First light tonight

[Nick Steele]

My great big 6 inch reflector arrived in the post yesterday.

After spending yesterday evening setting it up, and this afternoon allowing it to cool, I was ready to go out and have a look. Due to some lowish cloud and light pollution in the north, I couldn't sight in on polaris to get the setting circles lined up. No matter, I could manage without them for tonight.

Lacking the ability to just put the scope on a target, I decided to aim for the biggest, brightest thing in the sky. Jupiter. The big one.

I managed to find it without too much hassle, and started tracking and observing it. Using the highest power eyepiece I had (not counting the 3x Barlow that came with the scope), I managed to see all of the moons, one of which just dipped behind the planet as I watched, and 2 darker bands.

I'd have liked to have been able to just aling the scope to a target, say, the orion nebula, but you can't have everything at once. Seeing Jupiter in such detail on my first go was a damn good start, I think.

I just hope it's clear tomorrow night...

[Daniel-K]

great first night! wait for saturn she will blow your socks off!

[nephilim]

Well done on getting your first night 'in', the first time I saw jupiter was amazing (As DanielK above mentions Saturn is amazing I bagged her for the first time early this morning & I'd strongly recommend giving it a go, its mindblowing), as for the setting circles, you really dont need to use them, I never have & I dont know many (if 'any') people who do, they're not particularly accurate and dont really serve much of a purpose, I'd concentrate on getting Polar Alignment sorted, watch this

it's very helpful. For visual observing you only need a rough PA, the need for precision only really comes into play for Astro-photography.

Enjoy your new scope

Steve

[Nick Steele]

Onr thing I did notice tonight is that my finder scope is terribly poor - the eye relief isn't long enough to allow me to get my head the right distance away. it's also wobbly and doesn't hold zero. I'm thinking of getting another, either a refractor with an eyepiece at 90° to the body of the scope, or a red dot sight. I believe the latter isn't as reliant on eye relief.

Any suggestions to help me choose? Is my current finder scope adequate, and I'm at fault? I don't want to to tighten the mount all the way in fear of breaking it.

[nephilim]

If your not comfortable with it then i cant see it being your fault. While one finderscope will work for one person it wont work as well for another. I've both the RDF, you see the sky as is, the right way up & not magnified BUT the brightness of the dot cant be turned down & will quite regularly get in the way of the fainter objects, personally i dont get on with it. I also have a Telrad http://www.firstlightoptics.com/finders/telrad-finder-astronomy.html which is excellent & highly recommended by many on here, again the view is as is, but u can turn the brightness down, it projects the image of 3 concentric circles at 1/2,2 & 4 degrees, used in tandem with these http://www.astro-tom.com/messier/messier_finder_charts/messier_maps.htm free printable maps which enable you to 'star hop' from one object to another (Stellarium also has a Telrad option so u can use it at home to plan your evenings viewing)

The Telrad is perfect for me and has helped me find some very tricky objects. Be aware tho that they are usually always out of stock everywhere (they're that popular) so you'd need to order one.

Btw I also have the Skywatcher 9x50 finder that came with my 200p & get on with that either. Telrad all the way for me .

Steve

[Double Kick Drum]

Great first light.

If it has fuelled your enthusiasm, I would say it was a succesful session.

Your scope will be capable of finding much more but the Orion nebula is a good second target. Not sure how much light pollution you have to contend with but a six inch reflector will show up lots of shape detail and some structure in a half decent sky. You should also see M43 in the same field of view. It is part of the same nebula but is categorised separately.

Happy hunting!

[Astro Imp]

Great to get out there the first time, you'll remember that for a long time.

Have you downloaded Stellarium, a great free planetarium program to help you find your way around, get it here:- http://www.stellarium.org/

For something easy to find if you look to the right and up a bit from Jupiter you will see a faint cluster of stars this is M45 the Pleiades these look stunning in a low power eyepiece.

Good luck.