PF65EDII Straight need eyepiece (1 Viewer)

[looksharp65]

Mike,

Thanks for the comment on my thread as it was very informative. I am not only a novice birder but as well a big game hunter and this will be used in both applications. What do you think about the fixed power BST eyepieces? They are more affordable. I was thinking about the one below and then a XW to compliment it and then maybe a inexpensive zoom eyepiece at a later date. Any help is much appreciated. Best regards, Jay

http://my.ebay.com/ws/eBayISAPI.dll?MyEbay&gbh=1

The link cannot be used as it is Your eBay, not mine. :-O
But I own the BST Explorer Dual ED 12 mm and cannot praise it enough - it is super sharp to the field stop with the Pentax. The colors are neutral on the coolish side and not warm and vibrant like the XWs or Nikon Fieldscope eyepieces.
Anyway, it is an excellent eyepiece. The 18 mm has a little field curvature where the 12 mm has none. From what I've read the 15 mm is very nice as well.

/L

 

[jgs8163]

Well I ordered a BST Dual Ed Explorer 12 and a Vixen NLV 8-24 click stop zoom. Have my fingers crossed that these will work well for me. I was going to try and buy the William Optics and make the mod as discussed in other threads but have not been able to locate as it's no longer made. I have however located a clone of the William Optics but am hesitant to order one as there is no reviews that I can find about it. Here is a link to the seller. If anyone has any feedback on this I wuold apprecite it. Presently backordered but seller states will have in a few weeks. Thanks, JGS


http://handsonoptics.com/index.php?...id=663&zenid=956c0c553ad501d422be86b495ce2877

 

[jgs8163]

Found a review on the Cloned Williams that I mentioned in my previous note and it was not very good. Scope and Vixen eyepiece to be here today.

 

[mayoayo]

You made nice choices.The Vixen zoom is a safe choice for the pentax,as I wouldnt reccomend modifying your scope(at least right away!)..The Williams Optics zoom that i was mentioning is the model #II,The clon that You show in the link is a copy of the first WO zoom..The One that We pointed as a possible copy of the Swaro zoom is shown in a link in Henry link´s post.

 

[FrankD]

Well I ordered a BST Dual Ed Explorer 12 and a Vixen NLV 8-24 click stop zoom. Have my fingers crossed that these will work well for me. I was going to try and buy the William Optics and make the mod as discussed in other threads but have not been able to locate as it's no longer made. I have however located a clone of the William Optics but am hesitant to order one as there is no reviews that I can find about it. Here is a link to the seller. If anyone has any feedback on this I wuold apprecite it. Presently backordered but seller states will have in a few weeks. Thanks, JGS


http://handsonoptics.com/index.php?...id=663&zenid=956c0c553ad501d422be86b495ce2877

Hmm, for that price I am tempted to order one and see how it performs in my scopes.

 

[woodhornbirder]

http://www.burgessoptical.com/Accessories/OCA1_9.html

you might find this useful to help bring the baader to focus. Could work with other eps too.

see here....http://www.birdforum.net/showthread.php?t=158902

 

[jgs8163]

Well I got the scope and the Vixen Eyepiece. Wow!!! Great combo. I am very pleased and thanks to all for the advice. I will report back when I get the BST eyepiece. The clarity is phenominal. I went on ebay today to leave some feed back for the sellers and stumbled upon a New PF65EDII for sale in the 350 range and their is also a Pentax SMC 8-24 eyepice for the same price. Ebay item#'s below if anyone is interested.

250962341340 Scope

250962379540 Eyepiece

Regards, Joe

 

[jgs8163]

http://www.burgessoptical.com/Accessories/OCA1_9.html

you might find this useful to help bring the baader to focus. Could work with other eps too.

see here....http://www.birdforum.net/showthread.php?t=158902

Thanks for the info but I am very pleased with the Vixen and it's $60 less. Kind regards, Joe

 

[FrankD]

Well I got the scope and the Vixen Eyepiece. Wow!!! Great combo. I am very pleased and thanks to all for the advice. I will report back when I get the BST eyepiece. The clarity is phenominal. I went on ebay today to leave some feed back for the sellers and stumbled upon a New PF65EDII for sale in the 350 range and their is also a Pentax SMC 8-24 eyepice for the same price. Ebay item#'s below if anyone is interested.

250962341340 Scope

250962379540 Eyepiece

Regards, Joe

$350 for the scope body isn't bad. There have been a few in the $380-$400 range in the last few months. Too bad it isn't the angle version. If it was then it probably wouldn't still be up for auction.

 

[jgs8163]

$350 for the scope body isn't bad. There have been a few in the $380-$400 range in the last few months. Too bad it isn't the angle version. If it was then it probably wouldn't still be up for auction.

I prefer the straight myself. Works better for my primary applcation and fits in my pack better.

 

[jgs8163]

I prefer the straight myself. Works better for my primary applcation and fits in my pack better.

380-400 for a refurb.

 

[woodhornbirder]

joe may be worth buying the OCA regardless of which zoom you have.

`The Burgess Optical OCA is a broadband multicoated Barlow lens giving 1.9 magnification `

this will screw into fixed eps too. @ 10 dollars it not much of a risk)

 

[jgs8163]

joe may be worth buying the OCA regardless of which zoom you have.

`The Burgess Optical OCA is a broadband multicoated Barlow lens giving 1.9 magnification `

this will screw into fixed eps too. @ 10 dollars it not much of a risk)

Thanks. I think I'll do that.

 

[Kevin Purcell]

Having once owned this scope and all the eyepieces, I would buy the XF 12mm or XW 14mm and be done with it. Both yield ~30x mag while still keeping a relatively bright exit pupil. The view thru the XW should be very pleasant but the XF is much smaller/lighter/cheaper while staying true to the main benefit of the 65ED for its small compact size compared to other scopes in its class from Kowa and Nikon.

I concur. I have a PF65 with an XF12 and it's a good alround combo (though the XW14 would be better!).

If you give up the JIS 4 water resistance a good fixed astro EP like a fixed Hyperion between 15mm and 12mm works well too.

Fixed eyepieces are good solution to this problem.

Take a 10mm or so EP for those (few) times you need 45ishx for an ID.

 

[henry link]

I did a little more research on the William Optics/Orion 7.5-22.5mm zoom discussed earlier in this thread. It appears to be a United Optics product found here:

http://www.united-optics.com/produc.../Eyepieces/Zoom_Eyepieces/Zoom_Eyepieces.html

It's available under the Orion brand name and is also sold for less by Smart Astronomy. Here are links to those sites:

http://www.telescope.com/Accessorie...Telescope-Eyepiece/pc/-1/c/3/sc/47/p/8238.uts


http://store.smartastronomy.com/sanew722zoey.html


The other zoom on the United Optics page appears to be a probable knock-off of the Nikon MCII zoom and is also available from Orion here:

http://www.telescope.com/Accessorie...Telescope-Eyepiece/pc/-1/c/3/sc/47/p/8250.uts

Without actually buying one of these eyepieces I can't be completely certain that they are the same Swarovski knock-offs that are used in the Zen-Ray and Vortex spotters, but I think it's extremely likely. They have been around as astronomical eyepieces for a few years, so I suppose it's possible that neither Zen-Ray nor Vortex was aware of the Swarovski connection and thought they were buying eyepieces of original Chinese design for their spotting scopes.

 

[FrankD]

Interesting info Henry. Thank you for taking the time to dig it up.

I do have experience with the William Optics and Smart Astronomy zooms as I tried them out on the Pentax 65 several years ago. I never even gave it a second thought though to consider that they may be the same eyepieces being currently used on the Zen Ray and Vortex spotters. Sadly, I cannot verify it either as I sold the ED2 a month or so ago to another forum member.

On the other hand, I may be able to verify the second zoom. I do have the 25-75x zoom eyepiece for the Theron Mag82. I am assuming that this is the same eyepiece as the one listed on the United Optics website? I thought it was a Bosma product. Of course it could be the same situation as many of the open-bridge ED binoculars. There is a basic design out there that several Chinese manufacturing plants are producing under their own label or the label of one of the optics companies out there.

 

[eitanaltman]

henry -- although my PF-65 scope and WO Zoom disappeared with my stolen car, I actually still DO have another copy of the WO 7.5-22.5mm zoom sitting around unused. The reason I still have it is that this zoom was damaged in a fall (lesson learned -- don't use a tripod head that is not rated to support the weight of your scope) so I replaced it with a good version I bought used. The "good" undamaged copy is now gone but I still have the scratch-and-dent one.

the damage thankfully was not to the optics (although there are a few pock marks on the glass), mainly just that the barrel body got dented which makes it very difficult to zoom, but I would be happy to send it to you if you want to shine a light through it and verify whether it is or isn't the same design as the Swaro.

and yes, the WO, Orion and Smart Astronomy versions are all the same, I read about that back from a couple of years ago on cloudynights...

 

[henry link]

eitanaltman,

Thanks for the generous offer, but I wouldn't want anyone to ship their personal optics to me. I'm so distrustful of shippers that I never send my own stuff anywhere and I would certainly feel responsible if an item sent to me were damaged or lost. I may just buy one of these myself. I used to use a Swarovski zoom with a 2" adapter on my scopes, but I sold it a few years ago. A copy as good as the Zen-Ray/Vortex eyepieces is a temptation.

You can probably determine whether the Smart Astronomy zoom is the same as the Swarovski by comparing the reflection pattern in yours to the photo I made of the Swarovski and Zen-Ray in my Zen-Ray review. Just place a bare lightbulb somewhere above and behind you as you view the photo. Tilt your eyepiece around to see if the internal reflections of the bulb in your eyepiece can be made to match the reflection patterns in the photo.

Henry

 

[eitanaltman]

in this case, no need to worry about responsibility because this eyepiece is ALREADY damaged! It's essentially worthless at this point, and I have no use for it personally, so your exposure to liability is negligible...

anyway, I'll give that reflection thing a shot and see if I can get a good comparison photo. But the offer still stands.

 

[jgs8163]

Well I got the scope and the Vixen Eyepiece. Wow!!! Great combo. I am very pleased and thanks to all for the advice. I will report back when I get the BST eyepiece. The clarity is phenominal. I went on ebay today to leave some feed back for the sellers and stumbled upon a New PF65EDII for sale in the 350 range and their is also a Pentax SMC 8-24 eyepice for the same price. Ebay item#'s below if anyone is interested.

250962341340 Scope

250962379540 Eyepiece

Regards, Joe

Just noticed the prices on these have been lowered to the 300 area. Just a FYI.