What will I be able to see?

[cthulhugazes]

Hi all,

So I have a celestron astromaster 114eq telescope and a lot of eye pieces, I’ve successfully seen the moon and Venus (which just looked like a star close up) and was wondering how much detail I could get looking at Jupiter and Saturn? Will I be able to see the rings of Saturn? 

I googled images from my scope when I got it but it wasn’t really helpful in telling me what was used, also is it possible to see nebula and galaxies? 

[Knighty2112]

You should be able to see at least the two of the main belts on Jupiter depending on seeing conditions, along with the main 4 Galilaen moons. Saturn’s rings should be easy to make out. As for nebula and galaxies apart from the main ones like M31 & M42 you may struggle unless you have some dark skies. There are quite a few open clusters and globular clusters that you should be able to pick out quite easily though. Mars is coming up to opposition too, so you may get a chance to see a little detail on that, as long as the dust storm raging on it at the moment settles down. 

[John]

Hi,

We have a very good thread on this forum on this topic. Here it is:

Where you see references to a 4 inch refractor (frac) you should be able to see views approaching those described and illustrated, assuming that your viewing conditions are reasonably good. Sometimes you might need to gain some experience observing to get all the details described. There are no cast iron guarantees of course but the above link describes the potential that a scope like yours has.

 

[Waddensky]

18 hours ago, John said:

Sometimes you might need to gain some experience observing to get all the details described.

This is very true. Experience can really make a huge difference in discerning details, splitting close double stars and detecting low contrast.

[LukeSkywatcher]

On 19/07/2018 at 18:33, cthulhugazes said:

Hi all,

So I have a celestron astromaster 114eq telescope and a lot of eye pieces, I’ve successfully seen the moon and Venus (which just looked like a star close up) and was wondering how much detail I could get looking at Jupiter and Saturn? Will I be able to see the rings of Saturn? 

I googled images from my scope when I got it but it wasn’t really helpful in telling me what was used, also is it possible to see nebula and galaxies? 

I could see see the rings of Saturn in a 90mm celestron refrac, so im sure you will see them in a 114. You will also see the bands on Jupiter and its 4 main moons.

Nebs and galaxies should be visible (the larger ones), but you probably wont see great detail. Galaxies will just be "faint fuzzies". TBH, they are just faint fuzzies for most people, unless you go to a dark site.

To observe nebulae, you could do worse then invest in a UHC or OIII filter (or both). £40-50, should get you a good middle of the road one of either. 

There is a website (i can never remember the mane) and you enter your scope details and what EP you are using and pick a target and it shows you a rough guess of what that target should look like with your gear (under perfect conditions). Im sure the next post will have a link to the site. 

[LukeSkywatcher]

The site im thinking of is similar to this:

http://astronomy.tools/calculators/field_of_view/