yes with the achromat (although it's very subtle even at 160X) but I think it may have superior spherical correction and baffling.

 

Problem is - it's raining again.

 

PS I think the Vixen you had is Chinese made. It's possible the earlier Japanese 'first scope' have better optics.

You are correct.  I bought that Vixen A80Mf (the lowercase "f" identifies it as being made in China by Synta) four years ago, right before Vixen went out of business.  As far as I understand, the Japanese-made Vixen A80M and A81M scopes had much better optical quality.  One CN member has commented about having been familiar with the older Vixen A80M and the Chinese-made A80Mf, and there is no comparison.


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#15 Princess Leah

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Posted 12 October 2024 - 04:43 PM

Did Vixen actually close and reopen again?



#16 STEEL

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Posted 12 October 2024 - 04:45 PM

Some of the experts on CN state these are the same eyepieces. They are listed 60 AFOV and 58 AFOV respectively.

If they are the same, what is the correct FOV? 59 degrees!

 

I am looking to buy an eyepiece of such focal length to compare with a Barlowed 6mm.

Is there any other low price (sub £100) recent additions to the EP market worthy of consideration?

 

Many thanks Leah.

I have the Tecnosky Planetary ED 3.2mm and if we leave out the extreme edge of the field and consider only 50° of field (maybe more), this is a very sharp eyepiece. I have done several tests with Zeiss abbe II, Pentax ortho, Takahashi TOE, and Televue DeLite. In the tests I have done I also used the Zeiss Barlow (on the 6mm of Zeiss abbe II and Pentax or 7). The Tecnosky Planetary ED 3.2mm are absolutely very sharp and it is possible to do very serious astronomy even by combining them with very expensive telescopes. The Televue DeLite and Tecnosky Planetary ED have remained in my equipment and are absolutely wonderful. If hypothetically you could diaphragm a Tecnosky Planetary ED 3.2mm and reduce it 52° like the Takahashi TOE 3.3, I don't know who would come out on top (ED 3.2mm is a big step forward in dispersion containment).

 

I can reassure you that the Tecnosky (Paradigm, BST) are excellent quality eyepieces at a reasonable price, but be careful with the 18mm and the 25mm, these are not to everyone's taste (I returned the 18mm

waytogo.gif


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#17 Oldfracguy

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Posted 12 October 2024 - 08:28 PM

Did Vixen actually close and reopen again?

No, the original Vixen closed, as did Meade only months before.  The rights to use the Vixen and Meade product names were awarded to other entities.  I see you can still buy the popular Vixen Porta II mount.  Production of Meade's old ACF (Advanced Coma Free) SCTs was taking place in Mexico until literally a few months ago when Orion (the U.S.-based Orion), who had acquired the rights to the Meade product name, abruptly closed its doors.



#18 T1R2

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Posted 12 October 2024 - 09:18 PM

No, the original Vixen closed, as did Meade only months before.  The rights to use the Vixen and Meade product names were awarded to other entities.  I see you can still buy the popular Vixen Porta II mount.  Production of Meade's old ACF (Advanced Coma Free) SCTs was taking place in Mexico until literally a few months ago when Orion (the U.S.-based Orion), who had acquired the rights to the Meade product name, abruptly closed its doors.

What do you mean by the original Vixen is closed? 


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#19 Oldfracguy

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Posted 12 October 2024 - 09:34 PM

What do you mean by the original Vixen is closed? 

Here is a CN thread from three years ago:

 

https://www.bing.com...mVhbGx5Lw&ntb=1

 

Soon after that I seem to remember an announcement on the Explore Scientific website that they had become the Vixen distrubutor for the U.S.


Edited by Oldfracguy, 12 October 2024 - 09:37 PM.

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#20 davidgmd

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Posted 12 October 2024 - 10:00 PM

I don’t think Vixen ever closed or went out of business. Their US distributor did, after which Explore Scientific took over as US distributor. Availability of Vixen products in the US was curtailed during the transition. I don’t know if it’s fully recovered. Vixen products have been available in Asia and Europe all along, as far as I’m aware. Other than supply-chain related shortages in 2020-202?


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#21 Princess Leah

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Posted 13 October 2024 - 03:32 AM

Interesting. Like Dave said, in Europe I never noticed any change in supply.

 

Has Orion closed completely?



#22 Princess Leah

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Posted 13 October 2024 - 04:06 AM

I have the Tecnosky Planetary ED 3.2mm and if we leave out the extreme edge of the field and consider only 50° of field (maybe more), this is a very sharp eyepiece. I have done several tests with Zeiss abbe II, Pentax ortho, Takahashi TOE, and Televue DeLite. In the tests I have done I also used the Zeiss Barlow (on the 6mm of Zeiss abbe II and Pentax or 7)

waytogo.gif

Very helpful thanks .

Was your comparison all with Barlowed EPs?

You said you did tests with Barlowed Zeiss abbe II and Pentax or 7)

What's the 7? If it's a 7mm Take TOE, does that mean the Delite was the only non Barlowed ep in comparison, and if so how did that compare?



#23 STEEL

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Posted 13 October 2024 - 05:04 AM

Very helpful thanks .

Was your comparison all with Barlowed EPs?

You said you did tests with Barlowed Zeiss abbe II and Pentax or 7)

What's the 7? If it's a 7mm Take TOE, does that mean the Delite was the only non Barlowed ep in comparison, and if so how did that compare?

With the Zeiss 2x Barlow:
Zeiss abbe II 6mm
Pentax SMC O-7

 

Against native focal lengths:
Tecnosky Planetary ED 3.2mm
Televue DeLite 3mm
Takahashi TOE 3.3

All TOEs were the most disappointing in dispersion.


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#24 Princess Leah

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Posted 13 October 2024 - 05:19 AM

With the Zeiss 2x Barlow:
Zeiss abbe II 6mm
Pentax SMC O-7

 

Against native focal lengths:
Tecnosky Planetary ED 3.2mm
Televue DeLite 3mm
Takahashi TOE 3.3

All TOEs were the most disappointing in dispersion.

Thanks for clarifying and for sharing. A very thorough comparison.

Very helpful.



#25 Princess Leah

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Posted 13 October 2024 - 05:59 AM

Does the Planetary 3.2mm ED incorporate a Barlow lens in its configuration?




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