Better colour and higher power advice?

[DaveJFT]

Hi All,

I'm wanting some advice on getting better views of the planets.

I'm just setting out and have bought myself the following kit:

Skywatcher Explorer 130p, on a manual EQ2 mount

Skywatcher 25mm Possil eyepiece (came with the telescope)

Skywatcher 10mm Possil eyepiece (came with the telescope)

This 2x Barlow lens from Amazon.co.uk

This moon filter from Telescopehouse.com

I've spent a couple of evenings looking at Mars and Saturn so far.

Mars was a disappointing white disc. 52x or 130x, off-axis mask in place or not, all I got was the tiny or small white disc - could have been the moon through the wrong end of a pair binoculars. At 130x focussing was very difficult and Mars would not stay steady.

Saturn was an amazingly crisp white disc with rings and shadows. At 52x the view was pretty steady and consistent. Again at 130x I had real difficulty with keeping Saturn in view and in focus. It was like I was looking through a hole in a black piece of card which kept moving in the eyepiece and Saturn kept fuzzing around in, around and out of that hole. The off-axis mask helped contrast hugely but all I was seeing were shades of white while others have spoken of yellow rings.

Can anyone help me to understand how to get a better experience with higher magnifications and how to get better colour contrasts.

Many thanks

Dave.

[DaveJFT]

Sorry - Plossl, not Possil

...I would have edited this post to correct it if I could get at it before someone else read it but because of "moderator approval" it disappeared and seemed to take several hours to appear on the forum - and then it appeared at the time I originally submitted the post so it popped up on page 3 where few people will trawl back to to see it and offer help.

[Tribal-Wolf]

The 10mm you get with the scope is not great for sharpness and you say you bought a barlow from Amazon so I'm assuming it was cheap? Unfortunately Mars is never the easiest planet to get great detail but throw in some bottom end gear and it will never be good. Even if your barlow is a decent one the 10mm you have won't give you detail. You don't have to spend a fortune though BST explorer EPs are £45 and a TAL barlow is £36, these should give you quite an improvement over standard EP, I went for the 8mm BST and it is miles better than the stock 10mm. There are other factor like light pollution too, this will give fuzzy views under higher magnification, so maybe an LP filter may help too if that's the case.

[DaveJFT]

Hi Tribal-Wolf,

Thanks for your response. I was getting some success with my 10mm last night - though I was seeing some inclusions in the glass of either my 10mm or the Barlow - couldn't tell which. I'll have to investigate by turning the EP relative to the Barlow and see whether the inclusions move or not ...hope it's not my telescope mirrors though I doubt I'd see minor defects in those.

That said though Juptier and its moons were last night's WOW! for me, and Saturn looked even better than 2 nights ago.

I do now think I've got to get a motor for my mount because everything moves so fast through the 10mm and would be even faster through any new slightly higher power BST that you recommend.

Cheers

Dave