Jupiter in a 6" Reflector??

[cygnusx1]

Well after weeks of waiting, good weather has finally allowed me to set up and take a look through my new scope.

After polar aligning, i pointed the finder-scope at Jupiter, plugged in a 25mm eye-piece and looked.....

What i saw dissapointed me - a tiny reddish globe, with 3 or 4 pinpoints that i took to be moons.

No clouds or bands, no GRS, in fact hardly anything more than a blurry little globe.

My question is:

Am i expecting too much out of my scope? Is it my eye-pieces?

How do i get those wonderful view that some ppl have posted? :jupiter:

OK im probably being naive, but let me know the hard truth!!

:sad10: in Herts

[stargazer1980]

that is all you will see with a 25 mm EP! You really need something like a 10mm or 6mm to be able to start seeing anything significant! Anything more than that you would need to get a BARLOW lens!

Hope this jelps!

Darren

[cygnusx1]

that is all you will see with a 25 mm EP! You really need something like a 10mm or 6mm to be able to start seeing anything significant! Anything more than that you would need to get a BARLOW lens!

Hope this jelps!

Darren

Hi Darren

My focal length is 1400mm, so 25 mm would be x56 magnification.

I did try 12mm but made no difference, with and w/out 2x Barlow.

[GazOC]

A 25mm eyepeice will give you x56 in your scope, which isn't enough to show much detail. You need to get up to around 180 -230, did you get any other eyepeices with the scope?

[GazOC]

You need a something like a 5 or 6mm...

[Black Shuck]

Hi,

I often find this to be a very useful tool.

http://www.scopesim.com/

Input your scope and eyepiece (not all are listed so you might need to pick the nearest one) and it will show you a rough representation of what you should see.

Hope this helps

Bill£

[stargazer1980]

still with a 12mm EP and a Barlow your only getting the magnification of a 6mm EP! I'd recommend like GAZ says to go for a 6mm EP! If you want to see real close try some thing like a x3 or x5 barlow! Then you'll get some proper view!

Hope this helps

Darren:)

[cygnusx1]

Thanks for the replies folks

I've tried both PL6.5mm (x200 ) and 4mm with and w/out 2x Barlow.

I can't seem to focus, as soon as it starts focusing, it gets to a blur, then goes larger again.

I guess its either my eyepieces or my scope quality???

[GazOC]

As the magnification goes up the 'point of critical focus' gets smaller, so you have to be more careful in when you are coming to focus. Its doesn't help that Jupiter is very low near the horizon this year so you'll get a lot of atmospheric interference, its not the best object to test a scope/ eyepeice on TBH.

[Cloudwatcher]

I second what Gaz says. Try looking at another object nearer the Zenith and if you don't have the same focus problem then it's not your gear thats at fault, it's just the atmosphere that is giving you a hard time.

CW

[anthony]

Certainly the atmosphere will reduce image quality.

Collimation is another critical area.

Anthony

[mpeniak]

Just to add that you won't see so much detail as you can see from the images posted as they are usually stacked from 500 and more individual pictures.

Martin :-D