Observing for the first time!

[moonbell]

Brought a Skywatcher Skymax 127 GoTo as my first telescope so thought I would share my experience with other newcomers and other watchers who mights hurt themselves from possible outbursts of laughter.

Set it up the first night and thought that using the goto was a bit ambitious so charged up some batteries went outside and was ready to go starting with a look at Ursa Major.

Moved the telescope round to the right area and looked though the finderscope, focused on a star (dubhe) and was ready to go but I could not see anything through the telescope. Moved the focus device backwards and forwards all the way and still nothing.

Thought briefly and concluded i'd left the cover on the end of the scope but no it was off. tried again using the focusing device and stiil nothing in view, at this point I needed to smoke a cig (very stressful!).

Had a thought - it must be a duff eyepiece so switched to the 10mm and carried on using the full range of focusing and stiil nothing, was now getting concerned that I must be quite dim.

After about 45 mins of this (and another cig) I resumed the daunting task of trying to see something and it worked, what I should have done was simply put my eye closer to the eyepiece so everything is now ok, not really.

It least I can see things though the scope so now I thought i'd line the the finderscope with the tube thinking this is going to be simple, should have known better. I focus on a bright star with the finderscope but when I look though the scope there are loads of bright stars visible so which was do I set up on? After a lot of messing about I think i've cracked it.

The goto was next starting with Arcturus everythings going ok select Capella and the scope swings round and points at the conservatory door which suggests that Capella is either in the lounge or I got it wrong.

Had further goes and eventually did a roughish set up so when I looked for M101 etc nothing was seen.

Looking forward to trying again and will use different stars next time for setting assuming of course that I don't end up in hospital due to the unusual positions my body has had to endure. Will update after the next viewing if i'm not in hospital or I don't drown in the excessive dew that was present last night (19/08/12). Also prepare yourselves for some 'advice required' on eyepieces, dew guards etc.

[Capricorn]

Set the finder up during the day on something a couple of miles away.

The assorted bits like buildings,trees etc don't move whereas the stars do. That is a very useful characteristic you will find.

If you are going to use a star try Arcturus, it is bright, a funny colour (orange) and it is all alone. Not easy therefore to mix up with others.

Eyepiece advise: Start with the longest one and stick with it, don't bother for a while with the short one, possibly too short for initial learning, consider a 15mm for the medium power viewing on the 127.

[moonbell]

Thanks Capricorn, interesting re the 15mm, like all beginners I was obsessed with magnification it's only after reading web based comments thet less is more in observing.

[swamp thing]

Hi

I always align my finders using Polaris, it has a couple of advantages. 1/ it doesnt move 2/ it's a double star so you can be sure your on it.

[Tinker1947]

When you are setting up the GoTo alignings Stars use a low power EP (High MM) to centre it, then change to a high power EP (Low MM) and recenter do this for all the stars, when looking for DSO, there only going to be faint grey smudges and will take a bit of practice to recognize, Open/Global Clusters would be a better choice to view and get some viewing practice...... Download Stellarium, and the Telrad maps these have the Messier list displayed and both are free...... do a Google search for Messiers Objects this will list what's what...Good Luck...

[iamjulian]

The goto was next starting with Arcturus everythings going ok select Capella and the scope swings round and points at the conservatory door which suggests that Capella is either in the lounge or I got it wrong.

lovely description. Can picture you thinking, what the... when it swings towards the house. Good luck on your next attempt. Technology eh.