Telescopes

[p1stonhead]

Can anyone recommend one for home use?

I've just moved to a house in a location with no light pollution and frankly, the sky is incredible. I want a closer look

Complete newbie no idea of what different types do! Some move to find object by themselves by pressing a button I believe? This may be helpful!

Say up to £750?

Thanks all

[2fast748]

Have a quite scan here: http://www.telescopehouse.com/acatalog/Telescopes-...

Go-to mounts make finding specific objects easy but you will get a smaller scope, a bigger scope with a more basic mount will enable you to see more potentially.

[p1stonhead]

2fast748 said:

Have a quite scan here: http://www.telescopehouse.com/acatalog/Telescopes-...

Go-to mounts make finding specific objects easy but you will get a smaller scope, a bigger scope with a more basic mount will enable you to see more potentially.

Thanks

[jmorgan]

I went old school and decided to find my way around. But, the whole;e mount can be upgraded at a later date. This gave me more loot to get a bigger light bucket and work up from that. On top of that a good set of legs, solid and stable.

But what I did first was find out what the different types did and how they did it. For my light polluted back garden I went for a Newtonian and by leaving out the goto stuff, an 8" primary mirror.

[valiant]

Celestron 6se or a 250mm dob would be my choice at that budget.

[Moonhawk]

Go to mounts are good - however they aren't perfect and unless you know how to navigate the sky and what to look for - you will still have difficulty finding objects when the goto mount does not place the object in the field of view (mine is invariably off).

IMO - the best way to start is to by a scope on a manual mount and learn the sky, how to navigate around it, hunt for objects etc. It's loads more rewarding when you find what you are looking for and you'll learn a lot more.

Also - don't be swayed by promises of high magnification. Cheap telescopes often promote wildly ambitions magnifications and the most common question I get asked is "how powerful is the telescope" (meaning magnification). Aside from the planets, moon and the odd DSO and double star - most objects you will be looking at benefit more from large aperture and low magnification (around 50x or even less). Even the planets and the moon will show a lot of detail at 100x.

Personally at that price level i'd got for a 6" or 8" newt on an equatorial mount. Something else to consider - depending on what comes with the scope you may also want some additional eyepieces or filters. Factor the cost of these in too.

The worst thing you can do is buy a decent scope - then put a rubbish eyepiece on it. I have seen the views in even the cheapest Jessops telescope transformed by simply using a good eyepiece.

[jmorgan]

Pretty much what I do, hop around the night sky. Find a known then try to get to the next bit etc.

[RobM77]

I recently wrote a fairly big post about buying your first telescope in reply to a similar thread a month or two ago - a PH search should find it.

HTH

[Moonhawk]

RobM77 said:

I recently wrote a fairly big post about buying your first telescope in reply to a similar thread a month or two ago - a PH search should find it.

HTH

Yep - there have been a few over the last year or so that I have contributed to as well:

http://www.pistonheads.com/gassing/topic.asp?h=0&a...

http://www.pistonheads.com/gassing/topic.asp?h=0&a...

http://www.pistonheads.com/gassing/topic.asp?h=0&a...

http://www.pistonheads.com/gassing/topic.asp?h=0&a...

Loads of information, opinions and advice in them.

[RobM77]

Moonhawk said:

RobM77 said:

I recently wrote a fairly big post about buying your first telescope in reply to a similar thread a month or two ago - a PH search should find it.

HTH

Yep - there have been a few over the last year or so that I have contributed to as well:

http://www.pistonheads.com/gassing/topic.asp?h=0&a...

http://www.pistonheads.com/gassing/topic.asp?h=0&a...

http://www.pistonheads.com/gassing/topic.asp?h=0&a...

http://www.pistonheads.com/gassing/topic.asp?h=0&a...

Loads of information, opinions and advice in them.

Thank you - I didn't have time to search.

[p1stonhead]

RobM77 said:

Moonhawk said:

RobM77 said:

I recently wrote a fairly big post about buying your first telescope in reply to a similar thread a month or two ago - a PH search should find it.

HTH

Yep - there have been a few over the last year or so that I have contributed to as well:

http://www.pistonheads.com/gassing/topic.asp?h=0&a...

http://www.pistonheads.com/gassing/topic.asp?h=0&a...

http://www.pistonheads.com/gassing/topic.asp?h=0&a...

http://www.pistonheads.com/gassing/topic.asp?h=0&a...

Loads of information, opinions and advice in them.

Thank you - I didn't have time to search.

Thanks Moonhawk