6.5MM BAADER MORPHEUS - REVIEW

6.5MM BAADER MORPHEUS

As with the 12.5mm and 9mm Baader Morpheus eyepieces, I have owned this one three times as well. I guess three times is a charm, (so they say, lol).

Eye Relief:

I will go into the eye relief right away. As checked with a flashlight, by shining the light into the bottom of the eyepiece and getting someone to hold a thin piece of cardboard where the light comes out, and holding it right where the beam of light is the smallest, this is where the eye relief is. I measured exactly 16mm. I can see the whole field if I use glasses. My glasses just touch the rubber eyecup when I get in to view. It will depend greatly on how thick your glasses are in able for you to do this. You can take the eye cup off by unscrewing it, which will enable you to get in a bit closer if you need to wear glasses, but you will have to be careful as to not scratch the lenses of your glasses, and if they are expensive, I will not recommend doing this. I only use glasses if I need to read the controller of my Orion Intelliscope or if I am sketching at the eyepiece, otherwise, I do not use glasses when I am observing. I also use cheap readers, so this is of no concern. Your mileage may vary here. I leave my eye cups down when I observe. I only bring them up if I really need to make things look really dark or if I am using filters. When using the 6.5mm Baader Morpheus with the supplied eye cup in the up position, I find it just right. I don't need the M-43 extender with this eyepiece. (YMMV).

Exit Pupil Behaviour:

I find that some eyepieces from 7mm down to about 4.5mm are sometimes difficult to hold the exit pupil, (SAEP). This happens when you are at fairly high power and the exit pupil is very small. In the dark, your pupil is LARGE so you can gather as much light as possible, and in turn, your eye has difficulty in grabbing the small exit pupil and you really have to be lined up just right. I have no problems AT ALL in this regard when using the 6.5mm Baader Morpheus. It is very easy to use even at high power. I have heard that the 6.5mm Baader Morpheus is actually 6.7mm according to some Astronomy sites. Baader just decided to "round it off" to an even 6.5mm to make it look nice.

Night Sky Performance:

I use this for globular clusters, Jupiter, (when the seeing will not allow 240x), Venus, and sometimes Saturn, (180x). I also use it on some planetary nebulae as well, and double stars. The field stop on this is the softest out of the entire line in the daytime, but at night you can't see it, so it is of no concern to me. It feels very immersive and comes quite close to an 80° medium-high power eyepiece. Transmission is very good like the others in the series with top notch coatings and a very good polish. The weight is the same as my 9mm Baader Morpheus at 14.5 Oz, which is just right, IMO. There is no unwanted "reflections" or "ghosting when viewing planets...Especially on Jupiter, which is a brutal test for any type of reflections or ghosting on any eyepiece. It also barlows very well without any problems.

Closing Thoughts:

The 6.5mm Baader Morpheus is a really nice eyepiece, doesn't weigh a ton, and it stands up well with the TeleVue Delos or Pentax XW's. I put the Baader Morpheus eyepieces right up there with the best of them in terms of sharpness, clarity and overall performance, with maybe a slight "nod" going to the Ethos, Delos or Pentax XW as far as sharpness goes, (High power eyepieces). The lower power XW's, (14mm & 20mm), have some positive field curvature of their own, and the lower power Delos, (17.3mm), will need a coma corrector. The 17.3mm Delos only shows pure coma which comes from a fast mirror. The 14mm & 20mm XW's show field curvature in fast telescopes, which can slightly be eliminated with a coma corrector. The central sharpness in the XW's is second to none, IMO, but I still prefer the immersiveness I get from the Baader Morpheus.

More to come !!!! Clear Skies to All !!!

-Mark