The Nagler was the ethos of the eyepiece world before there was an Ethos. Tele Vue's Al Nagler broke all sorts of boundaries in the late 1970s when he created a telescope eyepiece with an 82-degree field of view that had amazing sharpness, comfortable eye relief and a short focal length.
Tele Vue has been working to perfect and add to the Nagler concept ever since. The Nagler Type 4 is a well-regarded incarnation of the original and is a quality Type 4 eyepiece. The 17mm Nagler Type 4 lands our TopTenREVIEWS Silver Award.
The 17mm Nagler Type 4’s 82-degree apparent field is nothing to scoff at even though there are more and more 100-degree telescope eyepieces out there now. A wide field of view means nothing if the quality of the view is degraded as you move toward the field stop. The Nagler Type 4 was designed to offer extra crisp images for the full 82 degrees.
Tele Vue is trustworthy for a number of reasons, including the fact that designers there were unwilling to produce a 100-degree eyepiece until they could make it significantly different and better than the 82-degree Naglers. Presumably it took so many years because the Naglers are pretty hard to improve upon.
They have been offering great wide-angle views for years.
Features include blackened lens edges, anti-reflection threads and rubber eye cups to enhance contrast. Tele Vue pioneered the idea of rubber grip rings, which are a great creature comfort.
Tele Vue is committed to using quality materials. It shows in all of their telescope eyepieces, including the Nagler type 4.
The features are best suited to medium power deep space viewing with scopes down to focal ratios of f/4. You can expect great images of globular clusters and nebulas with a wide range of scopes. Dobsonian owners will like the Nagler Type 4’s big field of view for lunar and planetary viewing, though this eyepiece’s weight can knock certain Dobsonians off balance.
Designers included the most users possible when they designed the 17mm Nagler Type 4 to work with both 1.25 and 2-inch focusers. A simple adapter will allow it to work well with either size.
Tele Vue’s quality eyepiece products and reputation do a lot of the marketing work for the company so we are not sure why much of their website seems to be devoted to the advertising side of things rather than customer service.
There are not many ways to contact the company and the tutorials and help files leave much to be desired.
The 17mm Nagler Type 4 is still a good investment, even in light of all of the 100-degree eyepieces on the market. This eyepiece will offer crystal clarity for the entire field of view. Tele Vues always seem to cost more but their quality justifies the price if you have that kind of cash on hand.
