*** The Official Astronomy & Universe Thread ***

TNA said:
Got a budget of around £400 (though cheaper would be better) and looking for a scope to do a bit of star gazing. Never had one before. What are your recommendations? :)
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Have a look on Astro Buy Sell and Stargazers Lounge. Do you live under dark skies or willing to transport a scope. I picked up a 9k scope from Astro a while back for 3k so there’s bargains to be had.
 
Saw the ISS this evening. It was quite bright. You could see it even through the thin clouds.

Now I have to see the comet Neiwise, which has not been possible due to cloud cover.
 
lunar said:
Now I have to see the comet Neiwise, which has not been possible due to cloud cover.
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Yeah bit frustrating every time I've looked for it all the sky is clear except the bit around Neowise - couple of times I can just make out very dimly the tail shape is there but unless I knew what I was looking for I'd never have known.
 
Rannoch said:
Have a look on Astro Buy Sell and Stargazers Lounge. Do you live under dark skies or willing to transport a scope. I picked up a 9k scope from Astro a while back for 3k so there’s bargains to be had.
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Will look into it. Thanks.

Seems everyone is spending at least a four figure sum, so nothing decent can be had for £400 brand new I take it?
 
TNA said:
Will look into it. Thanks.

Seems everyone is spending at least a four figure sum, so nothing decent can be had for £400 brand new I take it?
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I think the thing is you need to first figure your requirements. Do you have a lot of storage space? What do you want to look at? What are local light conditions like? How easy do you want to make it?

£400 can get you a large dobsonian. https://www.firstlightoptics.com/dobsonians/skywatcher-skyliner-200p-dobsonian.html but then you need eye pieces, maybe need equipment to collimate it. It is big and takes up a lot of space but you get as lot of light gathering for your money.

Do you want to view planets only, do you have the dark skies to view deep space stuff? Do you want an alt-az mount or are you wanting to learn about equatorial mounts? Alt az can't really be used for long exposures where as equatorial mounts can (this is a very very basic statement).

Honestly, before splashing £400 I'd say have a read around about the capabilities of different options for what you want, and your requirements. I started with a set of £100 binoculars.

Edit : Also ignore magnifications, it's just marketing imo. For example a telescope may be advertised at 400X magnification, it might be able to do 400X magnification, but you won't see anything. The viewing conditions based on the atmosphere is in most cases the limiting factor
 
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VaderDSL said:
I think the thing is you need to first figure your requirements. Do you have a lot of storage space? What do you want to look at? What are local light conditions like? How easy do you want to make it?

£400 can get you a large dobsonian. https://www.firstlightoptics.com/dobsonians/skywatcher-skyliner-200p-dobsonian.html but then you need eye pieces, maybe need equipment to collimate it. It is big and takes up a lot of space but you get as lot of light gathering for your money.

Do you want to view planets only, do you have the dark skies to view deep space stuff? Do you want an alt-az mount or are you wanting to learn about equatorial mounts? Alt az can't really be used for long exposures where as equatorial mounts can (this is a very very basic statement).

Honestly, before splashing £400 I'd say have a read around about the capabilities of different options for what you want, and your requirements. I started with a set of £100 binoculars.

Edit : Also ignore magnifications, it's just marketing imo. For example a telescope may be advertised at 400X magnification, it might be able to do 400X magnification, but you won't see anything. The viewing conditions based on the atmosphere is in most cases the limiting factor
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Thanks. There is a lot more to it then I thought, so will have to start doing research.

The idea was to look at planets yes :)
 
I'm just starting to get into astro photography, and as above the sum of money can get pretty eye watering very quickly.

My plan is to slowly build up some very decent kit over a long period, so I've started with the mount - purchased a Skywatcher HEQ5 Pro (about £750). Luckily I've got a decent SLR and and a 70-200 L lens with a 1.4x converter - not really enough reach for deep space but enough to be able to make out the object I'm imaging while I learn about set up, tracking, exposure times, frames required (bias, dark & flat), and the processing after (I've quickly learnt this is a very significant portion of obtaining good images in astrophotography).

In time, I will purchase a good refractor telescope with plenty of reach (I think about 800mm to 1000mm with a good wide aperture seems to be a decent middle ground from what I have read), and plan to also combine this with a tracking scope for accuracy.

I think if you are only doing visual observations, or only taking short focal length images, the accuracy of the mount becomes much less important, whereas if you plan like me to eventually do deep space at higher focal lengths, with long exposures, the mount is absolutely the most important component.
 
TNA said:
Will look into it. Thanks.

Seems everyone is spending at least a four figure sum, so nothing decent can be had for £400 brand new I take it?
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Large binoculars on a sturdy mount are a good start. Easy to transport to darker skies and simple to use and setup. I can see several galaxies through Helios Lightquest binoculars under dark skies. A second hand dobsonian telescope with good optics are relatively easy to find at a reduced price.
 
Rannoch said:
Large binoculars on a sturdy mount are a good start. Easy to transport to darker skies and simple to use and setup. I can see several galaxies through Helios Lightquest binoculars under dark skies. A second hand dobsonian telescope with good optics are relatively easy to find at a reduced price.
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Thanks for that info. I always imaged telescopes would be much better. But it seems even if they are they cost more for something that is noticeably better than binoculars?
 
TNA said:
How well do you see the moon with it? Also any chance of spotting the ISS or any other planet with them?
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The moon can be great to view with binoculars, but it can be spectacular through a telescope, seeing valleys and mountain tops in light and shadow.

planets wise, you can see the moons of Jupiter for example but you don’t see any details, just a large point of light as the planet and smaller points of light of the moons.

http://www.deepskywatch.com/Articles/what-can-i-see-through-telescope.html The photos on there are probably getting on best case views, a lot of the time due to the atmosphere the views through a telescope will be distorted and blurry, but on the odd time the atmosphere is stable, it can look great.

Binoculars won’t get you details of the planets, they are good for viewing the moon etc. You’ll not see things like the ISS at all with anything.
 
VaderDSL said:
The moon can be great to view with binoculars, but it can be spectacular through a telescope, seeing valleys and mountain tops in light and shadow.

planets wise, you can see the moons of Jupiter for example but you don’t see any details, just a large point of light as the planet and smaller points of light of the moons.

http://www.deepskywatch.com/Articles/what-can-i-see-through-telescope.html The photos on there are probably getting on best case views, a lot of the time due to the atmosphere the views through a telescope will be distorted and blurry, but on the odd time the atmosphere is stable, it can look great.

Binoculars won’t get you details of the planets, they are good for viewing the moon etc. You’ll not see things like the ISS at all with anything.
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Yea, so binoculars are pointless for my needs then. Those medium shots look nice. The large quality ones look spectacular!

It says $600 dollars for the large quality ones. Is it worth grabbing one of those second hand? Or go brand new for something producing the medium quality? I could live with the medium ones by the way, they look impressive too.
 
TNA said:
Yea, so binoculars are pointless for my needs then. Those medium shots look nice. The large quality ones look spectacular!

It says $600 dollars for the large quality ones. Is it worth grabbing one of those second hand? Or go brand new for something producing the medium quality? I could live with the medium ones by the way, they look impressive too.
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good thing, is for planets and the moon, they are bright enough that you don’t need a lot of light gathering capability, so an 80mm or there abouts refractor would do well. They are fairly light and small enough compared to a larger aperture scope, they are sealed, as they use lenses, not mirrors (excluding the eyepiece end) so require less maintenance, you don’t need to collimating mirrors.

maybe something like a skywatcher evostar 9?0? https://www.firstlightoptics.com/evostar/skywatcher-evostar-90-az3.html

Bear in mind the planets do move, so you need to move the scope to follow them, you can get a motorised option but that then adds to the cost.

The below video is sort of the stuff you can expect to see, but again the atmosphere plays a big part in how it looks.

 
Photos taken through a telescope will show more detail than you will see with your eye as you can stack many images together to get more detail. However, nothing beats seeing Jupiter and its moons, the phases of Venus, Mars and the rings of Saturn with your own eyes, no matter how big and small. That the light from the sun travelled millions of miles, reflected off the planet and travels through space, and happens to hit your eye its better than anything you see from Hubble.
 
VaderDSL said:
good thing, is for planets and the moon, they are bright enough that you don’t need a lot of light gathering capability, so an 80mm or there abouts refractor would do well. They are fairly light and small enough compared to a larger aperture scope, they are sealed, as they use lenses, not mirrors (excluding the eyepiece end) so require less maintenance, you don’t need to collimating mirrors.

maybe something like a skywatcher evostar 9?0? https://www.firstlightoptics.com/evostar/skywatcher-evostar-90-az3.html

Bear in mind the planets do move, so you need to move the scope to follow them, you can get a motorised option but that then adds to the cost.

The below video is sort of the stuff you can expect to see, but again the atmosphere plays a big part in how it looks.

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Really appreciate you helping out. Very happy to hear that. That definitely looks good price for performance wise. Looks good for a beginner like me. I wonder how much the motor will add to the cost. Is it something one can add to it?

How does this compare in terms of scope quality? https://www.firstlightoptics.com/evostar/sky-watcher-mercury-707-az-gte.html

The WiFi bit seems interesting, does it find the planet for you using the app or something? If I get better quality images and something that find the planet and track it for me, then it would be worth stretching the extra. That said, maybe could be a bad move as half the fun for a beginner might be to find it myself!
 
Rannoch said:
https://stargazerslounge.com/topic/...ar-5se-w-starsense-autoalign-and-accessories/

Nice little scope, easy to use and comes with Starsense.
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Looks good, but it is about a 2 hour drive and my inexperience I could end up buying something not quite fully functional and not know :p

Also max I wanted to spend was about £400 which I think he would not accept. Thanks for the link though. I will add it to my favourites and pick up my 2nd scope from there in the future perhaps :D
 
TNA said:
Looks good, but it is about a 2 hour drive and my inexperience I could end up buying something not quite fully functional and not know :p

Also max I wanted to spend was about £400 which I think he would not accept. Thanks for the link though. I will add it to my favourites and pick up my 2nd scope from there in the future perhaps :D
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You'll save a fortune if you go second hand. Some people turn it into a business.
 
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