Last night

[kamperman]

Well first time out with the scope (8" newt). Looked South just above the roof tops and there it was :jupiter: unfortunately it didn't look as good as that! A lot of turbulence coming off the roofs and I think my cheap ebay eyepieces did not help! Going to have to get some decent secondhand eyepieces so what makes are worth considering that don't cost the

Cheers

[Whippy]

What sort of budget are you looking at?

Tony..

[centroid]

The Meade 4000 Series Plossl eyepieces (now superseded by the 5000 series) are pretty good. I've been using my set of 4000s for five years now, and have been quite happy with them.

Dave

[GazOC]

You can pick orthos up for ~20 pounds S/H.

[Naz]

Don't knock the ep's just yet, there are always better ones, but with Jupiter being so low, even without the turbulence from the roofs, it's a difficult one to see well at present.

Also, you may only get very brief glimpses of any detail, even under fairly good conditions.

Try your ep's on star clusters and the moon, (when it drags it,s self from it's holiday down south.)

I also use a 8" newt on a dob base and I can spend ages looking for just a fleeting glimpse, (where abouts are you, I am in France 46degrees north) even with Jupiter showing reasonably high here.

The belts should be visible, mainly the Northern one (I think if I have my orientation correct) as a brownish smudge at worst.

naz

[Kenny_10_Bellys]

Yeah, dont plame the eyepiece just yet. I just looked at Jupiter an hour ago through my brand new 8" CPC800 and it looks like a boiling light because it's so low and I'm in town right now. At best I catch brief glimpses of the most prominent band and that's it. A few weeks ago it cleared enough for me to go up the nearby hills and set up my little Orion ED80 and the view of Jupiter was practically :jupiter:

The big difference was it was later, it was higher and the air was clearer at the time. In the right conditions you really see it at it's best, but if all you've ever seen is the crummy views we're being treated to right now then I'd begin to suspect my equipment too. Location, atmosphere and position of the planet play a far bigger role than the equipment most nights.