Have i bought the wrong telescope?

[Rihard]

Had my first go at looking at the planets last night and i'm rather dissapointed. As you may gather i'm a complete novice so i spent a couple of weeks researching what telescope to buy for little money i.e £100 second hand to view planets in our solar system and decided if i could find a decent reflector that would be best for my money. after talking to a friend he said he had a Helios 115mm x 1000m focal that i could have very cheap so i snapped his hand off. last night i found all the planets i was looking for Mars, Venus, Jupiter and Saturn but i couldn't see any great detail at all just bright spots in the 8mm ep. i suppose if i'm honest Jupiter was quite clearly a planet and the 4 moons were visable but i'm now wondering if i should have gone for a refractor to meet my needs?

My first scope was a cheapish 114" X 500" Konus reflector... With the supplied eyepieces I could actually make out some details on jupiter and the phases of venus. With the supplied 3X barlow jupiter would look huge but I couldn't achieve focus properly. I enjoyed with no problems the saturn rings too. With a similar spec scope (but from Skywatcher) that I bought to my niece back in October, Jupiter was sharp and nice, not huge but I could clearly see the bands. Pleiades and M42 were also spectacular. My site was a pretty dark one with a good seeing.

I'd say, despite there's an extra lens inside your scope to make the focal longer, you shouldn't have any problems with planets as I didn't have with my cheap and mishandled Konus 500 when I was just 10 years old. Collimation, cool down time, no dew, good weather and good seeing might help a lot as the other folks suggested! Be also aware of dust in the eyepieces and other optics components (but do not try to clean the mirrors inside or you'll mess everything up as I did with mine )

Stick with it for a few months and try to squeeze the impossible out of it even if it causes frustration!

Have you seen the moon with it yet?

[The Warthog]

Hi, sooty,

A 114mm scope is unlikely to have a parabolic mirror, as most in that size are ground spherical. That's not a terribly bad thing as long as the focal ratio is f/8 or better. However, through my own experience with such a scope you should not hope for more than about 150x which could be achieved with a 6mm ep and your 8mm will give you 125x. At these powers you should be able to clearly see bands on Jupiter and the rings of Saturn. If you can't, then as others have said your collimation is most likely off.

The first time you try collimating your scope you will most likely tear out your hair and your eyes, and then go into the house and murder your children, but it gets easier with time. Just remember, make small adjustments at a time.

[kenmyers]

Hi, sooty,

A 114mm scope is unlikely to have a parabolic mirror, as most in that size are ground spherical. That's not a terribly bad thing as long as the focal ratio is f/8 or better. However, through my own experience with such a scope you should not hope for more than about 150x which could be achieved with a 6mm ep and your 8mm will give you 125x. At these powers you should be able to clearly see bands on Jupiter and the rings of Saturn. If you can't, then as others have said your collimation is most likely off.

The first time you try collimating your scope you will most likely tear out your hair and your eyes, and then go into the house and murder your children, but it gets easier with time. Just remember, make small adjustments at a time.

haha

[Tribal-Wolf]

I never realised you're in Hull sooty, I'm just in Hessle, if you need any help with anything just send me a pm and I can maybe pop round or call you. I will warn you though that I'm from Newcastle so you might not understand me lol

[Demo johnny]

astro_dog's pic is great for any new to get an idea of what they will see with good entry level scope. It may not look much but when you see saturn with your own eye's for the first time if your not blown away get your scope on ebay as this hobby is not for you. Then you have Jupiters bands and the moons all completely captivating but Saturn for me was the wow. Hope that the OP gets a good idea of what he can see from this pic. 2 months now and still not had decent view of Mars but will keep trying.