advice

[Beardy30]

Hi

I am wondering what sort of quality of images of the planets and moon :icon_scratch:anyone has had from a Skywatcher 130m???

[rowan46]

webcams work alright on them they don't have the resolution of the big boys but the moon is great and jupiter and saturn show some detail I have never had a half satisfactory image of mars with my 5" but that may be me I am not great at processing.

[Beardy30]

i am talking visual , sorry not photography

[John]

The moon looks superb in just about any scope. a 130mm will show tons of detail. The planets vary considerably but in general the detail that is seen depends on the seeing conditions, collimation and cooling of the scope and observer experience. They will look small but Saturn and Jupiter should show some finer detail plus 4/5 and 4 moons respectively. Mars is a challenge but should just about show the north polar cap and one or two vague dark markings at the moment - it's going to look very small though. Venus shows a 50% phase at the moment but it can be challenging because it's so bright. Mercury looks like a tiny version of Venus. Uranus and Neptune show tiny disks (so you know they are not stars) but no surface detail.

The phrase "the more you look, the more you see" applies strongly to planets. You may benefit from better quality eyepieces than the supplied ones too as that will help make the most of the conditions and the scope.

[Pappy Nick]

I've got a 130p with 10mm and 25mm stock eyepieces. The Moon looks absolutely beautiful through it, though the fuller it got, the brighter it got. To the extent that it was totally knackering my night vision ! Jupiter and four of its moons is easily spotted though not very big, its cloud belts are just about visible depending on the seeing. Venus is just a very bright ball, not very exciting. Mars is a tiny red bright ball, again I haven't seen much to get excited about yet.

I haven't seen Saturn yet, but I'm looking forward to it.

I'm also hoping that investing in some decent quality eyepieces will improve things in the near future.

HTH

[Carbon Brush]

Patience is needed. Not just to learn how to get the best from your scope. But also to find out whether the scope or the sky is limiting the view.

Looking at recent results on Mars with my SW200P. A couple of weeks back I enjoyed good views with surface detail and polar cap. A few nights later it was a reddish featureless blob. There was nothing wrong with the scope. The sky was not up to good seeing. Tonight it was really clear at x100. So I went for x200 with a reasonably sharp disc and hint of detail. Time to try a filter to help with the detail? By the time I had fitted a filter it was cloud, cloud ,more cloud.....Time to come inside.

[Beardy30]

thanks guys was thinking of getting a 150but i Will stick with it