The DeLites lived up to their name as I felt after testing that they were indeed a delight to use given their smallish form factor and generous eye relief. Contrast was superb and the viewing was very comfortable, with lunar features rich in detail and contrast. Lateral color when observing the bright lunar limb in the far off-axis was extremely faint in all the DeLites -- on one side of the limb showing a lime-yellow, and on the other side showing a small fringe of light magenta. Comparing this behavior to the Pentax 14mm XW, the lateral color in the DeLite was more controlled, with the lunar limb lateral color much less obvious and the color much less strong than the XW.

When the bright Moon was allowed to intersect the field stop, all the DeLites in this test exhibited some degree of what is popularly called a ring of fire (usually blue). The 15mm DeLite was definitely the best controlled of the three in this respect showing only a very thin line of color hugging close to the field stop. The field stop was also nicely sharp in the 15mm, whereas it was less so in the other DeLite focal lengths. Overall I felt the 9mm DeLite showed the least distinct field stop and also had the largest ring of fire when confronted with a bright Moon. As can be seen in Figure 6, the 9mm and 5mm DeLites showed the least sharp field stop and the largest amount of a ring of fire at the field stop. This was also easily seen when used for daytime observing as well. For comparison, the far right image in Figure 6 shows similar behavior in the Pentax 5mm XW, although it is much more controlled and the field stop is sharper in the XW.

Moving to lunar features, the Moon was richly and crisply delivered through the DeLites. High contrast as well as subtle features like maria shadings and ejecta patterns were rendered identically in all the DeLite focal lengths. Similarly, when using the Pentax XWs, they also did quite well and actually showed to my eye just a little brighter, being able to see into the dark shadowed areas a little better. And with highly critical scrutiny I could see a very slight advantage for the DeLites when observing subtle ejecta patterns around craters and within crater rays. As an example, the difference I could see with the DeLites was in the bright ring of ejecta around a small crater near the crater Clerke, which is surrounded by a darker lava bed. The brighter ejecta around this very small crater was difficult to detect in both the XW and DeLite lines, but overall I felt it stood out just a little better and with a little less critical observing needed when using the DeLites. The same advantage held for the delicate patterns of ejecta between the two rays of the crater Messier . These patterns were seen in both eyepiece lines, but were judged more distinctly revealed in the DeLite after several iterations of comparison.

Finally, checking for unwanted light reflections, ghosts, or other artifacts, none could be seen when using any of the DeLite eyepieces, whether the Moon was within or outside the field of view. This test was conducted in all the scopes used for this review. While there has have been some reports by other observers that they were able to see a slight red flaring within the field of view of the 15mm DeLite when the bright Moon was the target, I was not able to replicate this phenomenon with any of my telescopes from 3" aperture to 10" aperture.