Newbie with a new Telescope.

[felixflyer]

Hi

My 8 year old son has been learning about the solar system at school and asked for a telescope so he could see the planets etc. We stupidly bought a telescope from a large toy shop which was basically junk and he was very dissapointed.

I went on ebay, not knowing anything about telescopes and have managed to buy an 'Orion Europa 200 on a Gazer Gem1 mount' for £20. I picked this up last night and was amazed at both the size and weight of this item. From some brief searching on the net it appears I may have a half decent telescope here and hopefully my son will get to see something. I have also become quite interested myself and am eager to make the best use of it.

The reason it was only £20 is because of two things, there is no spotting scope on it. There are 4 holes where it had one and the description read. 

'there are a couple of sets of holes on the tube one set near focuser was where skywatcher auto focuser was mounted and drove via belt the focuser knob and when i replaced std 30mm finder scope with 70mm orion new holes were made to allow fitment.'

I am not really sure what that means yet but I would like a spotting scope to make it easier to find things. Is there a certain scope I need to buy for this?

Also there are no eyepieces with it. What would be a suitable starter set of eypieces for a beginner? I am on a tight budget here so can't afford top of the range although don't mind looking for another ebay bargain.

The description also said 'the standard 1 1/2" focuser was changed to a 2" one to allow it to ne used for imaging with dslr or ccd.' Again I don't really know what this means but is it something I need to change?

I have a Canon DSLR and would like to try and connect this but am completely in the dark about all that. I take it I need special eye pieces for that?

Sorry for all the questions but I now have a very eager 8 year old who is keen to see the planets (and maybe santa).

Regards

Mike

[RichM63]

Cool, nice find. Bargain.

2" focuser allows the use of 2" eyepieces EPs, but you can still use 1.25" EPs with the appropriate adapter tube.

The DSLR will require a T2 adapter and an EOS to T2 adapter for a direct connection to the camera with no lenses or EPs, the telescope acts as the lens. Focusing can be problematic.

A standard 9x50 finder + bracket could be fitted, although a lot of people will recomend a Rigel Quick finder.

One thing you will require is a 'Collimation Tool', a Cheshire EP is the simplest and cheap method, again others will recommend a laser type.

A couple of standard 25mm and 10mm EPs will be a very cheap start, if you lived locally I would have given you a set. Most people will have these rattling away in their EP cases.

The extra holes are not something to worry about and can be covered with insullation tape.

Motorizing of any description is also not something to worry about. The GEM mount you have resembles the later EQ3-2 mount and fully loaded will be at what is considered maximum weight for the mount.

Follow youtube, for some great tutorials on Balancing the mount, Aligning the Mount, and Collimating a Newtonian Telescope.

All in, £50 to £80 covers everything I have mentioned when bought sensibly. Less if you can find another great bargain.

Best wishes to you and your young astronomer.

[Avocette]

Hi Mike and welcome to SGL!

It sounds like you bought a bargain, but you've got quite a lot of learning to do! If the telescope is one made in the UK by Orion Optics, it should have had a pretty good set of mirrors, and hopefully the coatings are in good condition.

I suggest you look on www.AstroBuySell.com/uk/ for a secondhand Red Dot Finder (RDF), a Sky-Watcher or similar 9x50 finderscope and some Plossl eyepieces. Take a look at the thread http://stargazerslounge.com/topic/43171-eyepieces-the-very-least-you-need/ and calculate which 3 focal lengths you could start with.

Good luck!

[Jim Steele]

Hi Mike and welcome to SGL.

Sounds like you have a bargain there! You can pick up new acssories and eyepieces and a finder scope quite cheaply. Try either of the below links.

Best of luck and Clear skies,

Ben

Astroboot: Has some lovely bargains, down the page are some GSO (aka Revelation Optics) Plossl's for quite reasonable prices... They also have finders

http://www.astroboot.co.uk/AstroBoot

You can also try Astrobuysell as people are often selling as they upgrade to better EPs or finders.

http://astrobuysell.com/uk/

[Thom]

I have Celestron 10mm and 25mm EPs, boxed and never used, gathering dust in my 'spares' box.  If it helps to encourage a youngster to get into astronomy, you can have them, no charge.  If you can PM me you address, I'll get them posted to you ASAP.

Only caveat of this, is that I would hope that you 'pay it forward' as well - do a good deed for someone in the future if you can.  Maybe get your son's friends interested as well, or do a talk at his school.  That would be ace!

[happy-kat]

I would focus (npi) on making a fully working telescope, eyepieces, possible 2 inch to 1.25 adaptor, collimation tool the cheapest option is a collimator cap about £5 or make one yourself for free and a finder device such as a red dot finder (avoid the celestron one) :-) just to get going and a son delighted.

Then once that is sorted look at what you need for connecting your camera. But budget about £25 for that.

Free software stellarium is excellent.

Great book is turn left at orion £20 ish.

[happy-kat]

Just had a thought so need to bare in mind the apperature of your great find, a fast telescope is more demanding on eyepieces so you might get less exact views at the edges, I am not knowledgeable on what this means visually bit her you will see far more than the mk1 eyeball.

Devide the focal length of the tube by the apperature to know the f. F5 is fast f10 slow.

[felixflyer]

Thanks for all the replies and many thanks to Thom for his kind offer.

It is f/6 apparently. I am reading as much as I can on this forum (which is great by the way) and will buy the book turn left at Orion.

Regards

Mike

[Avocette]

It is f/6 apparently.

Right, so focal length 1200mm for an aperture of 200mm. So the highest focal length eyepiece (EP) recommended (by Warthog's thread) would be 6mm, a 12mm would give you 100x magnification and a 32mm focal length would give you a 6mm exit pupil and a magnification of 37.5x. The 10mm and 25mm offering 120x and 48x would be a good starting point (especially at zero cost)!

[mister_wavey]

I'm loving the original post, all the responses and this forum very much. You guys rock.

[cotterless45]

These are free and user friendly charts , ideal for learning the sky,

http://www.skymaps.com

Nick.

[robbie c]

Welcome to SGL Mike. If you have a mobile phone that can download apps you might want to download one that will help you and your son to tour the night sky.

One of the good ones that I found very helpful when I started and still use is called Star Walk, you can use it to navigate the night sky in real time and it will also

show you what Planets are in the sky along with many other night sky wonders, also you can download a program called stellarium to your laptop that you will

find very useful.   

[felixflyer]

Hi

Just thought I would update this post.

Many thanks to Thom I received the eyepieces which are great. I noticed however that I couldn't get the scope in focus even with the focuser all the way out. I then brought just the eyepiece back and only when it was completely out of the socket did it get into focus. This was then to shakey in my hand to see anything clearly.

I called into my nearest astronomy shop and the guy there told me that the focuser had been changed to use with a DSLR and that is why the focusing has been moved forward. The addition of an extension should sort it however he had none in stock. He did suggest using Barlow lense though that would do the same thing whilst also doubling the magnification. He also had a decent used one in stock which he let me have for £30. 

We are now all up and running just about, unfortunately I haven't had a clear night since but lookiing forward to trying this out.

Merry xmas everyone!