Jupiter`s size

[Pete D]

Saw Jupiter for the first time last night it was nice to see something other than just stars and was wondering if light pollution effects the size of planets. I Know the planets appear quite small but I was expecting it to be slightly bigger. I could make out some different colours and it seemed to have 2 rings around going around the middle, no black spot though and was wondering what other peoples experience are with Jupiter. I was using a 8" skywatcher Dolsobian with a 6mm Planetarium eyepiece.

[Daz Type-R]

Hi. I too have a 200P SW dob and was looking at Jupiter last night, did you make out the 4 moons?

I am no expert but I do not think that LP makes any difference to the size of the image, it just makes a difference to the quality of the image. I just manged to make out the great red spot last night, but only just.

I was useing the standard ep's that came with the scope, still saving to get some decent ones so I was surprised with the quality.

I was using the standard 10mm ep, tried to barlow it but the image was terrible.

[MatthewC]

The 6mm ep gives 200X magnification with your scope. It takes fairly decent seeing conditions to use that much power on Jupiter. Sometimes and especially with Jupiter, a bit less mags will reveal more detail i find.

[Pete D]

What size did jupiter appear mine was about the size of a pen top in the eyepiece

[Daz Type-R]

Lol - what size pen top?

To me, with my standard 10mm ep, I would say Jupiter looked about 5-6mm wide. The moon's were just bright dots of light. I could make out 2 bands across the surface and just make out the GRS.