Help

[Phia123]

Hi I'm new, with both this website and observing the solar system.😁 Christmas is coming up so I was wondering which lens I should get for my telescope. I have a Celestron StarSense Explorer, and I only have a 10mm and a 20mm lens, plus a Barlow Lens. With the 10mm and Barlow lens I could only see a small dot for Mars and its two moons, which was really cool, but I would still like to see a pigment. I would also like to see nebulae, Saturn, Jupiter and other planets. Which lens's should I get? Please write soon I am really excited to start.☺️

 

[Zermelo]

Hello,

and welcome to SGL.

It will help if you can tell us the actual model of your telescope.

I think you might be mistaken in having seen the moons of Mars - they are really very small and faint.

[Broadymike]

For a start if they're the eyepieces/barlow that came with the scope I would chuck the 10mm and barlow in the bin straight away, the 20mm may be a bit more acceptable. Celestron (as with most manufacturers) supply really cheap eps with their scopes. 

 

I would replace the barlow for a decent one. Possibly an 8-24mm zoom ep could be an idea as you can try out different powers to find out what works best with your scope and then buy individual eps when you know what works. I got an svbony 8-24mm and it's actually an acceptable bit of kit. Other than that possibly a 32mm ep which will give you a far bigger field of view which makes locating targets much easier. 

 

When choosing eps try not to get ones which the barlow makes irrelevant.  Basically why have a 20mm and 10mm when a barlowed 20mm is the same magnification as the 10mm. Better of say having 32mm, 25mm and a 10mm. Or something similar.  This with a barlow gives you the equivalent of 32mm, 25mm, 16mm, 10mm and 5mm. This would give a pretty good range of magnifications. Without knowing the exact model its hard to tell what would work. Just remember it's not worth over magnifying as it just makes things fuzzy. As a general rule of thumb twice the aperture of your scope (in mm) will give you the maximum useful magnification. 

 

Like with all these things your budget will massively affect the quality. If on a tight budget the astro essentials plossls from FLO are pretty good for the price. Both my 32mm and 2x barlow are from them and are good for the price (£45 for the 2 of them) my other eps are all svbony. They all seem to be more than acceptable. Obviously if you're not on a really tight budget like myself (us musicians don't make a lot of money lol) then there are much better quality options out there. Both these budget friendly option were researched so I knew I wasn't buying complete crap. I'd definitely steer clear of cheap "amazon" non branded stuff as you really don't know what you're getting. 

Edited January 3, 2022 by Broadymike