Hello All!

I'm on vacation right now, but after I got a package at 10:20am,
from FedEx today, from Burgess Optical, I had to come out, and
go back to work.

My next promised step in our new eyepiece line was in that package.
Inside was an eyepiece that I have been working on for months. To
say I was nervous, and excited, is an understatement.

I opened the well boxed eyepiece, and held it in my hand. I could
not believe that it was so light! I weight it, and it came to 3/4
of a pound. Now, you might ask, what is so light about an eyepiece
that weights 3/4 of a pound? Well, if it is a 68 degree, 2", 40mm
focal length eyepiece, then I would say it is very light.

Running down to my shop, I had my autocollimator ready, using a
TMB 130mm f/6 apo lens as the test lens for the new TMB Paragon
68 degree wide angle 40mm focal length eyepiece. I can set up a
multitude of tests with my 10" flat and autocollimator, but for
this test, I used an Edmund laser pin hole, with a 50 watt Halogen
light source, and also a simulated planetary surface, with a metal
surface that has very fine details scribed into it. This way,
I can test all telescopes, lenses in cell, eyepieces, Barlows,
diagonals and so on, that all are under temperature controlled
conditions, that will simulate an Airy disk under "10" seeing,
and the detail test, that is simulating a Lunar and planetary
test. Also, I used a lamp well off axis to simulate how a bright
object might show off axis scatter light, in another bench test,
at 60 feet from the very bright, light source. The skies here in
Cleveland have been cloudy for weeks, so an under the sky test
will have to wait, but if anything, these tests under laboratory
conditions, will allow me to see aberrations better than under
the night sky.

The new TMB 40mm Paragon eyepiece gives about 20x with the TMB
130mm f/6 apo refractor. The spot sizes, wavefront errors,
distortion, curvature of field, lateral color, astigmatism, coma,
false color, and the on and off axis performance is the best I
have ever seen on my computer in a wide field design. Before I
tested the eyepiece, I looked carefully at the coatings, and they
are among the very best coatings ever put on an eyepiece, in the
same class as the Zeiss/TMB 25mm Aspheric eyepiece, which has the
best coatings I have ever seen on an eyepiece. I specified matched
coatings. What that means is that every surface index was matched
with coatings that were optimized for it. This gives the maximum
light transmission, right at the .1% reflection level per surface.

There are 6 elements, but only 8 air to glass surfaces. All the
glass types (and yes, glass types do make a significant difference
in eyepiece performance) were the most expensive, exotic, high
index glass -- I used the best glass for the job for every element,
price being of no concern.

So, on to testing. All the aberrations I spoke about above were as
good as the computer said they would be -- truly superb performance.
This is an orthoscopic eyepiece, in that it has no noticeable
distortion, something I can't say about any other 68 degree
eyepiece that I have ever tested, or heard about. Lateral color is
gone, even at the field stop, and curvature of field is under
control, as is color, astigmatism, coma, and edge sharpness. There
are no exit pupil aberrations either, the eyepiece not having
any of the "kidney bean effect" and the comfort and eye relief
is outstanding. The entire field is very easy to see, and the
images are bright, contrasty, very sharp with very low scatter.

This 40mm eyepiece will have the largest true field of view in
a 2" eyepiece, without having distortion, like so many other
wide angle eyepiece do.

In concluding the tests, I felt that this wide angle eyepiece
is unmatched in its field size, and focal length. It will be
a TMB eyepiece, called "Paragon series," our top of the line
models. Each eyepiece will come in a TMB black engraved box,
with a nice foam cut out for the eyepiece (no bubble wrap
here), and each eyepiece with be serialized.

I am so excited about this eyepiece, I will design a full
set and we will put them all in production.

They are: 40mm, 35mm, 30mm, 25mm, 20mm and maybe a 15mm.
The 40mm should be ready for sale in a month, and soon
after, the other focal lengths will be available.

I will post a drawing of the final production eyepiece in
the files section under "TMB Paragon Eyepieces," and also
with the spot sizes of an optimized 50 degree Plossl, and
the TMB 68 degree Paragon 40mm wide angle eyepiece, and
with pricing. It is getting very late, so I will post all
this tomorrow.

We will soon have this eyepiece in the hands of an unbiased
reviewer, and then I am sure that CloudyNights will also
have a review. I just wish you all could have been there
with me, testing this new eyepiece. Thank you.

Thomas Back