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Hi & Happy New Year

dannyboy

By dannyboy
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dannyboy

dannyboy

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Just thought I would take the opportunity to introduce myself and also say Happy New Year :rolleyes:

I'm a 32 year old kid who has always been fascinated by the skies, and probably like quite a few others here I got a telescope for Christmas. Have wanted one for as long as I can remember so I was pretty excited when I got it. Although I am pretty new to all this, I tried to do some research and decided a reflector would be my best bet, as I only live about 10 minutes from the centre of Poole. Eventually decided to go for a Skywatcher Explorer 130PM , which seemed to be one of the better ones in my price range.

Christmas night was clear, so I got my first look at the moon, which was brilliant. Tried to also look at Mars too, but couldn't find it in the eyepiece. Think I still need a bit more practice at finding anything smaller than the moon! We haven't had any clear nights since then but at least it gives me a chance to learn. I have a ton of questions, but I'm gonna read the stickies in the beginners section rather than ask silly questions which have already been asked a million times.

Hope to stick around and meet you all anyway.

cheers

Dan

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Starflyer

Starflyer

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Hi Dan and welcome to SGL.

I have the same 'scope as yourself and I really enjoy using it.

I aligned my finder like this; put in your lowest power eyepiece (25mm ?) and find a nice bright star. Get the star centred as best you can in the eyepiece and adjust the two knobs on the finder so that the red dot appears over the target star. It should be close now but if you want you can repeat the procedure with a higher magnification eyepiece.

Enjoy your 'scope; the Orion nebula, Pleiades cluster and the double cluster in Perseus are great targets using your 25mm eyepiece.

Cheers,

Ian

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dannyboy

dannyboy

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Hi Dan and welcome to SGL.

I have the same 'scope as yourself and I really enjoy using it.

I aligned my finder like this; put in your lowest power eyepiece (25mm ?) and find a nice bright star. Get the star centred as best you can in the eyepiece and adjust the two knobs on the finder so that the red dot appears over the target star. It should be close now but if you want you can repeat the procedure with a higher magnification eyepiece.

Enjoy your 'scope; the Orion nebula, Pleiades cluster and the double cluster in Perseus are great targets using your 25mm eyepiece.

Cheers,

Ian

thanks Ian, sounds like I good tip. I'll give it a go as soon as I get another clear night. :rolleyes:

Yep the eyepieces which came with it are 25mm and 10mm. My futile attempts to find Mars on xmas day were with the 10mm lens, which I now realise is not the best way to initially locate an object! With 650mm focal length, am I right in saying that would give me 26x magnification with the 25mm eyepiece, and the Barlow lens thingy would double that?

also would you guys recommend buying more eyepieces, with shorter focal lengths to give greater magnification. I'm quite keen on observing Jupiter at some point and I guess I wouldn't see much even with the 10mm eyepiece?

thanks again to all for the welcome, never had so many welcomes from a forum.

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Starflyer

Starflyer

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Yep the eyepieces which came with it are 25mm and 10mm. My futile attempts to find Mars on xmas day were with the 10mm lens, which I now realise is not the best way to initially locate an object! With 650mm focal length, am I right in saying that would give me 26x magnification with the 25mm eyepiece, and the Barlow lens thingy would double that?

It certainly makes it easier to find things with a lower power EP, centre the target and then swap to a higher power one. Yes, the 25mm gives 26x, so your range is 26x, 52x, 65x and 130x for your EPs and 2x Barlow. Captain Chaos has written an excellent article that covers such things in detail; http://stargazerslounge.com/index.php/topic,8470.0.html

also would you guys recommend buying more eyepieces, with shorter focal lengths to give greater magnification. I'm quite keen on observing Jupiter at some point and I guess I wouldn't see much even with the 10mm eyepiece?

Jupiter is quite large and I was very impressed at the views late in the summer at 130x. I don't think you'll ever get clear, defined banding with your 'scope, but you'll be able to see some banding and the four main Jovian moons. Mars, on the other hand, is tiny and will probably appear as a pink / orange disk with no surface detail. Don't forget Saturn, fairly soon it'll be up in the evening sky and is a truly amazing site :rolleyes:

As far as expanding your EP collection; the first thing I bought was a 3x TAL Barlow from Steve at FLO, this will give you 26, 52, 65, 78, 130 and 195x - just about the limit for that 'scope. More experienced members can probably offer better advice, but I would look at replacing the supplied EPs with second hand higher quality ones of similar focal length - Meade 4000 series are very good value and come up second hand quite regularly.

thanks again to all for the welcome, never had so many welcomes from a forum.

Your very welcome :lol:

Ian

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barkis

barkis

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Welcome to the SGL Forum Danny. You have got yourself a good scope there, and you will get a lot out of it, especially when you come to terms with it's use. Everyone finds it a litte confusing to begin with, but you will soon master it given a little time.

You will get all the help you need from the guys here should you need it. Just ask.

Good luck and a Happy New Year to you.

Ron. :rolleyes:

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