• Welcome to BirdForum, the internet's largest birding community with thousands of members from all over the world. The forums are dedicated to wild birds, birding, binoculars and equipment and all that goes with it.

    Please register for an account to take part in the discussions in the forum, post your pictures in the gallery and more.
ZEISS DTI thermal imaging cameras. For more discoveries at night, and during the day.

Kowa 611 eyepiece choices? (1 Viewer)

kittykat23uk

Well-known member
Hi everybody

I've got a Kowa TS-611 and a new 20x w TSN eyepiece and am very happy with this, but I was wondering whether it might be worth getting an additional eyepiece with a higher mag, or a zoom. I'm changing my digiscoping camera to a Fuji F31FD which hopefully widens up the possibilities for digiscoping. What would you folks recommend? I do a bit of birding on the norfolk/suffolk coast and have a holiday to India coming up in November. :cat:

Thanks all,

Jo
 
ETA. Another question. Is the 20-60x Zoom 5 position, with twist up eyecups with product number 146-207 as advertised here:

http://www.warehouseexpress.com/?/binsandscopes/spotting_scopes/kowa.html#660acc

The same as the TSE-Z9B as advertised here?

http://www.epinions.com/Kowa_20_60x_Zoom_Eyepiece_TSEZ9B_TSEZ9B

If not then I presume I would be better off with the 146-207 for general birding/digiscoping?

Also how do either of these compare to the Kowa TSE-Z6 20-40x Zoom Eyepiece?

http://www.opticsplanet.net/picture...pieces-for-66mm-and-60mm-spotting-scopes.html
 
Eyepiece

I would recommend you go to an outlet with your spotting scope and try them for yourself - you have a few optics retailers within 1/2 an hour driving from Norwich (Jessops / LCE / In-Focus / Cleyspy) and see what the various ones do, perhaps even pick up a good second hand one. Some of the items on your post are now quite dated against the range of Kowa lenses currently available
 
Last edited:
Pretty sure those are one and same. The TSE-Z6 is an older eyepiece which attempted to achieve optimum quality but only through a two times zoom range; not very successfully according to Kimmo's review back in 2001 looking at the Kowa 660 series :
http://www.alula.fi/gb/test_kowa.html
You'll see the TSE-Z9B is very highly regarded by the optics advisor in the forums section of that OpticsPlanet site you link to.
 
Thanks for your help.

ETA and another question. For digiscoping, is there likely to be a real noticeable difference between the 611 and 613 ED version of the Kowa scopes?
 
Last edited:
Hi kittykat23uk,
I use a Kowa 611 scope with a couple of eyepieces including the newer TSE-Z9 20-60x zoom. For field of view, you can't beat a 20 or 30x and these prove the best bet for digiscoping. The zoom is great, but from about 40x onwards it starts to get dark and at 60x, combined with the slightest tripodow wobble, is only really suitable for id'ing at the most extreme!!
The 613 prominar glass version of the scope is excellent and would reduce some colour fringing when digiscoping against bright background, i.e. bird in tree against bright white clouds. I'm sure purists would disagree, but the 611 can produce some really good results provided you put the time in and learn what it can do...and what it can't. The bigger the objective lens the more light you can let into the scope so 60mm is ok for most situations. People reccomend 80-100 mm if using in low light. Some people insist on at least 80mm with ED, Prominar or Low dispersion glass as a bare minimum. On the whole the cost of this set up is prohibitive, the used market is a good source but still quite pricey. Remember also that 80mm Prominar/ed/low dispersion is quite a weighty propostition when used in the field. My advice would be stick with what you've got, get the technique right, then upgrade at a later date. Todays newer lighter models will be tomorrows' second hand bargains in a year or two! Have fun.
 
Warning! This thread is more than 17 years ago old.
It's likely that no further discussion is required, in which case we recommend starting a new thread. If however you feel your response is required you can still do so.

Users who are viewing this thread

Back
Top