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Hello from Edinburgh

EdinGazer

By EdinGazer
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EdinGazer

EdinGazer

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Hello All,

Despite being given a (seemingly large) telescope a number of years ago (Helios 200mm, 1000mm with a very heavy equatorial [?] mount) I have never been in a place or time to set it up and start upon this hopefully splendorous journey!  I have been reading a bit about setting it up (polar alignment etc) and have discovered that I should probably collimate it first...and so the learning begins!  I have a 10mm and 20mm eyepiece with it and a 2x Barlow lens - my first question to you all is; what would these lenses be best suited to observing, Moon, planets or deeper space objects? Also, what additional eyepieces would you recommend? (not a great deal of extra cash though - given the three kids I now have!)...

Finally, anyone on here hailing from Edinburgh too?

Thanks for your time!

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Floater

Floater

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Welcome from farther up the coast. Hope you enjoy the hobby - and take your children into it with you.

The usual advice on your eyepieces is that they will be fine to use until you decide where you're going with the hobby. Get to grips with collimation and setting up your mount first and use the EPs as much as you can. All the information you need can be found on SGL - either by searching the forums or by posting a specific question.

I have no experience of your scope but don't be in too much of a hurry to buy EPs and other stuff, although a collimation tool (or tools) might be a useful investment.

The main thing is, have fun.

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laudropb

laudropb

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Hello and a warm welcome to the SGL. Your 20 mm eyepiece will give you a magnification of 50x and your 10 mm 100x. The Barlow would effectively double these magnifications, but I would forget about it for the present. You use the 20mm ep for searching the sky, as this will have the widest field of view. It is important to align your finder scope, if you have one, to the main scope. Do this in day light. Look at a distant object, the farther away the better, such as a chimney or tree and focus your main scope on it. The image will probably appear upside down. Then centre your finder on the same object. When searching for stars, planets etc you use your finder as it will have a wider field of view. The eye pieces you have will be fine for the moment.

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scotttumsh

scotttumsh

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Hello and welcome from the just down the road in the Borders. Great scope to be given! get used to the scope and how it works and your current eyepieces will be good for now.learn your way around. the moon is well worth a study at the moment, early in the morning you have Venus, Jupiter and Mars all very close to each other in the Eastern sky. also if you have not already done so download Stellarium as its a great way to find what your looking for and very easy to use. All the best and clear skies! Scott

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abodee2

abodee2

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Hi!

If you're in Edinburgh it's definitely worth looking up the Central Scotland Observers Group, they meet up every now and again at a dark sky site which is fantastic. I pop by from time to time when I'm back home for the weekend. It helps so much when you have people there who can help you get set up and going, learned a lot just from going a couple of times and talking to the members there.

http://scottishastronomers.com/forum/index.php

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Tim99

Tim99

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Welcome EdinGazer!  It seems we all travel down the same road ... reading and learning and putting into practice.  It can seem overwhelming at times but the main thing is to enjoy it along the way.  Good advice from experienced folks above.

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