Was just gifted a Celestron Astromaster 130 EQ.

[TalkingPie]

So my dad had an old telescope that he no longer needed or used (as it was broke, easily fixable) so he gave it to me as I'd recently expressed my interest in astronomy, I love looking at the stars at night but no next to nothing about astronomy or telescopes for that matter.

My first question is does anyone have any firsthand experience with this telescope and how was it? what can I expect to observe with this?

Are all Celestron eyepieces universal? How would I go about selecting new ones?

Any other advice would be greatly appreciated thanks. 

 

[Dr Strange]

It is a good starter telescope. Check out the book Turn Left at Orion. Another good book is the Pocket Sky Atlas from Sky and Telescope. Both are good starting points.  I believe it uses a 1.25"/31.75mm focuser which means any 1.25" eyepiece (EP) should work in it. 

[Ricochet]

12 hours ago, TalkingPie said:

Are all Celestron eyepieces universal? How would I go about selecting new ones?

These days all eyepieces are universal, you don't have to stick to Celestron. There are three common sizes you might encounter:

• 0.985" - only found on old telescopes or with really, really, cheaply made modern scopes.
• 1.25" - Most modern eyepieces are this size, and this is the size your telescope takes.
• 2" - Required for long focal length, wide field of view eyepieces. Your telescope can't use these.

With regards to selecting new eyepieces, the first thing that you should do is to get some experience using the ones you've got so that you can better understand the features that an eyepiece will have and what is important to you, for example the eye relief (distance your eye must be from the lens) and apparent field of view (how big the image circle appears when you are looking through the eyepiece).

Once you have that knowledge you need to decide on what your budget is for a new eyepiece and what you want to observe with that eyepiece. For instance, if you want a finder eyepiece to maximise the true field of view that your telescope can deliver then you will want to be looking at something like a 32mm Plossl or a 24mm 68° eyepiece. If you want a good general purpose DSO eyepiece then you will want something that produces an exit pupil in the 2-2.5mm range, which with your f5 scope corresponds to a focal length of 10-12.5mm. For planetary viewing look for something that gives a 0.85-1mm exit pupil, so a 4-5mm eyepiece.

Having found candidates that fit your requirements, search for reviews on those eyepieces look for reviews on them and feel free to post here for people to give advice on an eyepiece and/or alternatives.