Complete novice - Telescope opinions please.

[ga-rat]

Hi

I have just posted in the welcome section to say hello.

I have just returned from a 3 day visit to Bristol with my wife and 3 children, whilst there we visited the @bristol science centre, we really enjoyed the Planetarium, my 7 year old daughter now knows a few groups of stars and is very keen to spend her money on a telescope, I have always had an interest but I never got passed the point of using my naked eyes or binoculars, I am looking forward to this just as much, if not more than my daughter. :p

We are looking at a very small budget just to see what happens, I have a couple of links to a couple from Argos , one of the manufacturers is Danubia and they seem to make telescopes at various prices. I am also watching a couple of Vivitar's on ebay. I know people may say I would be better off using binoculars but I just think it would be nicer to be able to get the telescope fixed/focused onto something and then my daughter can just look through the eyepiece. I am not by any means expecting great things.

Any comments would be much appreciated, good or bad (i'm expecting more bad)

http://www.ebay.co.uk/itm/VIVITAR-SQUARE-ASTRONOMICAL-TELESCOPE-F700-X-60-WITH-TRIPOD-/251279359607?pt=UK_Photography_Telescopes&hash=item3a816abe77

http://www.argos.co....ber/9286832.htm

http://www.argos.co....mber/063475.htm

Thanksyou.

[Andy_E]

Pretty bad I'm afraid . I think the chances of seeing anything in these telescopes is pretty slim. It might be worth looking out for something like a skywatcher 130 second hand, you might get one for under £100. I'm suspecting you guessed an answer like that was coming...sorry. the skywatcher heritage is also a favourite low budget first scope.

[umadog]

Don't waste your money on that stuff. You'll only be out of pocket and uninspired.

I have a couple of suggestions. The first, as you suspect, is the binocular suggestion. I remember that, as a beginner, binoculars didn't seem like quite the thing compared to a telescope. As a result I went through two or three cheap (toy) scopes of the sort you have listed. I never saw anything through any of them and I'm surprised that I persevered. Had I used binoculars and known where to point them I'd have seen far more. I had binoculars but I didn't use them properly because I assumed I'd see nothing and because they "weren't a telescope." Surely you have some binoculars lying around? Spend the money on an suitable binocular sky atlas or guide and go see some stuff. The fun is in tracking things down and learning what you're looking at. Binos will give you that if you let them. The second suggestion is to Google around and find your local astronomy group. Contact them about viewing and they will surely provide you with a list of events to attend. You can go and look through some instruments and see a variety of different objects. It'll be a fun and useful experience.

If after the binos and the club viewing you're still interested in purchasing a scope then you will have a far better idea what to buy. You'll understand why the toy scopes are a mistakes. The best bet is to look in specialist telescope stores. Most of the instruments they sell are good.

[Gilez]

This is a Skywatcher 130P, currently reduced on FLO. This might be an option for you too, although I am not sure what your budget is....

http://www.firstlightoptics.com/reflectors/skywatcher-explorer-130.html

I am only just getting ito all this, but this is the same scope that I went for, albeit it has a different mount, but the 130P is generally regarded as a very good starter scope.

[jonathan]

You can buy a simple L bracket which will allow you to mount your binoculars on a camera tripod, thus giving you the chance to point them at something and let others have a look. Get the larger of the two to reduce wobble.

The type of binoculars you use makes a difference - a good pair for astronomy will have BAK-4 porroprisms and high light transmission fully multi-coated optics (most cheap binoculars are only coated on the outside glass). Here's a simple budget pair.

The joy of binoculars is that you can very easily use them for birding, boat watching, etc and are very portable - just put them around your neck or in the back of the car without a second thought.

For a simple budget telescope that won't give you too much trouble I would suggest the Skywatcher ST80 on EQ1 mount. It's good enough to see the craters on the moon (with a moon filter) and to spot some planets (you will see the clouds on Jupiter, but only on a very clear night), the Orion nebula, Andromeda galaxy, and some double stars and clusters.

[Mattscar]

One small thing to keep in mind comes from the 'get the telescope fixed on something' is that (obviously) as the earth rotates things drift out of view. If your using a low magnification then things stay visible in one place for longer, but at some you will need to be able to just nudge the scope to see it again, but this is quite quite simple

As for which scope, FLO do have an offer on SW 130's, or if your looking for a cheaper option, maybe something like this may be a better idea http://www.firstlightoptics.com/dobsonians/skywatcher-heritage-76-mini-dobsonian.html

Matt

[RyanL]

Surprised nobody has mentioned the Heritage 76 mini dob ,reviews seem good for the most part and can be had for under £50.

[RyanL]

whoops didn't spot the link above!

[rwilkey]

Hi Ga-rat, the telescopes you have linked to are worse than useless, as others have said, don't waste your hard-earned cash. Always refer to a dedicated telescope shop such as the form sponsers FLO, where you will get the advice and support you need. While we are on the subject of poor 'telescopes' also avoid 'Seben' as they are very poor as well. If you go to a dedicated shop you will be sure to be on the right lines. The suggestion above of binoculars to start with is a good idea if you are on a low budget, then save for a telescope later. I also note that the other suggestions above regarding possible decent telescopes are also very good. The mini-dob gets excellent reviews and is under £50, this will open up the skies for you to start with.

[endure]

This is a Skywatcher 130P, currently reduced on FLO. This might be an option for you too, although I am not sure what your budget is....

http://www.firstligh...plorer-130.html

I am only just getting ito all this, but this is the same scope that I went for, albeit it has a different mount, but the 130P is generally regarded as a very good starter scope.

That's the 130 not the 130P. It has a spherical mirror and 900mm focal length. I've got one

[Schorhr]

I have a clone of the firstscope/heritage 76mm as it is available for 20€ but the heritage 130p I bought recently shows so much more.

Especially when it comes to deepsky it is an investment well worth it, and along with two or three 8 - 30€ eyepieces later on it will show nice views of planets, shapes of galaxies and other deep sky objects...

If the budget is really tight building a dobsonian out of a 50€ telescope 125/900 can be a great solution. All you need can be found in a hardware store for a few €/£/$.

[Schorhr]

Corrected/Fixed :-) Sorry

[bingevader]

It's quite a leap to the next level of 'scope and you'd obviously want to be sure it wasn't a passing phase before investing any more money.

I know it is probably the wrong time of year to get to a local club and check out some other 'scopes, but that would be ideal.

Not wanting to put a damper on things, but maybe it'd be worth putting things off 'til the autumn anyway.

It's not getting dark until after 10pm at the mo, I'm not sure how many observing sessions a 7 year old will manage into the wee small hours!

You can start much earlier in the autumn, especially after the clocks go back.

Having said all that, if you can't wait, then bins or the Heritage 76 would be best on a tight budget!

Cheers

[Schorhr]

True, the 130p is a lot more money. But the difference is very noticable.

I'm not saying the 76/300mm telescope is bad, I had quite some fun with it... Though without decent eyepieces (especially something with higher magnification to comfortably view planets with) it's not that much cheaper anymore.

Binoculars and a small scope will be a good idea if the kid is fascinated by it already, though after seeing deepsky objects through a larger telescope or even expecting full-color hubble-pictures from TV and prints it will be very disapointing.

Even larger telescopes will just show faint smudges and little to no structure. But it's still fascinating and a very rewarding hobby :-)

The original Heritage 76 package contains a 10mm and 25mm eyepiece, giving you a 30x magnification that shows jupiter's planets but both saturn rings and jupiter bands will require a good 4mm, better 2.5-3.2mm eyepiece- already on the limit what the telescope can show.

With a 2.5mm eyepiece (costs 30-50€ itself!) Saturn will look like this:

and Jupiter like this:

On the 130/650mm telescope (or any telescope with more then 90 or 100mm aperture) it will be possible to magnify more, and up to the maximum of what's usually possible under conditions near town/cities anyway.

Also deepsky objects will reveal a little more, too. In small telescopes galaxies are just blurry dots, the ring nebula will be a disc, not a ring, and stars of star clusters will only be visible on the outer area. With the 130p the brighter galaxies will be visible and show different shapes;

Under true dark conditions maybe some faint structures in the brightest ones.

The 130mm telescope on EQ-2 is somewhat limiting. Especially on higher magnification it will shake a lot;

The heritage 130p on Astro-3 is a bit more stable (less leaver on the mount, Astro-3 can handle a bit more anyway).

After pushing the telescope, demonstrating the shaking and it's duration, about equals the visual impression on high magnification;

At least here the heritage 130p is just little more expensive then the sale of the explorer on eq2...

Another alternative could be a 30-60x, 60mm spotting scope from Lidl. At only 29€ it is pretty much universal, and kids can use it at day and on a stable tripod for moon and planets as well. Though the classic 10x50 or better 8x (less shaky when used free-hand) binocular is a nice gift too.

You can even attach a 6x30 or 8x35 finder behind the binocular with tape and use it on a tripod (adapter costs €2 on ebay), and achieve about 60x magnification that way... And kids like tinkering with stuff like that a lot :-)

Also Astromedia has a DIY pipe and DIY cardboard-mirror telescope; Both cost about €20/17gbp.

I have assembled the later, and it is both educational and does already shows jupiter moons, saturn rings with a different eyepiece, and great views of the moon. too. Though it does need a glue that dries quick (UHU Flex&Clean worked very well - and fast) and a patient parent to help with assembling.

[ga-rat]

Thankyou everyone for the suggestions, I am google-ing things as I read the posts to try and get a better understanding.

I do like the look of the Sky-Watcher Heritage-76, this seems a very good price too.

There is so much to think about. I am going to dig out the binoculars, I have two pairs but I can't remember the details or specifications of them, I expect one pair are about 25 years old, not sure about lens coating either. I will find them out and try them.

I am a member on a mountain biking forum and an archery forum and these are my hobbies where I have offered advice similar to what I have been given here, no matter what hobby your into there are always cheap/toy versions of the real thing.

Once again I thank you all.

[umadog]

Ok, so what we haven't addressed is that you have a seven year old. Kids that age often find pointing telescope and tracking with it to be hard. Ditto, I imagine, for binos. So the L-bracket and tripod suggested by Jonathan may well be necessary (you'll have to experiment and see). If this is the case, then the binos won't work for you without more money invested. If that's so, a telescope might start to make more sense.

The Dobsonian telescope (mentioned above) is a Newtonian reflector attached to a simple mount. The design has become very popular of over the last 20 years due to its high stability, portability, and cheap price. You can get Dobsonians in every price range from 50 quid to 20,000 quid (seriously). So if you want to get the most bang for you buck in terms of aperture per unit cash, then a Dobsonian is unquestionably the way to go. You can point the scope and the kids can look through it. If you decide to go the Dobsonian route, then give a little thought to how much you want to spend. There's a substantial increase in image quality over the first couple of hundred pounds, so you might decide you want to hold for a bit and buy something a little nicer. Here's a brief list in terms of increasing price:

http://www.skywatcher.com/swtinc/iya_products.php The heritage scopes already listed above

http://www.amazon.co.uk/Skywatcher-SKYLINER-150P-PARABOLIC-DOBSONIAN-TELESCOPE/dp/B005KBR5P2 6" Dobsonian

The price jumps across those three are about 50 => 140 => 215 GPB. The first price jump gets you a larger mirror with more light grasp. The second price jump gives yet more light-gathering power and re-packages the scope into a larger format. The advantage is that you won't need a table-top any longer, it'll probably be easier to use, and it has a larger focal ratio which will yield significantly sharper views. The hardware on the larger scope will likely be better and it will be easier to keep the optics aligned. All scopes will set up equally quickly. The advantage of the Heritage scopes is their very high portability. If you are very tight on space then you might want to look at the dimensions of the 6".

Although you can magnify more with the 6" scope and the views are sharper in it, all three scopes you will show you the rings of Saturn, the moons of Jupiter, craters on the moon, and all of the Messier objects if you're somewhere dark. You shouldn't expect a lot of detail in the views; that said, seeing detail depends as much on experience and sky quality as it does on the telescope.

[Andy_E]

Just as a heads up, there's a 130p heritage up for £50 on astro buy and sell http://www.astrobuysell.com/uk/index.php . This will be a CONSIDERABLE improvement on the heritage 76.

[ga-rat]

Been doing more browsing, I have searched locally on ebay and nothing much is coming up apart from a couple of Vivitar's, the same as the ones in my OP, can anyone point me in the direction of any example pictures of what I could expect to see with the Heritage 76 and 130, it would be good if the pics were of the moon as I have something to compare to. I had a Sony Alpha DSLR and a couple of lenses and I was very impressed at how the moon looked through a 300mm lens, well 450mm because of the sensor magnification.

I used to be into photography and I understand about f-stops in camera terms... I have no idea yet if these work the same for telescopes, I presume they do but I will wait and ask about this at a later date. I expect I am getting a little deeper into things than I need to at this point.

[ga-rat]

I have just found one pair of binoculars, they are made by Miranda (i think this was Dixons own brand), they are 8 x 40 , coated optics, wide angle, 157 mts at 1000 mts. I will have a look outside tonight and see what I can see. The pair I had suggested were very nice but at the same sort of price as the Heritage 76, I think I would go with the Heritage 76.

[RyanL]

That heritage for £50 is in my town, seriously tempted!

[Schorhr]

@RyanL: It's a great little (big) telescope, I'd say go for it :-)

@ga-rat:

The moon will be impressive on any telescope, as it is bright and high-contrast. Even when over-magnifying a little.

You can check out the telescope simulation of Stellarium (ctrl+o/alt+0) and http://www.sternfreunde-muenster.de/orechner.php .

The reccomendation is that you should not magnify over twice as much as the telescopes aperture, and usualy 200-300x is the limit due to air transparency/turbulances/seeing.

On the telescope with 300mm focal length, a 10mm eyepiece wold give you a magnification of 30x (focall. : eyepiece-mm = magnification).

The f-stop is only relevant when using a camera on the telescope (this requires a eq mount to compensate earth's rotation though, and usualy nothing a beginner will do right away).

For visual observing, both a 130/650 (f/5) and a 130/1300mm (f/10) telescope will show the same bright image if you use different eyepieces to achieve the same magnification factor.

Photographs through different telescopes will not represent what the visual impression will be;

Excuse my rough sketches, but I have not managed to scan anything better yet.

Here is a rough sketch to simulate what moon and jupiter will look trough beginner telescopes at the same magnification level;

Achieving the same magnification is no problem, but a smaller aperture telescope will show less contrast, darker image and not as much detail on objects when over magnifying.

http://www.ringohr.de/tmp5/2013-05-04_comparison_3_small.jpg

The heritages are nice telescopes, but the larger one will give months and months of nice views while the smaller one is limited to tiny planets and the brighter DSO (orion nebula, andromeda, a few star clusters).

The 130p is rather low, but a (wooden) box will be great for transport and to place the telescope ontop.

But I usualy just take along a collapsible stool and a foam pad.

I use 10x50 cheapo-binoculars a lot too, but while I think they are a great addition, a telescope is really something different. If a kid expects to see galaxies and planets, a telescope should be the best choice.

The Heritage 76 has a focal length of only 300mm.

While the f-stops have not much influence on visual astronomy light- or magnification-wise, cheap eyepieces will perform badly on f/5, f/4 and under. The outer area in the view will be blurry and coma (long/shaped stars) are visible.

But really, for beginners, that's no big deal, it's nice to view anyway, even with that limitation.

More of a problem is to get high magnification on 300mm focal length, so you will have to invest on some decent eyepieces, especially since 4mm or 6mm Plössl and other cheap-o eyepieces will have a verrry low eye relieve, so you have to get close to the eyepiece (nudging the telescope and smearing over the glass with eye lashes).