Pls explain working and wording of "a" scope.

[meridian man]

Hi all,

As a complete newbie can you please explain the workings of a telescope, both reflection and refraction and the words used as i never thought there was so much to "a" telescope.

EG; magnification, lenses, aperture, etc.

What do they do/are exactly.

EG; Magnification, where does it come from? in both types of scopes.

Len's, why don't reflectors have them like a refractor, (is a refractor packed with lenses)??

Aperture, whats so important about it?

Focal length, ??

Eyepieces, why so many sizes and types, again what exactly do they do.

Cooldown, ??

Fast, ??

There are other things i need explained but i can't think of them now, so feel free to educate me.

Cheers

Robert.

[rory]

hi robert, theres alot to answer there, id say 90% of what your asking here is easily googled up. so a little research or id recomend "backyard astronomers guide" as a book that gives alot of information.

also try the search button on the s.g.l site . anything you dont find out im sure you'll get answers to no problem. but theres so much your asking there to be fair.

[bombassa]

Hi Robert.

You should take a look at the 'Primers and Tutorials' section - there are many good articles there:

http://stargazerslounge.com/forum/43-primers-and-tutorials/

User 'Rob' wrote a nice piece on Telescope Types a bit down the list.

Also Understanding and choosing eyepieces is worth a read.

I hope this can answer just some of your questions.

Kind regards,

[Pauly]

Hi Robert. For explanations on the various types of scope you could do worse than Wikipedia. You should find entries that will show you how the types of scope are constructed, and how the various terms relate to them.

[meridian man]

Hi Robert.

You should take a look at the 'Primers and Tutorials' section - there are many good articles there:

http://stargazerslou...-and-tutorials/

User 'Rob' wrote a nice piece on Telescope Types a bit down the list.

Also Understanding and choosing eyepieces is worth a read.

I hope this can answer just some of your questions.

Kind regards,

And i thought astronomy was just looking through a tube with glass!!

[rory]

And i thought astronomy was just looking through a tube with glass!!

lol, yeah i thought that too. although it can be what you want it to be. binoculars or even naked eye observing is still astronomy.

[John]

And i thought astronomy was just looking through a tube with glass!!

I guess the programmes you refer to here in this thread might have hinted that there is more to it ?:

http://stargazerslou...s/#entry1547352

[brantuk]

Telescopes focus light from distant objects at a specific point. The distance over which it achieves focus is known as the focal length. Refractors focus light using lenses, reflectors do it with mirrors (mostly parabolic).

When the object is focussed you can magnify it with a magnifying lens inside an eyepeice that is designed to fit in the focus tube.

The aperture is the diameter of the lense or mirror used to do the focussing. Generally speaking - the larger the aperture the more light a scope can gather to focus. Different eyepiece sizes will give different magnifications, which is calculated by dividing the focal length by the eypiece size.

The focal ratio is the focal length divided by the aperture. This is a measure of how "fast" a scope is and lower numbers represent faster ratios (eg f-10 is slow, f-5 is fast). Focal ratios relate mostly to photography - the faster a scope is the quicker you can take photos.

A scope operates most effectively at ambient temperature. So if it comes outside from a warm house it needs to cool down to ambient before it is working at it's best. I think that answers your questions

[pixelsaurus]

Hi MM,

This may not be quite you are looking for but it is very comprehensive. As well as all the definitions you are asking about, it also covers most of the different kinds of telescopes you may encounter.

http://www.telescope-optics.net/index.htm#TABLE_OF_CONTENTS