24mm Pan + 5x powermate anyone?

I just purchased a 24mm Pan. I've been clouded over since, except for a 15 minute break Sunday night. The double cluster was beautiful in my 8" f/6. Anyway, I'm looking for something in the 5mm range and was wondering whether anyone has tried the 24mm Pan w/ 5x powermate. This would give me about 250x. It's either that or the 5mm T6.
Any comments appreciated.
Jason

A friend has a 130mm f/6 AP refractor. He routinely uses a 20mm plossl with a 5x Powermate for some excellent planetary views. I see no reason the 24 Pan would not be just as good.

Walt

Jason,

I haven't said much on this question because I haven't tried it. But I guess I can share with you the thought process I would go through in your shoes. You may find it interesting as I am similarly bound to try most things only at my expense and so I have to cull the possibilities somewhat by reason rather than by experimentation.

I'm sure it will work well, but at 10 elements and 12 air-to-glass surfaces I suspect the comparison of this combination to a 5mm Nagler Type 6 with 7 elements and 8 air-to-glass surfaces is not likely to defy expectations. For my money the 5x Powermate is not useful enough with a wide variety of focal lengths for my scopes to justify the expense, and in my Dob-Newts I didn't like the height of the 2.5x PowerMate which is similarly sized--just seemed unnecessarily unwieldy with moderate sized and larger eyepieces.

I think the difference between a 5x PowerMate and a 5mm Nagler Type 6 is about $75 at MAP. This is 37% more for the type 6 Nagler, nothing to sneeze at, but maybe it is a bargain when you consider the second-guessing that you will avoid versus going with the PowerMate compromise.

Anyway, that's the way it goes in my head. YMMV.
--
Mike

The Panoptics are not known as great planetary eyepieces. The type 6 Naglers are surprisingly good in that regard.

Dave Mitsky