mars and eyepieces

[twotter]

Viewing Mars in January 2010 was probably the highlight of my astro 'career'. Ice cap was plainly visible and dark surface detail too. Definitely worth the effort

[Catweazel]

I tried last night too, and I have to say it was dissapointing. I got a bright orange disk the size of a pinhead with no detail at all. I tried down to 10mm with 2x barlow, but at this level Mars was moving through the FOV pretty damn quick, so I struggled to focus it in the centre of EP. To be fair though, the moon was really washing out the sky, so I don't think seeing was at a premium. Think we're about to get snowed under here, so it may be a while until I get another try

[SiriusB]

hellloooo! been looking at mars tonight and found it really small and fuzzy, cant see a disk clearly and im getting lots of colours around it. Does anyone know if its just that its small this time of year or am i doing something wrong with my scope. I using my 20mm eyepiece with a 3xbarlow lens, is it too much magnification? Also does anyone know when it will be best to view mars? thanks :0) S.J

Mars isn't the easiest of targets for small scopes, but keep trying!

Had a look 1am this morning, the planet was dancing about a bit at a mere 125x in my Mak 127 but inbetween the martian dance routine i could see the Northern polar cap & some vague dark markings.

As to the fuzzyness & colours~Had your scope cooled down properly? The colours sound like either Mars was a bit low in the sky when you observed or maybe down to your barlow lens~some can be a bit colourful.

My best ever views of Mars were in 2003 when it was unusually close to earth,& there seemed to be endless warm,clear late Summer nights with good seeing.

I was only using an ST80 clone , so keep trying.. or wait till 2018 like John said.

[gothicangel]

Mars isn't the easiest of targets for small scopes, but keep trying!

Had a look 1am this morning, the planet was dancing about a bit at a mere 125x in my Mak 127 but inbetween the martian dance routine i could see the Northern polar cap & some vague dark markings.

As to the fuzzyness & colours~Had your scope cooled down properly? The colours sound like either Mars was a bit low in the sky when you observed or maybe down to your barlow lens~some can be a bit colourful.

My best ever views of Mars were in 2003 when it was unusually close to earth,& there seemed to be endless warm,clear late Summer nights with good seeing.

I was only using an ST80 clone , so keep trying.. or wait till 2018 like John said.

thanks siriusB. it was quite low in the sky then it clouded over:( but i will not give up lol