Celestron Astromaster 114EQ

[mazza83]

Just wondering if anyone else has one of these scopes?? Ive recently got one and just cant get my head around the daft little red dot finder!! Struggled even to find the moon, completly gave up on Jupiter.

Just wondered if im doing anything wrong (which i probably am) or if people tend to change the finder with something else, in which case where would it go??

Any help would be appreciated

Matt

[John]

Having seen posts from others who use the Astromaster scopes I believe the red dot finder on them is a weak point in the design. A good replacement (although the original finder would stay in place I guess) would be a Rigel Quikfinder:

First Light Optics - Rigel QuikFinder Compact Reflex Sight

They attach to the scope tune using double side sticky pads and work pretty well.

[Astroegg]

Hi Matt. Sounds like your finder is not aligned with your scope. Try pointing it at a daytime object to "zero" the sights. (e.g. Use the tip of a church steeple from over a mile away and adjust your finder so it is perfectly centred in both your finder and your main scope eyepiece.)

Once your finder is aligned, you should be able to distinguish the view in your eyepice more easily because you can find the patch of sky you want to look at using the finder scope.

[mazza83]

cheers for the advise guys

@jahmanson i might look into getting one of those

@Astroegg thats probably whats wrong tbh i did try and thought i had it but obviously not lol. I'll try get it bang on and see if i have more luck

[Astroegg]

The zero magnification red dot finder that comes with your scope is notoriously poor and getting it accurately aligned is more luck than an exact science I'm afraid, but I think a red dot finder is invaluable to initially guide your scope to a starting point in the sky. Then it could be better to switch to a small magnification finder scope. A 6x30 maybe? This could be difficult to attach to your scope (could require a couple of drill holes) and may upset the balance, so proceed carefully if you chose to do this.

Collimating is another essential with this particular scope, and I read that is has a hidden barlow lens (not mentioned in the instructions) between the secondary mirror and the eyepiece, which ideally needs to be removed to perform collimation.

There are loads of videos on the net showing how to perform these tasks, so I recommend you take a little time getting the scope prepared so you can get a great night's viewing. The extra effort reaps rewards, and then you can regret the day you took this up as a hobby because you'll spend all your cash on it