first night with new scope

[mazza83]

I picked up a celestron astromaster a couple of weeks ago for £50, not what i was after but hey £50 why not??

Anyway, finally got chance to take it out last night, the finder is awful and took ages to find anything, first target was Jupiter. I finally found it, although quite suprisingly large with the 20mm eyepiece in i could see no detail whatsoever, i dont know if i need to try collimate it or not?? I then moved over to the pleiades which were a much better sight, very bright and clear. I really tried to find andromeda but with my finder being less than good it proved impossible.

Any ideas on why i cant see detail on Jupiter? My friend has a small tasco refractor which probably cost a fiver and i can see bands on Jupiter, albeit very faint

Matt

[great_bear]

If it was "surprisingly large" with a 20mm eyepiece are you sure it was in focus?

Most people describe Jupiter as "disappointingly small"

Certainly you should see at least the main two bands.

Perhaps the opposite is true and you haven't got enough magnification - thus leaving Jupiter all washed out?

[jgs001]

Matt, which Astromaster is it ? I'm inclined to go with the focus also... Jupiter doesn't look large when I use a 5mm ep, in my 600mm (focal length) refractor

[mazza83]

Its the 114eq, i didnt mean it was actually large, just larger than i was expecting as ive seen it through a similar sized scope. Was definitely focused (well, as good as i could get it) its just i was hoping for some detail, like you say, at least two bands. I must be doing something wrong :/

[cosmological]

Is it this one AstroMaster 114EQ Telescope

A 20mm eyepiece on the above telescope would result in a 50x magnification which is very tiny so I'd be surprised if you managed to see any bands at all, you really need to up the magnification to see detail.

[mazza83]

Yeah thats the one mate. Well i tried the 10mm eyepeice also but still couldnt mate out any kind of detail. At least the pleiades looked good

[LeeB]

Its a bit of a coincidence but I decided to get a cheap project scope ( a Tal1 ) off ebay.(£42.20) Collected it yesterday and took it straight out to cool. Its 110mm so a good comparison in size to the celestron. First jupiter, droped in 15mm meade 4000 so 53x mag , bands clearly seen so upped it with a 2x barlow to 106x super sharp and multi banding. The collimation must be out on the celestron,

I was vastly impressed with the performance of such a little scope, I took the 10" OO out for comparison and although detail was obviously higher, the Tal did impress, the mount inparticular is super solid.

The next job is a full strip, paint and make over.

sorry for straying Back to the celestron they are normally good scopes so something must be wrong to see no detail.

[mazza83]

hmmm yeah i must need to collimate it, should be fun lol congrats with the new scope Lee