What Was Your First Eyepiece Upgrade?

[Ruud]

I snipped this from some place. Right click the image.

 
Refractordude, it's as if you have discovered the twin brother that I never knew I had.

[Don Alvarez]

First upgrade? I'm pretty sure it was the Meade 5k UWA's. After that followed a smattering of Superviews, Meade plossls and smoothies. What gets the most use now is the BCO's in the Q-turret. It's already set up and works no issues with the 150. Clickety-click. That thing is great.

[StarBru]

My first upgrade was a 2" Orion 50mm plossl MIJ for my C-8 SCT in the 1980's. I still have it! Other than that, I only used MA's, plossls, or super-plossl eyepieces I got with each new scope purchase for about 35 years. In the last couple of years, I have bought in this order: 9mm Orion Expanse, 4mm TV Radian, 18mm Baader Classic Ortho, 14mm Meade UWA Series 4000, 16mm BST FF, 27mm Starguider FF, 32mm Celestron plossl, 40mm Meade super-plossl.

[Bigzmey]

First upgrade? I'm pretty sure it was the Meade 5k UWA's. After that followed a smattering of Superviews, Meade plossls and smoothies. What gets the most use now is the BCO's in the Q-turret. It's already set up and works no issues with the 150. Clickety-click. That thing is great.

Glad you are enjoying BCO Q-turret. I feel that it should be a strong contender for any frac or CAT owner looking for EP upgrades.

[Don Alvarez]

Absolutely! Especially if the bundle goes on sale again for under $200, the one with the little tin box. It's the ultimate grab and go.

[kt4hx]

Mine were .965" Ramsdens that came with my old Gilbert 3 inch reflector. As a kid I didn't know from nothing. I thought the whole set up was the cat's meow, and truth be told it did introduce me to the wonders of a sky largely unknown to me. So all said the whole shebang did what it should do.

[notFritzArgelander]

First upgrade? I'm pretty sure it was the Meade 5k UWA's. After that followed a smattering of Superviews, Meade plossls and smoothies. What gets the most use now is the BCO's in the Q-turret. It's already set up and works no issues with the 150. Clickety-click. That thing is great.

Glad you are enjoying BCO Q-turret. I feel that it should be a strong contender for any frac or CAT owner looking for EP upgrades.

Not just CATs and Fracs! They beat out Delos on fine planetary detail especially shadow transits on Jupiter.

[The Happy Parrot]

My first update was a used ES 16mm/68 deg. eyepiece to fill the gap between the stock 30 and 9mm eyepieces that came with the Z8. It was advertised as "only used 4-5 times" which was true except I think the seller forgot to add "per day". It came in the wrong box, with a cap that never stays on and covered with enough skin detritus and flakes to run a proper human genome study. Despite all that and after a good cleaning, it is my most used eyepiece to date.

[Bigzmey]

First upgrade? I'm pretty sure it was the Meade 5k UWA's. After that followed a smattering of Superviews, Meade plossls and smoothies. What gets the most use now is the BCO's in the Q-turret. It's already set up and works no issues with the 150. Clickety-click. That thing is great.

Glad you are enjoying BCO Q-turret. I feel that it should be a strong contender for any frac or CAT owner looking for EP upgrades.

Not just CATs and Fracs! They beat out Delos on fine planetary detail especially shadow transits on Jupiter.

Agree! BCOs themselves perform well in any type of scopes. Q-turret will not work in Newts/DOBs - not enough inward focuser travel.

[Don Alvarez]

Agree! BCOs themselves perform well in any type of scopes. Q-turret will not work in Newts/DOBs - not enough inward focuser travel.

It's hit or miss on Newts I guess. It doesn't work in my 10" Skyline, but I noted when I got the Apertura 6" F5 newt that it had a lot of in-focus, and it does work with that.

[Bigzmey]

Agree! BCOs themselves perform well in any type of scopes. Q-turret will not work in Newts/DOBs - not enough inward focuser travel.

It's hit or miss on Newts I guess. It doesn't work in my 10" Skyline, but I noted when I got the Apertura 6" F5 newt that it had a lot of in-focus, and it does work with that.

Good to know. Was Apertura 6" designed with AP in mind?

[Don Alvarez]

Good to know. Was Apertura 6" designed with AP in mind?

The F4 150 is their astrograph, but before I bought it I put the question to Highpoint about the F5 150 and using it with a DSLR, they said it would work so long as I used a coma corrector. So maybe it is, or maybe it's just serendipity. I ended up with the F5 because its cheaper and could double duty with visual and AP.

Funny thing is, even with the Q-turret I still have a reasonable amount of in-focus left. I have to use extension tubes with EP's a lot, even though the primary seems to be all the way back in the housing.

[Bigzmey]

Good to know. Was Apertura 6" designed with AP in mind?

The F4 150 is their astrograph, but before I bought it I put the question to Highpoint about the F5 150 and using it with a DSLR, they said it would work so long as I used a coma corrector. So maybe it is, or maybe it's just serendipity. I ended up with the F5 because its cheaper and could double duty with visual and AP.

Funny thing is, even with the Q-turret I still have a reasonable amount of in-focus left. I have to use extension tubes with EP's a lot, even though the primary seems to be all the way back in the housing.

This makes sense. All my APO/ED scopes have plenty of inward focus, which is great. Achros made strictly for visual not so. I need to tweak them to use EP turret or filter wheels.

[kt4hx]

Well shoot, I just noticed the word upgrade in the title and I merely mentioned my first eyepieces.

I guess it would have been when I moved to plossls then, which were a big jump from the Ramsden.

[Wombat]

My first EP-upgrade was to replace the tiny vixen 8mm Huygens by a new 12,5mm Hygens-Mittenzwey EP..... in 1985....

Ok.... this year I replace the two tiny stock Orion EP coming with my XT10i by a Meade 40mm Super Plössl, a Baader Hyperion 21mm, a Meade 5000 UAW 14mm, a Baader Hyperion 10mm and a Meade 5000 UAW 6,7mm. That was a real update. Just looking for a Hyperion aspheric 31 or 36mm and a 5mm on the short-side.

WOMBAT

[Wombat]

Important info for the readers here: The Baader Hyperions have a housing with an additional 2''-Option. When using this option on the Orion XT10i it is impossible to reach a focus! You can't use the 2''-Option of the Hyperion EPs on this Dobson. The focus is to short! Not to long. So a low-profile-focuser will be no solution.
WOMBAT