celestron 8se and planets

[Planethunter59]

when i look at Saturn or Jupitur all i see is white no colors  25mm ep alone or with 2x barlow ep is flossl or even my 7mm 82 deg ep what am i doing wrong and the planets look very small

[Stu]

Whereabouts are you, and what time are you trying? You need to wait for them to get as high as possible to get the best detail.

Also, how good is your barlow? Which Plossl are you using? Somewhere around x150 to x180 often works well for Jupiter when conditions are good. In your scope that would be in the 11 to 14mm ish range. In an 8SE you should see subtle colour in the bands and the Great Red Spot should appear a pink, red or orange colour depending on how it looks this year, I haven’t seen it so far.

Other things to check are your scope’s collimation as that has a big impact on planetary contrast, and ensure the scope is cooled well for an hour or so before using it at high power.

Are you seeing the equatorial bands clearly?

[Planethunter59]

i am half way between houston and dallas in the country  the plossl is celestron came with the scope bought last month the barlow is celestron X-CEL LX  scop is outside about 8;30 pm viewing at 10pm to 1am they have to clear the trees first before i can see i can tell it is saturn because of the ring but the size is no bigger than a star i thought it should be bigger and it is only white

[Stu]

16 minutes ago, Planethunter59 said:

i am half way between houston and dallas in the country  the plossl is celestron came with the scope bought last month the barlow is celestron X-CEL LX  scop is outside about 8;30 pm viewing at 10pm to 1am they have to clear the trees first before i can see i can tell it is saturn because of the ring but the size is no bigger than a star i thought it should be bigger and it is only white

Well it should be pretty well placed by then, and the Celestron Barlow is good. At x161 (25mm plus barlow) you should clearly see the disk and rings with some surface detail.

[Planethunter59]

am i way out of focus because when its brightest and clearist it is so small in my ep shouldent it be bigger and the moon is full and not for to the left does that make a differance its not in the view of the scope thou

[Stu]

1 hour ago, Planethunter59 said:

am i way out of focus because when its brightest and clearist it is so small in my ep shouldent it be bigger and the moon is full and not for to the left does that make a differance its not in the view of the scope thou

Objects are smallest when they are focused, so it sounds like you are focused. Planets are small, and never really appear huge in the eyepiece but they are clearly much bigger than stars, and your scope should be capable of showing good detail on Saturn and Jupiter.

I would have another go, and spend plenty of time at the eyepiece really observing what you see. The disk will clearly be a disk, rather than a point like a star. See if you can see any differing shades in the rings, as well as the separation between the rings and planets. Often the detail is not obvious on first glance but can be seen after observing for a while.

[Planethunter59]

ok will give it another try tonight clear skys i also have a celestron luminos 7mm 82 deg would this be to much and will any filters help  #12 deep yellow #21 orange #80A light blue or @96nd-0.3 and thank you for all the advise and info because i dont no what i am doing