Advice on my new Astromaster scope

[johnkirkpatrick]

Hi, I've just bought my first telescope "Astromaster 130 EQ DM" so far i havent understood how to fully use my scope and have just been pointing it in a area that looks nice mainy the moon and Orion. havent seen anything yet. lol. I think am using the wrong eyepiece as i only have what came with my scope "20mm Erecting eyepiece and a 10mm eyepiece(which seems to give me a mirror image view). After watching countless episode of Universe,The Universe and Extreme Universe I thought its about time to see for my self. Any help and advice would be really great. thanks

[Chris H]

I have not seen any episodes of Universe so I don't know what you've seen on it. If it showed you bright images of nebula and detailed photos of planets thats not what you will see with a scope. Nearly all objects in the night sky are dim, with the exception of the planets some nebula and star clusters, and hence they are called faint fuzzies. Are your expectations too high?

Your scope is a reflecting telescope and because of this the mirror flips the image, for astronomy this is not a problem. Your eyeieces are probably fine, firstly you have to check your scope is collimated this means you have to check your mirrors are properly alligned then get yourself some star charts and get out under the night sky and learn your way around the constellations. If you persevere things should fall into place and you will start to see things. I have a Skywatcher 130 Heritage which is the same size as your scope and I can see plenty with it. Good luck.

[scogyrd]

Your eyeieces are probably fine

To be honest I don't think much of the eps that came with my 130eq, my meade 4000s seem much better.

[John]

To be honest I don't think much of the eps that came with my 130eq, my meade 4000s seem much better.

Yes, the Meade 4K's are quite a bit better than those supplied as standard with most scopes and pretty reasonable to buy 2nd hand as well

I notice there are some decent low cost plossls for sale in our classifieds section at the moment (not by me ) so it's worth a look if you feel you want to increase your set