My Frustration

[creatureofhabit]

I recently got a Celestron Powerseeker 127 EQ. I have yet to see anything with it. When I look in it all I see is black. The last time I used it I pointed it at what I’m almost positive was Mars, I did see it but I could see it better by looking at it with the naked eye. After many hours of searching on the internet the only help I have found, they say to take dust cover off … well I know I’m not the smarts person on the planet, but I’m smart enough to know to do that. I have also read that if you look at any land based object it will appear upside down. Well mine doesn’t its sideways and I’m not sure if that has anything to do with it are not. In my mind what does it matter, what is up and what is down in space? And everyone says I should get a better lens for it but no one has said what lens I should get.

I know I get ahead of myself a lot. I plain on doing this and I want to do that. I want to take pictures of what I see, but than my bubble gets popped when I realize that I need a telescope that actually works first. I can’t afford to get another scope. My wife almost killed me and the UPS man when it arrived (I guess I should of told her I got it). I’m starting to get frustrated with all of this and I really don’t want to. What better way to spend your evenings than staring up into the unknown?

P.S. I know this is a UK based website (I live in the US) and its like 2 or 3 in the morning over there but please leave a comment and or suggestion on what I can do to get it working and I will read them and reply.

Thank you, Chris

[PeterM]

Hi Chris,

I'm sorry to hear you're having a difficult time getting started but, believe me, as a relative noob myself I can assure you that's not uncommon. I'm not sure where you're based in the US and as all of the following will be from the perspective of someone based in the UK please do ignore anything that doesn't work from your location.

Re Mars, it's really difficult to get a decent view of Mars at the moment but even so I'm guessing from your description that you were looking at a nearby star instead. It's really, really easily done and I'm pretty sure even the most seasoned observer does it from time to time.

If you don't have any books I can recommend picking up a copy of Turn Left at Orion. It's been written for people exactly in your situation and is really helpful. For each season it show you how to find the most commonly used marker stars and then to use those to find other interesting things to look at.

Other than that how about going for targets that are noticeably different from stars - Saturn and the Moon? The Moon is fantastic and you'll get some great views with your scope and while Saturn might be tricky to find initially there's really no mistaking it for a star.

As regards eyepieces which ones came with your scope?

Pete

[MarkF]

Hi Chris,

First of all I am no expert but I do have a 114mm EQ celestron Newtonian scope which is similar to yours although its quite old and for me quite disappointing in its performance, I have recently bought a 80mm refractor which gives better images but its probably the age of my scope.

If you are seeing daylight images and they are crisp then you should see at least back ground stars looking into the night sky even if you point to an area you cannot see anything with the naked eye.

Use the 20mm eyepiece that came with the scope the 4mm will darken everything down unless you are looking at a bright object such as the moon or a planet. Mars ATM doesn't look much better through a scope than not ATM due to its distance but with Saturn and the 20mm you should at least make out the rings and a disk although probably no detail.

You may be suffering with a kidney beaning effect trying moving your eye away or closer to the eyepiece and move your head around slightly, if you do not line your pupil up with the light exiting the eyepiece correctly it looks black.

The Newt is a very simple design and apart from collimation out of the box it should just work do a google on how it works if you haven't and that should help you trouble shoot.

Not sure what lattitude you are but the further North you are the sky does not really get dark I am at 51 degrees North and do not experience true darkness but after midnight for about an hour its acceptable.

Stick with it, there's a lot to learn and an EQ mount is not the easiest to master as a beginner.

Check out Astro-Baby Astronomy Website for some very useful info and tips as a starting point Astrobaby is a member here and her website is a must for beginners for understanding collimation and how things work with the reflector.

[tinvek]

have you tried looking at the moon ? that's bright enough to show up pretty much no matter what and should help you get a better idea what's going on. one thing you have to be carefull of is focusing, it's very easy to either miss the point when things are in focus or not get close to the focus point at all

[John]

I agree that starting with the moon is a great idea - it's much easier to find than most astro objects and it will give you the chance to find out about your scopes workings on an easy target. Mars is a very difficult one at the moment !.

If your scope is pointing at the moon and you put a low power eyepiece in and see nothing then you definately have a problem but I suspect the blackness you saw was that the scope was not precisely pointing where you thought it was - it does need to be precise as the scopes angle of view, even with a low power eyepiece, is very narrow.

It does take time to get used to using an astro scope - they are not really "plug and play" even with todays technology.

[Space Oddity6]

I'm pretty much exactly at the stage you are OP in that I recently got my Skywatcher 130 and am a complete noob. I took my scope outside a few days ago with a wishlist of viewing Saturn and Mars and I have no idea what I ended up seeing, probably some very distant stars. Should be another clear sky for me tonight so I'll try again.

What I did after I assembled my scope though was to keep it indoors for a few nights, and view the Moon and Venus from the comfort of my room. Obviously this isn't what they recommend as the heat from the house can distort the viewing but for me it was great just to get a feel for the equatorial mount and to generally start out.

[Space Cowboy]

Definitely start with the moon. I have used the scope you have and though its not the best scope in the world its certainly good enough to view the moon and planets. Make sure your finder-scope is aligned accurately. I would not bother with the 4mm eyepiece at the moment very tough to look through for a beginner. Concentrate on the 20mm and barlow, maybe purchase a 10mm. Patience is the name of the game especially with focussing. I remember first using my scope and could not see anything only to find it was so far out of focus that the stars became invisible.

[creatureofhabit]

I agree with starting the moon, but unfortunately I work nights. And the night that’s I've been off the moon hasn't been out. I do believe I am trying to start to big. what I think I'm going to do is get some books like Turn Left at Orion (I like that name) and just lay out in the backyard and stare at the sky. And see if I can make since of some of what's up there.

The eyepiece that came with it is a 20mm with a x3 barlow

my latitude is 43° and I live in the middle of nowhere in south Louisiana lights isn't an issue … but mosquitoes are lol

And I'm assuming seeing how no one has said anything about it that land based objects being sideways and not upside down is not a probable?

Chris

[RobH]

The moon is visible in the day at the moment. Give it a go.

The 20mm eyepiece is all you need to start with....the shorter the focal length of the eyepiece (i.e. 4mm), the higher the magnification, and the smaller the field of view (FOV). A smaller FOV makes an object much harder to find.

The 3x Barlow will increase magnification even more....for the moment, leave this in its box.

Just get used to finding objects using the finderscope and the 20mm eyepice.

Cheers

Rob

[northcanadian]

Have you downloaded Stellarium (an excellent free program)?

I highly recommend it...as other SGL members recommended it to me when I started out.

[creatureofhabit]

I have the program that came with the telescope "The Sky"(I think it's called) but I'm not too impressed. I am downloading Stellarium now. I also have a app called "Planets" for my iphone that I like

The 3x Barlow will increase magnification even more....for the moment, leave this in its box.

that's answers another question i have thanks

Ok I'll ask it one more time and if no answers it I'll take it is a "nope don’t matter" … is it a problem that land based objects are not upside down but sideways?

Chris

[RobH]

Hello Chris.

No, it isn't a problem

Refractors flip images one way, reflectors another.

Don't worry about it.

Cheers

Rob

[msinclairinork]

Also Chris you may know this already but no one has pointed it out yet so I will...Veiwing through the eyepeace can sometimes be difficult at first as you can either be too close to it or to far away and also your eye lashes can obscure your view, and make things look dark. I found this happend to me when i first got going. so as mentioned before get looking at the moon as its so bright you cant miss and then experement moving your eye further back or forth and opening it wider, this will give you good practice to when you move back to the planets..if you catch my drift...

Good luck mate you'l get their i promise!

Michael

[creatureofhabit]

Rob that's the answer i was hoping for, thank you

I think I know what one of my problems was … in my current job I spend hours a pone hours staring into a microscope (I’m a mudlogger/geologist in the oilfield), so I know there’s a fine line between focused and unfocused. I think I was focusing to fast and therefore wasn’t able to find the “sweet spot”.

Oh and I lied on the earlier post my lat is 32° not 43°

Chris

[Astro_Baby]

I wouldn't mess with collimation at all unless you know for sure its out of whack.

My advice would be to test the scope out in the daytime - whatever you do dont even go NEAR the sun. Make sure you are pointing away from it for sure one fglimpse of that in the scope can blind you - literally.

Take a look at some distant objects and see if it focuses ok. Chances are it will be fine. The Powerseeker 127 appears to be quite a slow focal ratio so will be quite tolerant of collimation errors (whats collimation - well lets leave that for now). Make sure the scope focuses ok and get to know how the mount works - EQ mounts can be a bit weird for beginners.

You will need to polar align the mount so take a quick look here on how to do that - this guide was written for the EQ2 mount but its very similar to the EQ1 you have with the Powerseeker Simple Polar Alignment for Beginners

Get the hang of the mount first - its always a source of stress for beginners to this hobby.

Next up make sure the finder is aligned to the scopes main optics - that just means the dinky little finderscope on top should be aiming at the same thing as the view through the main scope.

Use simple targets to start with - Mars is going to be hard right now - even in bigger scopes it looks like a tiny pink blob so take a look at the big stuff - the moon is good for a start and will allow you to practice.

Enjoy the moon and Saturn for now - wait for Jupiter in a few months and also the Orion Nebula- easy target in winter.

Dont get too depressed too soon - this hobby requires patience by the boatload and it can be a steep learning curve - stick with it and you will get lots of help from people on this board for sure.

Mel