Anyone own a telescope?

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RoyGBiv
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Re: Anyone own a telescope?

Post by RoyGBiv »

We bought a 4-inch reflector when we lived in the middle of nowhere in NC. It was enough to make out the rings of Saturn in a clear night sky. Used it to view Hale-Bopp in '97... Pretty spectacular. Last time we had it out of the box was to see a lunar eclipse a few years ago.
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WildBill
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Re: Anyone own a telescope?

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TAM - That is surprising the upgrade is not available. You are correct that nudging a bit will keep the subject in view. That is okay, but if viewing with a group of people or taking time lapse photos, it's very good to have. At any rate you will have a great deal of fun with your new toy.

I borrowed my brother's telescope back in 2003. I took it to a friend's house to have a Mars viewing party. This was in the SF Bay area and the weather and visibility wasn't the best, but we still had a decent view. The moon and Jupiter were out so we got to view them. I was surprised how few people had actually viewed the moon, Mars, Saturn or Jupiter's moons firsthand using a telescope.

Just for curiosity I checked out the Vixen R200SS. The cost is around $1700. The cost of the motorized equatorial mound and tripod is more than the telescope!
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Re: Anyone own a telescope?

Post by philip964 »

Aperture fever because you have to feed it.

With the 8 inch you will easily see the cloud bands on Jupiter plus Jupiters moons.

The advantage of the Dob is big aperture. Photography is more difficult due to the lack of a polaris aligned mount. (Axis of the mount aligns with the North Star) Thus to counteract the Earths rotation two movements are required to keep the image centered. No big deal viewing, but a big deal for timed photography.

I got my telescope for Hally's Comet in 1986. I'll see if I can find a photo I took to post.

One thing that you can spend money on that will transfer to your next telescope is eyepieces or oculars and filters.

You may want to "invest" in a low power wide field eyepiece if you didn't get that.

See I've got you buying that 14 inch Dob already. Saturn looks 3 dimensional on a 14 inch plus you see the shadow of the ring on the surface of the planet. The Casini division in the rings is as plain as the nose no your face.
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The Annoyed Man
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Re: Anyone own a telescope?

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philip964 wrote:Aperture fever because you have to feed it.

With the 8 inch you will easily see the cloud bands on Jupiter plus Jupiters moons.

The advantage of the Dob is big aperture. Photography is more difficult due to the lack of a polaris aligned mount. (Axis of the mount aligns with the North Star) Thus to counteract the Earths rotation two movements are required to keep the image centered. No big deal viewing, but a big deal for timed photography.

I got my telescope for Hally's Comet in 1986. I'll see if I can find a photo I took to post.

One thing that you can spend money on that will transfer to your next telescope is eyepieces or oculars and filters.

You may want to "invest" in a low power wide field eyepiece if you didn't get that.

See I've got you buying that 14 inch Dob already. Saturn looks 3 dimensional on a 14 inch plus you see the shadow of the ring on the surface of the planet. The Casini division in the rings is as plain as the nose no your face.
I'm already planning two other purchases; one in the not too distant future, and one in the next few years. I haven't settled specifically on what models they will be, but they'll fill a specific role. The first will be a small very portable scope, possibly with some kind of drive mechanism....something that I can easily take on a camping trip/road trip while still having a enough room in the car for other things. The second will be for when my wife and I finally acquire some property. I'd like to have a larger, much more expensive telescope, and I'd put it in a spot that's really set up for it, in a semipermanent installation.....something like a 16" dobsonian with a tracking drive. You could go crazy with this stuff, but there's a limit to how much I'd be willing to spend. I saw on the Meade website a 20" reflector that cost $35,000. That's too rich for my blood; but I already have a couple of rifles and optics that are worth the price of a VERY nice telescope, so something like a 16" dobsonian with a tracking drive for under $4,000 might be a possibility down the road.

This one here is $3,650: http://www.telescope.com/Orion-SkyQuest ... 102659.uts
Image

Just not right now.

As far as cameras go, I found this little doohickey which does connect to a computer: http://www.telescope.com/Orion-StarShoo ... 103029.uts.
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The Annoyed Man
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Re: Anyone own a telescope?

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philip964 wrote:One thing that you can spend money on that will transfer to your next telescope is eyepieces or oculars and filters.

You may want to "invest" in a low power wide field eyepiece if you didn't get that.
Here's what came with mine:
  • 35mm Orion DeepView telescope eyepiece, 2"
  • Orion Shorty 2x Barlow lens, 1.25"
  • 25mm Orion Sirius Plossl telescope eyepiece, 1.25"
I'm assuming that the 25mm lens will give a wider angle view than the 35m??
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WildBill
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Re: Anyone own a telescope?

Post by WildBill »

Too rich for my blood, but IMO this is the ultimate small light-weight high quality telescope. The light weight Titanium 7.
http://www.questarcorporation.com/questar.htm

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philip964
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Re: Anyone own a telescope?

Post by philip964 »

It's been a while so forgive me if I'm wrong here but I believe you take the objective main lens focal length and divide by the focal length of the eyepiece. That gives you the magnification.

From the size of your telescope times two since there are two mirrors inside I'm guessing that it is 2000 mm.

So taking 2000/35 : 57 x. or. 2000/25. : 80 x

Your 35 is the wide angle. They make I think a 75mm polssel for a real wide angle view.

Then the other way you add the Barlow to increase magnification. But you will want to get a 7 or 10 mm for real high power views of the moon and planets.

But again the prettiest views will be wide angle.

Your 8 inch width is about 200mm divided by the 2000mm length gives you a F 10 camera stop. Which is also why the exposures end up being timed for so long.

I bought my little 3 " travel telescope on EBay. There is a lot of used stuff there. I got a little Celestron c90 complete with case and lots of accessories. It's perfect for throwing in the car. The questor is the Louis Vitton of telescopes they are a small fortune even on eBay. But remember its a numbers game a telescope with the biggest lens win regardless of how much it costs.
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Re: Anyone own a telescope?

Post by troglodyte »

Dobs are great. For several years my 8th grade classes made them. I got a local grant for the optics and they designed and put the rest together. After a little in-field tweaking they would all work. Most were perfectly acceptable but we did see the rings of Saturn.

They are pretty easy to make but for $450 it is worth the time and effort to get the Orion.

I need to get one...
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Re: Anyone own a telescope?

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I haven't had my Meade ETX 125EC out in a long time now----reading this makes me want to go open it up and use it again. Seems like time just flys by now and never enough time to do stuff that I used to do.

The electonic controller with "go to" is really nice to have. I was really surprised the first time watching the moon how fast it move out of view without the controller, the sun is the same way, just have to be very careful with the sun. Besides your eyes it will melt the telescope in short order.

Congrats on your purchase and enjoy it.
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Re: Anyone own a telescope?

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I bought my wife a 4" newtonian years ago which we have since given to my sister. She took an astronomy class when we both attended Pepperdine and I would tag along to the observation trips up on top of Latigo Canyon. The professor had a 10" Schmidt-cassegrain and after looking through that, with gps alignment and photo adapter, I will save up until I can buy one. It was stunning.

Your scope looks awesome TAM and I'm sure you'll enjoy it. The 4" we had just was a little too difficult to really run well. My wife is 4' 10" and had a real problem getting up to the objective. Alignment issues also plagued that scope. We found it really tough to get dialed in. We managed to get it pretty good a few times and saw some amazing stuff but I can't even begin to describe how much an auto aligning scope helps. It gets really frustrating when you can't find what you're looking for in the sky.

You're post has me all fired up to find any "star party" groups out here. Last one I attended was in Frasier Park off of I-5 many years ago.
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Re: Anyone own a telescope?

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olafpfj wrote:You're post has me all fired up to find any "star party" groups out here. Last one I attended was in Frasier Park off of I-5 many years ago.
Maybe we can find a local club together. Also, while it is a bit of a drive, my wife was talking to a friend of hers yesterday who told her that there are astronomy parties put on at the observatory at Fort Davis, Texas. It's a day's drive, and it would mean really a 2-3 trip, but it might be a pretty cool thing.
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Re: Anyone own a telescope?

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I'm jealous, been wanting an 8 or 10 inch Orion Dub for many years, just haven't been able to swing it yet.
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Re: Anyone own a telescope?

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Jaguar wrote:I'm jealous, been wanting an 8 or 10 inch Orion Dub for many years, just haven't been able to swing it yet.
You can get the base 8" for $350. That's not a paltry sum, but it is at the lower range of what you'd pay for a gun, for instance.
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Re: Anyone own a telescope?

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The Annoyed Man wrote:
Jaguar wrote:I'm jealous, been wanting an 8 or 10 inch Orion Dub for many years, just haven't been able to swing it yet.
You can get the base 8" for $350. That's not a paltry sum, but it is at the lower range of what you'd pay for a gun, for instance.
Yep, going to bite the bullet sooner or later. Kids are expensive - and the priority at the moment.
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Re: Anyone own a telescope?

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The Annoyed Man wrote:
Jaguar wrote:I'm jealous, been wanting an 8 or 10 inch Orion Dub for many years, just haven't been able to swing it yet.
You can get the base 8" for $350. That's not a paltry sum, but it is at the lower range of what you'd pay for a gun, for instance.
Good point--I paid $3K for a rifle; I wonder how much telescope that would buy.
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