I need a spotting scope

[paul73]

Believe me I was looking for all the LER eye pieces out there for a few friends with the Celestrons.
I did find a chart that gives the magnification results with out doing the math. For some fun I use my Celestron telescope eye pieces in my Regal 80 to look at the stars. Its easier to set up. It provides all sorts of different mag , eye relief, focus.
Theres been some nice views of Saturn, Jupiter and Mars this week.

for a range spotting scope zoom is not needed at all, all you want is the best possible clarity to see the holes in the target.
so the fixed eyepiece there is the best idea, in my opinion, as long as magnification is crisp enough. this thing i used is, apparently, ok.
it is not a $300 baaden, but, it works.

i am just not sure if it was a good idea to use 9mm, or may be i should have gotten 6mm, to push it into an 80x area. 9mm should be around 57x-58x

 

[Quite_Exasperated]

 

[centermass181]

its to bad they dont at least have a recommendation on some idea of what you might need.
My friend has one FOV at 1000 yards is 150' Mag is 50X and it can focus as close as 20'

Plenty of light getting into this thing!
C5 Spotting Scope | Celestron

can always shoot an email down there.

 

[PatMcD]

A good article from Creedmoor about eyepieces.

Five Important Things You Need to Know About Spotting Scope Eye Pieces - Creedmoor Sports InfoZone

Do I need the long eye relief or zoom eyepiece for my spotting scope?

creedmoorinfozone.com

 

[paul73]

A good article from Creedmoor about eyepieces.

Five Important Things You Need to Know About Spotting Scope Eye Pieces - Creedmoor Sports InfoZone

Do I need the long eye relief or zoom eyepiece for my spotting scope?

creedmoorinfozone.com

kowa pieces do not fit celestron ultima. LER original celestron piece is no longer sold.
plus i am not that concerned of what could be hypothetically good - i only show what practically had worked.

 

[PatMcD]

kowa pieces do not fit celestron ultima. LER original celestron piece is no longer sold.
plus i am not that concerned of what could be hypothetically good - i only show what practically had worked.

I just thought anybody else who was looking into spotting scopes would learn something about the difference in eyepieces, no matter what brand scope they were looking at.

 

[badshot101]

Hard to beat the Kowa ts-82sv scope with 25xLER eyepiece. I've been shooting highpower for years with one and its always been excellent - Creedmoor is having a special right now with scope, eyepiece and scope cover for $975

 

[Ron Jablonski]

View attachment 680211

I'd love a pirate spotter, every impact I get an arghhh! So satisfying

 

[paul73]

So, to all celestron ultima users. i wanted to do this for a while, but baaden planetarium eyepieces were just too damn expensive, made no sense to spend a $300 on an eyepiece for a $200 scope.

so i tried a chinesium one - SVBONY 1.25inch Telescope Eyepieces 68° 9mm Ultra Wide Angle Fully Multi-Coated

SVBONY 1.25inch Telescope Eyepieces 68° 9mm Ultra Wide Angle Fully Multi-Coated | eBay

FMC 68-Degree Ultra Wide long eye Relief Eyepiece Standard 1.25" Inch Astronomy Telescope 4 Piece Eyepiece Kit Super Wide 68 Degree apparent field offers expansive views of the moon, star clusters, and the Milky Way Multi-element design delivers sharp images with good color correction and...

www.ebay.com

it is not an exact fit, but not too difficult neither. the bottom part of the lower lens housing needs to be cut off by lower line (after you unscrew the lens out of it, of course).
the upper highlighted extrusion needs to be grinded down, so it all would fit into the celestron. that lens element then needs to be threaded down enough along that cut pipe holder so it would focus same way as the original eyepiece, to get to infinity focus properly. where it was in stock tube was too high.

the result is very nice optically, way better than the stock, in my opinion. opinions differ, of course.
View attachment 678647

here is the end result - could have been done prettier, of course, but i was not too concerned about esthetics of it.
i just tested it - the police department door is about 300-500 yds from me, i was able to see and read the font on the printed poster on their door, looked like a usual A4 format page.
major difference is - it is an ultra wide lens, not the stock celestron tunnel vision. i used 9mm and it is, i think, quite OK. looking at it now i think that may be a 6mm would be even better. i was concerned that too much magnification there will be counterproductive, but, the image is pretty damn nice - the core mirrors and optics in the celestron body are very good.

from old thread:
For the f6 80mm scope, fl 480mm;
8mm = 60x, 12mm = 40x, 16mm = 30x, 20mm = 24x, 24mm = 20x.

For the f5.4 100mm scope, fl 540mm;
8mm = 68x, 12mm = 45x, 16mm = 34x, 20mm = 27x, 24mm = 23x.

View attachment 678648

i have tested this today at 100 and 300yds - perfect success. at 300 i can see now holes in the plywood which would not render before at all.
should have used a 6mm lens version, probably. but, it is good enough as is, for now.

 

[paul73]

I swapped 9mm svbony for 6mm and the latter is the winner. I took that updated celestron to 300 and it was showing.223 holes in white paper printed targets perfectly fine.

I had posted before in the thread how it needs to be cut in order to be inserted, it is doable. Svbony adapter lens should sit pretty much right on the scope glass inside in order for focus to get to infinity.

I am quite happy overall now, it is quite awesome- no need to shell out an another grand for anything else.