I have always used scopes due to having one good eye.
Whether it was to watch the sudden appearance of a bird in flight or to view a planet at dusk I always did waste time trying to obtain best focus of the object, sometimes might miss an event completely. Even when I had found accurate focus there was always the niggling temptation to try and better it, and messing with focus could reduce the pleasure of just watching something.
I had always wanted a fixed focus scope but all the ones that I had seen for sale had variable focus. I made a small focus-free scope (only x3) using the nozzle from a very large funnel and two lens from old opera glasses, and this fitted on to the large free focus camera lens shown which produced a x5.5 image with amazing low-light ability. Both are shown in the pics below.
But it was at a boot fair two summers back that I saw a broken pair of fixed-focus binoculars, and the the left side was intact. This pair came home with me and in no time I had hacksawed the good section free; I don't know why but I discovered that by adding a 1 diopter lens to the eye piece it became focus exact for me. This scope is a 7x by 50mm but the extra lens does magnify the view slightly more than that. It is a brilliant piece of kit and I can obtain a best focus view immediately and every time at any distance over 10 meters. .
I didn't believe that fixed-focus telescopes were available but while searching around the local charity shops I found a 'Tasco' terrestrial refractor scope with seems to be free-focus on its x15 setting, and only needs focusing if the magnification is raised beyond that. I am delighted with it.
P1020976.JPG
P1020977.JPG
Whether it was to watch the sudden appearance of a bird in flight or to view a planet at dusk I always did waste time trying to obtain best focus of the object, sometimes might miss an event completely. Even when I had found accurate focus there was always the niggling temptation to try and better it, and messing with focus could reduce the pleasure of just watching something.
I had always wanted a fixed focus scope but all the ones that I had seen for sale had variable focus. I made a small focus-free scope (only x3) using the nozzle from a very large funnel and two lens from old opera glasses, and this fitted on to the large free focus camera lens shown which produced a x5.5 image with amazing low-light ability. Both are shown in the pics below.
But it was at a boot fair two summers back that I saw a broken pair of fixed-focus binoculars, and the the left side was intact. This pair came home with me and in no time I had hacksawed the good section free; I don't know why but I discovered that by adding a 1 diopter lens to the eye piece it became focus exact for me. This scope is a 7x by 50mm but the extra lens does magnify the view slightly more than that. It is a brilliant piece of kit and I can obtain a best focus view immediately and every time at any distance over 10 meters. .
I didn't believe that fixed-focus telescopes were available but while searching around the local charity shops I found a 'Tasco' terrestrial refractor scope with seems to be free-focus on its x15 setting, and only needs focusing if the magnification is raised beyond that. I am delighted with it.
P1020976.JPG
P1020977.JPG
Comment