Reflector Teleschope F70076

[TSEA]

Hi all, I am new here, I just bought my daughter a Reflector Telescope F70076 for her birthday as she has developed an interest in space.  Her dad assembled it, but we are not sure of how to align it so that she can do some star gazing.  The instructions in the manual don't make too much sense to us.  any help would be greatly appreciated please

[PeterCPC]

Hello and welcome. I hope that someone here may be able to help you with that.

Peter

 

[glowjet]

Hi TSEA and welcome to SGL, You have not mentioned what make of scope you have purchased for your Daughter, what you have given, translates to a 76mm F700 reflector. Manuals are, I am afraid, in a lot of cases, not written for us mortals to understand, however, there is a web site that may help put a lot of things you are wanting to do in a proper perspective, visit :  themacdonalds.net  see under the section, Setting up an equatorial telescope. There should be enough information on there to get you started. I hope  you and your Daughter enjoy the telescope and the forum

[TSEA]

Thank you very much for the warm welcome John and Peter and advice.  I will give it a go this afternoon. 

[JamesM]

Hi and welcome to the forum. You might find this video helpful in obtaining an overview of how a telescope's finder works in helping to align the main scope. Your scope has a straight through finder that, as part of it design, will not only invert the view but will also show it back to front. Therefore, an image normal viewed by the eye will now appear in the finder as being upside down with the left and right side of your normal view now having switched. The details of this are covered in more detail from around 2:06 onwards in the video.

The main difficulty with your telescope will not be aligning it, as that is straightforward once you understand the principles involved, but more the act of keeping the image settled within the eyepiece, especially at higher magnifications. Perhaps adding a weight to the mount will help with the rigidity along with avoiding high magnifications. High magnifications will have the effect of allowing the target object to move quickly across the field of view, which naturally will require constant adjustment of the scope to keep the object visible. However this adjustment will cause the image to jump around within the eyepiece which will require you to have to wait for everything to settle down and you've guessed it - the image has now slipped out of view and the whole process of frustrating adjustment continues. Keep the views to low magnifications (where the eyepiece measurement e.g x20 should be used rather than a lower number) and the "twitchiness" of the scope will be greatly reduced and the object will remain in view for longer.

Hope the above makes sense. The telescope that you have purchased is not a bad performer and like all equipment will have it's limitations at some stage. The real weakness is the mount which supports the scope, hence my suggestions above to help stabilise it. Remember, that any optical instrument that you point at the night sky will always yield you with a view that you couldn't access with your own eyes alone and to the end any purchase is a good investment to understanding the cosmos. Perhaps a different finder (right angle correct view) such as this one might a future consideration should your daughter want to expand her observing capabilities and of course it can be used for the next scope should she later want to upgrade.

In the meantime may I wish you and your family clear skies and hope that you will enjoy your stay here - don't forget to keep asking questions!

[Starwiz]

Hi TSEA,  

Welcome to the SGL!  

John

[TSEA]

Wow James, thank you so much, will let you all know how it goes  

[laudropb]

Hello and a warm welcome to the SGL. Lots of good advice already given and I will only add, feel free to ask as many questions as they arise. That is what we are here for. Good luck with your new scope.

[Starwiz]

Also, check out the post below if you haven't already done so.  Many people starting out in astronomy are hugely disappointed when they get their first view through a telescope as they expect to be able to see much more than is possible.  Try to have a look at Saturn, Jupiter, and of course the moon.  With other fainter objects, the real satisfaction comes from knowing what you are looking at and that the light has taken many years to travel the distance, millions of years in the case of galaxies.  You will also be looking at stuff that only a tiny fraction of humanity get to see with their own eyes.  

John

 

[Pete Presland]

Hi welcome to SGL from Pete in Bedfordshire

[Dave Lloyd]

Hi and welcome, it's great when youngsters discover the wonders of space.