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Looking to get into astronomy but a little confused


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Hello everyone, I've recently been interested in getting into astronomy and have a few questions. I"ve been looking for a good telescope to start star gazing with but I'm a little lost in my search. I've been looking at guides and reading reviews online but none of them have really helped me in narrowing down my search. I'm not really confident enough in my knowledge currently to purchase a telescope based only on my opinion. I was hoping to get some suggestions from the more experienced members to help me narrow down what seems to be a vast array of choices. I've got a budget of around $1400 dollars if it comes to that but I obviously don't have to spend all that. If all the components come out to $500 then great but if I have to spend more to get something that is of quality and will last a while then so be it. Since I am just a beginner though I am a little wary of dropping a bunch of money lest I make a mistake. Also if I wanted to do imaging what would I need to get? Sorry if these are dumb questions but I seem to be stuck in my search for a good telescope and would really appreciate any help. Thank you for any advice, I appreciate it.

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Before anyone advises they will probably need more information such as do you have access to a garden or yard where you can observe from or will you be travelling to an observing site. If you are at home, what are the views like regarding light pollution as this will affect the views of DSO's but not so much planets.

Are you going to be imaging planets or DSO's in the future ? there is a vast difference in budgets between the two

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The suggestion i was given, and which i ignored and wish i'd listen to, was to go to a star party and get to see other peoples' kit; watch them setting up, watch them calibrating, see the results they were getting with visual and imaging, ask them about price and second hand options, then you can make an informed choice. You can't do otherwise.

Good luck.

James

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imagine yourself at the eyepiece of each kind of scope. Quantify how happy you see yourself using that scope. That and a visit to a star party will both help you make the best decision for you.

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Buy a good pair of binoculars and a good guide to astronomy. Spend a year getting out under the stars whenever the opportunity arises finding your way around the skies. Find out if you really enjoy being out for hours on cold nights. Regularly buy one of the monthly magazines on astronomy to find out what's of interest in the skies this month and other useful information about observing and telescopes etc.

The thing is, amateur astronomical observation isn't about the kit. It's about doing it out there at night. I agree with others about joining a local society, meeting other amateurs and having a look at some telescopes in use at star parties and the like.

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Buy a good pair of binoculars and a good guide to astronomy. Spend a year getting out under the stars whenever the opportunity arises finding your way around the skies. Find out if you really enjoy being out for hours on cold nights. Regularly buy one of the monthly magazines on astronomy to find out what's of interest in the skies this month and other useful information about observing and telescopes etc.

The thing is, amateur astronomical observation isn't about the kit. It's about doing it out there at night. I agree with others about joining a local society, meeting other amateurs and having a look at some telescopes in use at star parties and the like.

This is good advice.

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The first thing to say is that there really is no such thing as an all-rounder telescope. Generally scopes that are good for viewing planets are not so good at viewing deep sky objects so getting what you want in one telescope is ALWAYS a compromise and it's helpful to know what you want to use the scope for most. In reasonably simplistic terms, long focal length means that the scope will have higher native magnification which is good for planets and detailed observation of the moon (these are bright objects and don't need a lot of aperture), where as for deep sky a shorter focal length is usually fine (as DSOs can cover quite a bit of sky) but you will need more aperture as they are faint; it is therefore the focal ratio (the ratio of focal length to aperture) that is important with a number between f/4 and f/5 being a good start.

If you want to get into astroimaging, and particularly deep sky astroimaging, then you'll really need a motor driven German Equitorial Mount (GEM) with what is called an ST4 port that will allow you to autoguide in future. You don't need to know too much about what that is now, but suffice to say that you'll probably need in future. For astrophotography the mount is all important.

Next up is the great GoTo debate. There is plenty written about GoTo on here and other fora and opinion is sharply divided. I find it no impediement to learning the night sky and it ensures I can make the most of my limited observing / imaging time. But you don't get the thrill of the chase and pleasure of finding something unaided that you do from "star hopping" (not that this bothers me!)

I started with a Celestron C6N newtonian telescope on a CG5-GoTo mount. I was very pleased with this as an initial scope and still use the mount as a more portable imaging rig for my refractor telescopes. This is the latest equivalent on Celestron's brand new (and very good looking) mount.

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Hello Frogfriend welcome to the lounge,

The advice I was given was to learn the night sky before buying a scope,

I observe with bin's (binoculars) this gives you an idea of what is out there,

10x50 or if you are quite strong 15x70 after that you will need a tripod and

mount, if you don't have http://www.stellarium.org/ download it, it's a great tool

and it's free, choosing a scope is not easy, decide what you intend to do long

term, otherwise you will be upgrading in no time, which means spending more

money, so take your time, learn the night sky, it's a great hobby to be enjoyed.

Good luck

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The bino advice is very sage. I came back to astronomy after many years and the kit has changed so much.

I bought a pair of 10x50's and went out in the evenings to see what I could see. I finally bought a 'scope last December after much research. I still wish I had gone to a local club but I do not regret what I bought.

Bins will not break your budget and will allow you time to research what you want and what is available, there are good reviews here on most equipment and they are unbiased as they come from users not sellers.

Where I bought my 'scope from also offered evenings where you could try their products, luckliy they are not in the centre of Perth but in a northern suburb.

http://binocularsky.com/

This is an excellent site to help demistify bino's.

Welcome to SGL

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welcome to sgl. to answer some of your questions they need to be split. Imaging and observing have different priorities. we'll start with the observing bit as it's slightly easier. The general rule is apparture is king. this means the bigger the scope the more you will see. However that's only part of the story the scope needs to fit your viewing needs. Are you fit and healthy can you handle a big scope? where are you going to use it? If you intend to use it elsewhere than your backyard how are you going to transport it there? So in answer to your question for observing the best scope is the biggest that you can use comfortably in the place you intend to use it.

Imaging is a different kettle of fish you don't need big apparture because the camera is much more sensitive to low light than the eye. But to make the camera more responsive you need to use long exposures hence it's the mount that is more important. So for imaging you are better off with a small fast scope on a good tracking mount.

to sum up and simplify this drivel for observing get the biggest scope you can use comfortably. taking into account its lifting and handling requirements. portability requirements general ease of use an 8" dobsonian ticks most peoples boxes for all of these requirements although some go bigger if they are only using the scope at home. maybe an orion xt 8"

Imaging look at getting the best mount you can afford then build your set up around it your best bet is probably a celestron vx and maybe an ed 80 refractor.

As you can see the two disciplines require different set ups hth

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Hi, welcome. My advice would be to not rush into purchasing. Expect it to get more confusing before the fog clears (well, thins a bit) and you start to feel a bit more comfortable in what is going to suit you.

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that is important with a number between f/4 and f/5 being a good start.

this was a good post but i felt i had to pull this single point out. On F ratios, the larger the F number the slower the scope. F5 is considered fast, anything faster i.e. a 4.X is faster still. Each 0.1 makes a real difference at this end of the speed scales where slower than F5 it means less in my opinion. I would say that anything over F5, particulaily when a Newtonian design is concerned will be challenging to work with and F4 being very much designed specifically for higher end imaging. The reason I say this is because beyond F5 collimation becomes exponentially more important and critical to good viewing. Under F5 a scope starts to get more forigivng and the seemingly ubiquitious 200p which is recommended often as a starter scope has a F5.9 which means it's very resistant to slight collimation errors.

One of the biggest fears people have at the start is collimation. both doing it and by potentially doing it wrong, introducing further errors instead. Being sacked with a fast scope (F4.9+) as your starter scope could put you off.

If collimation doesn't bother you then these fast scopes tend to have good focal length to aperture ratios which means you can have giant apertures and keep the true field of view quite large at the same time. win win for DSO.

F5 scopes and faster really test eyepiece designs as well because the faster newt mirors have concave profiles (well they are all concave but thats not my point, my point is -->). the faster the mirror the greater the depth of the concave. the mirror shape itself introduces an optical effect on the mirror edge called coma where the light is stretched slightly. the faster the mirror the geater the concave and therefore the more coma is introduced. this can be corrected with additonal lense elements imaginativelly described as coma correctors.

cheaper eyepiece designs also have inherent optical flaws which are not revealed by slower telescopes but the fast optics of big newts make blatent. this means that pleasing views in fast newts also require higher quality eyepieces.

none of this should put you off and if i had my way id have a much bigger much faster newt as collimation doesnt bother me and having good quality eyepieces is always nice regardless of your scope. good quality lasts a lifetime.

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I think you can get a basic idea of what to expect from binos by using a pair that someone might have lying around or at a star party.

When I first started astronomy I did this and was unsatisfied as I wanted larger images of the planets. That way I didn't waste money on binos when that money went toward a scope instead. Now that I have a couple decades of observing under my belt, I feel ready to get a pair of binos. Everyone is different and it might help your decision making to know what your expectations are.

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this was a good post but i felt i had to pull this single point out. On F ratios, the larger the F number the slower the scope. F5 is considered fast, anything faster i.e. a 4.X is faster still. Each 0.1 makes a real difference at this end of the speed scales where slower than F5 it means less in my opinion. I would say that anything over F5, particulaily when a Newtonian design is concerned will be challenging to work with and F4 being very much designed specifically for higher end imaging. The reason I say this is because beyond F5 collimation becomes exponentially more important and critical to good viewing. Under F5 a scope starts to get more forigivng and the seemingly ubiquitious 200p which is recommended often as a starter scope has a F5.9 which means it's very resistant to slight collimation errors.

One of the biggest fears people have at the start is collimation. both doing it and by potentially doing it wrong, introducing further errors instead. Being sacked with a fast scope (F4.9+) as your starter scope could put you off.

If collimation doesn't bother you then these fast scopes tend to have good focal length to aperture ratios which means you can have giant apertures and keep the true field of view quite large at the same time. win win for DSO.

F5 scopes and faster really test eyepiece designs as well because the faster newt mirors have concave profiles (well they are all concave but thats not my point, my point is -->). the faster the mirror the greater the depth of the concave. the mirror shape itself introduces an optical effect on the mirror edge called coma where the light is stretched slightly. the faster the mirror the geater the concave and therefore the more coma is introduced. this can be corrected with additonal lense elements imaginativelly described as coma correctors.

cheaper eyepiece designs also have inherent optical flaws which are not revealed by slower telescopes but the fast optics of big newts make blatent. this means that pleasing views in fast newts also require higher quality eyepieces.

none of this should put you off and if i had my way id have a much bigger much faster newt as collimation doesnt bother me and having good quality eyepieces is always nice regardless of your scope. good quality lasts a lifetime.

Completely agree with all of this. Tighter sweet-spot on the focus for fast scopes too!

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