Tech Makes Life Easier

[BSG]

Here's a few musings, and warnings from, and for, keen amateurs rediscovering astronomy.

I grew up during the space race, watched the moon landings and marvelled at seeing Jupiter and Saturn (just!) through my tiny, cheap and cheerful refractor telescope. Now I'm 52 and lucky enough to have enough spare cash to get back into the fascination...

Mistake number 1: I thought 'there's no point in mucking about with a piddly little scope', and bought a Skywatcher 200p reflector.

Don't get me wrong. It's an excellent scope and very good value for money. However, with its base, it is heavy. More on that later.

On the positive side, it's easy to use. Point and go, if you know what to point at.

Mistake number 2: Buying extra eyepieces make life better. (Everyone knows, the cheap ones that come with the scope are useless, right?). Wrong. They are perfectly adequate to learn your way around the night sky. < Remember this bit. It's important!

Mistake number 3: If you upgrade to a motorised mount, you'll be able to enjoy an amazing tour of the sky and find stuff with ease.

That's how it's sold to gullible folk like me. Once you've invested yet more money, you find out several things about how much easier your viewing experience has just become. These aren't necessarily in order, so bear with me:

1. You need to set up the tripod and point it in the right direction (a compass helps).
2. It needs to be absolutely level, otherwise what follows can be a waste of time.
3. You need to set up the motorised mount, lock everything in position and hope the tripod is still level.
4. The telescope mirrors need to be properly aligned (laser collimator useful).
5. The finderscope needs to be aligned with the telescope. (Arguably not required with a GoTo mount).
6. The telescope needs to be perfectly balanced after you've worked out which direction all the moving bits should be pointing.
7. You need to work out how to accurately set the Home position of the telescope.
8. You need to polar align the telescope. Not easy in the dark. (Shining a light over the front of the aligner helpful to see the reticule).
9. You need to know where Polaris should be in the polarscope.
10. You need to set up and connect the hand controller and you need a power supply. This means mains cables and adapters running around the patio/lawn in the dark. Ideally not on wet ground.
11. You need to set the date and time every time you switch on the controller.
12. You need to perform a star alignment (two or three stars). The controller will helpfully suggest some stars, but do you know where they are in the night sky? Will your garage/shed/neighbour's house/40ft Leylandii trees be in the way?

Excellent! Now you're ready to start viewing. This is provided you haven't lost the will to live, frozen to death, kicked the tripod, dropped an eyepiece, drunk too much wine or hacked off the neighbours with all the swearing accompanying your setup.

You'll also find that it's taken at least an hour (if you're lucky) to get this far. Has the shine worn off yet?

Hold on! Life could be easier if you control the scope from your laptop. (This would be mistake number 4).

I won't even mention that this probably won't work on a Mac. Oops, too late.

It's at this point, you can try to find an object to 'GoTo' to, if you see what I mean. But, hang on, if I click on M31, will I be pointing at the neighbours bathroom (followed by a Police raid), will the telescope be pointing at the the ground, or will it crash into the tripod?

This is where a simple star chart would have come in handy. 

Anyway, after 10 minutes of not finding stuff in your scope, the clouds have moved in or it's started raining (it's the UK after all). Now, you find out how heavy all this stuff is, as you dismantle everything and very carefully pack it all away in the large boxes and bags you've bought, trying not to trip over anything or electrocute yourself in the process.

You might think by now, I'm trying to put you off stargazing. Totally the opposite! Just not with all this gear. You don't need it. Get a small, simple scope that you can move around on an alt/az mount or simple tripod, and get a star chart ('Turn Left at Orion' is excellent). In other words, something you can get into the garden and be looking through in 5 minutes.

Learn where the stars and planets are and try to find them. All the gear won't make it easier, you'll waste too much time setting up instead of viewing and you'll be considerably poorer. Astronomy for us amateurs is supposed to be fun. Go out and enjoy it without the clutter! 

[Floater]

Amen to that, BSG.

Wise words - and more powerful given the vein of painful experience evident in them ...

Clear skies!

[jnb]

Bad night last night? ;-)

I'd sort of agree, partly, well at least in principle.

Mistake number 1 - small scopes are good, very small scopes are useless. A 200p is no use if you haven't learnt your way around with something smaller first unless you make set things up to have a wide angle lower magnification first.

Mistake number 2 - Extra eye pieces do make life better or rather there are always two rubbish eyepieces supplied with a scope. The rubbish ones are a 4mm plossl and a barlow. You will probably get a 10 and 25mm plossl with the scope - they are worth keeping and worth starting with because they will give nice wide angle low magnification views.

Mistake number 3 - motorised mounts are great. You can turn round and look at your atalas, reference book, battery, thermos, turn back and you are still on target. They don't need to be level, that's what the adjustment blots on the tripod head are for. Collimation, balance, finder alignment etc is no more useful or necessary with a motor than with an unguided dob. Polar alignment isn't that critical if you are just visual. Power supplies can be batteries so no trailing cables.

What I have seen from others setting up goto scopes is that a goto seems remarkably fussy about setup. But driven equatorials are excellent and not that difficult to use.

[Phillyo]

Hi BSG,

An interesting post but I would like to respond with a couple of points if I may? Let me first state I'm not an observer, I do imaging (badly) and I have only been doing that for a short while, maybe 6 months.

1. You need to set up the tripod and point it in the right direction (a compass helps). - Finding polaris is generally easy and for visual use a simple task I would guess. 30 seconds max.
2. It needs to be absolutely level, otherwise what follows can be a waste of time. - It doesn't need to be perfectly level, however 1 min with a spirit level will get you 'level enough'.
3. You need to set up the motorised mount, lock everything in position and hope the tripod is still level. - I only have the EQ6 but connecting it together takes 30 seconds too.
4. The telescope mirrors need to be properly aligned (laser collimator useful). - Only relevent to reflectors and not refractors collimation is the bane of using a reflector and can't be avoided.
5. The telescope needs to be perfectly balanced after you've worked out which direction all the moving bits should be pointing. - Depends on the weight of the scope, again it takes less than a minute to balance the scope.
6. You need to work out how to accurately set the Home position of the telescope. - I use EQMod for using my EQ6 and it makes everything so much easier, but requires a laptop to use.
7. You need to polar align the telescope. Not easy in the dark. (Shining a light over the front of the aligner helpful to see the reticule). - Using the EQ6, the polar alignment scope is illuminated and takes seconds to align accurately.
8. You need to know where Polaris should be in the polarscope. - Again, software like EQMod can make this a doddle.
9. You need to set up and connect the hand controller and you need a power supply. This means mains cables and adapters running around the patio/lawn in the dark. Ideally not on wet ground. - A simple leisure battery removes this issue and aren't particularly expensive
10. You need to set the date and time every time you switch on the controller. - Refer to EQMod again I haven't ever used the controller. It's still in the wrapper.
11. You need to perform a star alignment (two or three stars). The controller will helpfully suggest some stars, but do you know where they are in the night sky? Will your garage/shed/neighbour's house/40ft Leylandii trees be in the way? - Stellarium is a free and awesome planetarium for use with this, and you'll soon learn the sky and where things are from using it.

Just my opinion on a lot of these and I haven't replied to cause problems, more to address them. If you, or others, are having the above issues, hopefully anyone reading this may find some help in the points I have commented on. However, you are correct in that sometimes just a telescope and a map is all you need and star hopping is often a fun thing and something I have done with a pair of binoculars whilst my rig was imaging. Seeing M31 with the naked eye is awesome and finding it yourself using a map is great fun!

Good luck and clear skies

Phil

[badger111]

With reference to No.3, I particularly enjoy tripping over the tripod after I've polar aligned and have to do it all again. It's at that moment I start to think of concreting a pier in to back garden lawn and telling my wife its a garden feature.

[nicoscy]

With all due respect, but I disagree with *most* of everything in the opening post made. All misgivings / mistakes described there come from the fact that you need to research first and then invest time if you want to learn something. And it certainly is not nearly as challenging as described. 

What you describe BSG is the typical profile of of most stargazers who jump into the hobby. For every 10 telescopes sold, probably more than half are barely if ever used as the owners are enamoured with the idea, but not the practicalities of the hobby. Which leads to buyers' remorse.

So, they are not mistakes, but only the result of the initial mistake, i.e. not learning some things first prior to buying a scope and thus avoid the path you so eloquently describe  - and which as I mentioned - which is the pitfall of many beginners in the hobby. But I do wholeheartedly  agree with the closing remarks, that a small telescope and a couple of good books are a great way to start in the hobby - as well as hanging out on SGL of course and ask questions. 

[swamp thing]

Simple solution. Buy a Dob.

Plonk, observe. Job done

[Astro Imp]

Hi Steve, the Dob Mob were a bit slow off the mark 

[bomberbaz]

Ok i have a goto flextube and fwiw it takes me less than 15 mins from starting to move the stuff to being aligned and ready to observe. Some of the OP remarks ring very true though as my first goto scope gave me a lot of grief at first before i got to grips with it. Its an each to there own rwally isnt it. I believe dobs are a great tool, its just i prefer to have one that does the finding for me, that said i can find a great many dso,s myself now anyway.

[JRWASTRO]

BSG,

You paint a depressing picture and you forget to add that the view does not change either.

I have been observing and imaging (to get a better view) and the same stuff keeps turning up yery after year. At least nature could shuffle things around to add some excitement.

Jeremy.

[Charic]

About 13 Months ago a Celestron 127EQ was made available to me. We struck a deal, and  was amazed by the quality of the books in the deal ( not mentioned prior to purchase )  I think the chap had spent more on the books than the telescope itself.  I was happy to  pay £70. The telescope was set up ready for the first nights session. Jupiter, a few Stars, all looked ok, but the Moon was  impressive.

This first night alone gave it all away. What a load of messing about just to look at something, slowly tracking my target until reaching the end-stop of the slow-motion adjusters, then resetting,  re-aligning,  rotating the OTA to keep the focuser in a sensible position?

I decided there and then, This is not the best way to look at a few Stars or the Moon. There has to be a better way. 

I had to bury my redundancy so I couldn't spend it all at once? but everything was available to me as regards to telescopes and eyepieces, I had an unlimited choice?  However I decided that all I needed was something to place outside,  use straight away. No messing, no setup! apart from allowing my telescope to cool for an hour, and fitting  the 32mm Panaview, there is nothing else to set up in order to use the telescope, barring a little friction adjustment on the tension handles, but who's complaining.

If I want  to  see anything in the night sky now, I just use Stellarium as my system of choice?........If I can see the same thing with my Skyliner and its associated EPs it's a bonus!.

For imaging, I don't see away around the EQ tracking system setup. So for now, avoiding that side of Astronomy. If I need an image, I Google!

For  just observing .......   

[swamp thing]

Hi Steve, the Dob Mob were a bit slow off the mark 

Its the weather Alan

[Scooot]

My "push to" adds only a couple of minutes to my set up with my dob.

[jabeoo1]

Simple solution. Buy a Dob.

Plonk, observe. Job done

Thats the one......sorted !

Hi Steve, the Dob Mob were a bit slow off the mark 

Hold on......a mob implies a large disorderly crowd.   We are not that bad  

[swamp thing]

Hold on......a mob implies a large disorderly crowd.   We are not that bad

 A large disorderly crowd sounds about right to me  

[Floater]

Y'see!? It always descends into this - aggressive nudging ...

[jabeoo1]

Back to the thread:  

It all comes down to this book for me if you want to 'keep it real'.  The author has a preference for a 4 inch refractor on a tripod with manual slow motion controls.  I reckon theres a lot to be said in this short book thats very much aimed at the observer.  

Ken Fulton:  The Light Hearted Astronomer.      

[cotterless45]

There certainly is a lot of nonsense talked about GOTO. I got one after three years of getting to know the night sky, but struggling with so little time to go searching for new unknowns.

I certainly couldn't have coped from day one. Perhaps that's why there's always hardly used set ups going second hand.

From getting out of the shed, I can set up my goto in just a few minutes. It's just a procedure following one step after another.Tripping over the tripod just means a quick restart, no problemo.

I still very much enjoy pushing a Dob, which is my dark sky scope.

Whatever you use , just have fun under those

Clear skies !

Nick.

[NotSoSuperNova]

Hi BSG. Some good points made here, especially about a dobsonian scope, it sounds like you may have been better advised to go with this kind of set-up. However, you should remember that you have a beautiful piece of equipment there. With some familiarity you will half the time it takes to set up. I have a slightly larger variation of yours and it takes me around 15 mins to get going (I've had mine for a while though) 

For visual use, you don't need to be perfectly level or exactly polar aligned, albeit the closer the better. The GOTO will take care of the difference. And the one thing that everybody agrees on is that aperture is king!

Stick with it and remember, learning is all part of the fun. And if you find yourself pointing into the neighbours bathroom again, well, you have a great excuse.  

[dick_dangerous]

And that's why have a Dobsonian...

I think the main pitfall of the GOTO is it's sold as beginner's equipment when in reality you actually need to have a bit of sky knowledge to set one up properly. Of course when you've got it going, it makes life a lot easier if you don't want all that tedious mucking around trying to find objects in the sky. Personally, I quite enjoy all that mucking around! But of course a properly aligned EQ mount is a breeze because it enables tracking, and is useful for the budding Astrophotographer, so it's all swings and roundabouts really.

DD

[happy-kat]

The original poster does have a dobsonian but that was mistake number one. Too heavy.

It is OK as a beginner to start with a small telescope it should not be made to feel inadequate.

[swamp thing]

The original poster does have a dobsonian but that was mistake number one. Too heavy.

It is OK as a beginner to start with a small telescope it should not be made to feel inadequate.

If you look at the OP's first post you'll see its not a Dob its a 200p, this is an 8" newt on a  EQ mount.  

[happy-kat]

:-) so they do.

Either way both are heavy to me

[AndyWB]

When I started doing this, I was very, very tempted by computerised scopes. Luckily I found a forum with some advice that set me straight (along with a thought blog post or two). Now I know much is about personal preference, but for me, I can't see the point of a computerised scope unless you're planning on imaging.

My first star party convinced me of this. At the start of the evening, there were a few people scratching their heads and wondering where Polaris was. Then there were the cries of "Why won't it align?". Then a period of quiet which was then punctuated by "No! the scope slewed and unplugged itself!" or "No! The battery is flat!", and one memorable "Right, that's it, I'm soldering the dam thing on!". And all that time, I was observing with my mini-dob. Plonk it down, look through it. Set up time - 30 seconds. 

Actually, the best bit was when someone pointed out that Venus and Saturn were visible, but between two trees. I was sat next to chap who'd lovingly aligned his scope for imaging. I just picked up my scope and moved it to where I could see the planets - and he looked like I'd just committed some offensive act! (And he then looked thoughtful...)

Alt-Az Manual scopes for visual for me. No alignment, no power, no computer, no problem! I mean, when do computers ever work properly anyway? 

[ronin]

I listened to no one and bought myself a nice little goto. It was what I wanted. Still have it. Still the most used scope I have.

I mean, when do computers ever work properly anyway?

Your's has managed 1015 posts on SGL so it is not doing too bad. :grin: