TeleVue ETHOS Telescope Eyepieces

Tele Vue is known for its in-house eyepiece and telescope designs by Al Nagler; our latest eyepiece brings new meaning to the term “in-house.” The concept for this eyepiece was first proposed by Tele Vue President David Nagler, with performance parameters giving it the fundamental characteristics (the ethos) of a Tele Vue eyepiece: high contrast, comfortable eye relief and full field sharpness. Control of astigmatism, field curvature, lateral color, angular magnification distortion correction, and low pupil sensitivity for daytime use were specified criteria.

Following Tele Vue’s philosophy of pushing the state of the art, long-time Tele Vue employee and optical design protégé Paul Dellechiaie took up the challenge and designed the basic eyepiece form. Under Al’s guidance, Paul tweaked his design to fulfill the original goals.

While sharpness is inherent to the optical design, contrast is maximized through the intelligent use of flat finished baffles and ultra low reflectance, high efficiency coatings tuned to the composition of each element.

At the 2007 Northeast Astronomy Forum, Tele Vue once again broadened the amateur astronomer's perspective on the universe and introduced a new observing experience; 100º of pure Tele Vue quality. With a 13mm focal length evoking the original “Nagler” revolution, the field area of this new eyepiece is more than 50% larger than an 82º field. The Tele Vue Ethos is essentially multiple eyepieces, delivering the true field size of a longer focal length, narrower apparent field eyepiece with the benefits of higher power and darker sky background.

• The 21mm focal length completes the logical set of 21mm/13mm/8mm and nicely juxtaposes the 17mm/10mm/6mm combination. Each step within these two sets approaches a 3x field area gain. The 21mm's effective field stop diameter is 36.2mm, bringing its true field close to the 35mm Panoptic (38.7mm Field Stop diameter). Its true field is also larger than the 26mm Nagler with its 35mm effective field stop diameter. In an f/4 Dobsonian, the exit pupil is just 5.25mm using the 21mm Ethos instead of 8.75mm with a 35mm Panoptic, or 6.5mm with a 26mm Nagler.

• The 17mm ETHOS is an ideal complement to the 31mm Nagler Type-5. They are parfocal (both have focus locations about 3/8" above shoulder) and the 31mm Nagler Type-5 has exactly twice the true field area.

• We have not specifically endorsed the 13mm Ethos for Bino-Vue use because of the large diameter barrel. Even so, we were advised by Mike Harvey at the Winter Star Party (February 2008) that only 1-person in 25 had interpupilary limits with the bino'd Ethos (63.5-mm for the initial production 13mm). However, since many of our customers have been thrilled with the experience, we have maximized the potential use by narrowing the barrel from 63.5-mm to 62-mm diameter for eyepieces delivered beginning mid-March 2008. While the difference is only 1.5-mm, (or 0.75-mm for pairing a first production unit with current production) we decided to make this small change public, in case you want to give it a try.

• The 10mm is parfocal with the 13mm ETHOS. Its 59mm rubber grip diameter makes this model usable in binocular viewers — for most people.

• The 8mm in 1¼" mode, if you use Tele Vue's "high-hat" 2"-1¼" adapter, it will be parfocal with Tele Vue's Plössls, Radians, Type 6 Naglers, Nagler Zooms, 1¼" Panoptics and 6mm ETHOS. Further, its light weight and small diameter makes the 8mm suitable for anyone using a binocular viewer. Another application is for spotting scope set-ups with the Tele Vue 60° 1¼" diagonal.

• The 6mm in 1¼" mode, if you use Tele Vue's "high-hat" 2"-1¼" adapter, it will be parfocal with Tele Vue's Plössls, Radians, Type 6 Naglers, Nagler Zooms, 1¼" Panoptics and 8mm ETHOS.