Telescopes

Archive for January, 2010

I am an amateur at astronomy. For the past few months i have been reading books on star gazing and night sky. Now I want to start star gazing on my own. can anyone tell me where i can buy a good Telescope from?

Amazon has some of them
http://www.amazon.com/gp/search?ie=UTF8&keywords=telescope&tag=189-20&index=sporting&linkCode=ur2&camp=1789&creative=9325

also are the short stubby telescopes better, worse or the same as the long ones
im in the market for a telescope that i can see the moon, planets and other things but that isnt super expensive

★ I would like to suggest that you join a local astronomy club or astronomical society BEFORE you spend your money on a real telescope. There are many different kinds of scopes and what is perfect for one person is not perfect for another. Everyone has their own set of eyeballs and no two are the same. If you join a club, you can attend a few of their star parties and try out members scopes to see what works best for YOU, before you buy a scope. The members can also help you when you get your scope and show you how to get the most out of your new scope as well as to help teach you where the treasures in the sky are located. Most clubs have loaner scopes and extensive libraries that you can gather more information from too. Most clubs will have monthly membership meetings with informative presentations given by members and by guest speakers. You can really learn a lot from these clubs and an added plus is all the great new friends you make there too. Go to this site to find a club in your area. http://www.astroleague.org/societies/list
This only has clubs that belong to the National Astronomy League, so there are many more which do not appear on this list. Continue searching google if you don’t see one in your area here.
★There are several different kinds of telescopes and all of them have some excellent features. Refractors and Reflectors, plus Schmidt-Cassegrain, APO refractors, Mac-Cass, and many more. There are also several mounts to chose from and the mounts are just as important, if not even more important, than the scope is. All of the different scopes and mounts have some features that some people like and do not like.
★ No two eyeballs are the same and the perfect scope for one person might be completely wrong for another person.
★There is no one scope that is "better" than another, except for all the junk scopes out there, which are all just a waste of money. Never, ever buy from Walmart, Costco, Target, or any other discount store like that. Junk scopes are flooded into the market from those stores. You will be buying nothing but bad optics and plastic. You must buy from a reputable telescope manufacturer or telescope distributor or telescope store. If they don’t specialize in telescopes, look elsewhere.
★This is a new article from Sky and Telescope that will tell you about a few types of telescopes and how to choose your first telescope.
http://www.skyandtelescope.com/equipment/basics/12511616.html
★ If you are new at this, then stay away from anything used from ANY site. If you don’t know what you are buying and who you are buying from you will most likely be getting someone else’s headache—with no warranty either. Some great deals on used equipment are out there, by people who know how to use and take care of scopes, but if you don’t know what you are doing, you might be spending a lot of money on worthless junk. One improper cleaning can destroy a scope. Buyer Beware.
★I recommend: http://oriontelescopes.com/
Orion is the very best for value and for customer service too. I have 3 of their scopes and I will only buy from them from now on. My first scope was a manual controlled scope and I am very glad that it was because it forced me to learn where things are in the night skies. Go-To type scopes can be frustrating to use. If you do not have them aligned exactly perfect, they do not find the targets. If you are a beginner, you will be frustrated unless you spring for a GPS Go-To. An object locator is just that—it will locate objects for you (must be aligned first) but an object locator is not a tracking motor. It will not keep the scope on the target. The Orion site has some excellent diagrams and explanations of all types of scopes and mounts.
★ Things to consider are size–can the user lift and transport the scope to the viewing site easily? Does it fit in your car? If not, then it will gather dust in a closet. I recommend a carrying case too so it is protected in storage and transport. Can the viewer reach all the knobs and buttons? I have a long tube large manual refractor and it is very difficult for me to reach the knobs when I am pointed to Zenith. I am not a tall person.
★Some people will try to suggest that you get Binnoculars instead of a telescope. That is not a bad idea but at bare minimum you need 10×50 size and you MUST have a tripod for astronomical viewing. Even your pulse will make them shake. My personal preference is a telescope because Binnoculars must be aligned properly at the factory. If they are not, they you see double or triple vision of everything rendering them useless for astronomy. They can easily be bumped out of alignment too, so be very careful.
★ Take your time in making your decision.
★ Don’t try to learn everything all at once or you will be overwhelmed and discouraged. Patience is the key to Astronomy.
★ You will need a good star chart program too.
http://www.stellarium.org/
This is great freeware that you can download. Tell it where you are and it will tell you what you see. I wish you the very best.

I went out to my dads trailer in the woods over the weekend and used my Meade ETX-80 Telescope with both my 4mm and my 26mm eyepiece to view the nearly perfect night sky.

The 26mm to locate interesting things and the 4mm to get a closer look.

I saw two interesting things worth mentioning.

Time- 8:30pm-12:30am Saturday January 9th 2010 Harrison county Ohio.

1.- just rising over the trees was something bright and flickering to the naked eye and through my Meade-80 and 4mm eyepece the object appeared to be changing all kinds of colors. [this was earlier in my night watch]

2.North [looking mostly upwards in the sky] I saw through my Meade-80 and 4mm eyepiece a very bright object that appeared purple/violet. The strange thing about this was I looked back over to just above the trees where I saw the first object and it was no longer there and the only thing as bright as the first object that could have been reasonaly enough like it as far as it moving was the second object….was it being closer to the horizon [just above the trees] the reasons for it to look like a bunch of different colors flashing? [a distortion possibly?] then as it rose higher into the sky the purple waseasier viewed?

I havent been able to take my 10 inch dobsonian out to the woods yet because of how big it is and it is hunting season right now, meaning that my dads car is packed with hunting accesories [guns etc.] so I will have to use the Dob10 in my backyard until spring/summer time when we just go out to the trailer/woods to relax and "camp" and there will be more room to take the Dob10.

I did however use my dob10 in my backyard yesterday and have two things worth mentioning that I saw.

It was a pretty clear night, some light pollution, and a few clouds and its in my sub-urb backyard.

9:30-10:30pm Sunday January 10th 2010 Columbus Ohio [Franklin county]

Through my 9.7mm eyepiece.

3. Bright orange/red disc like object looking upwards in the sky.

4.A VERY bright /white looking object in the sky that looked even from the naked eye to be an interesting view.

I have talked to my astronomy teacher about all of these 4 different interesting views and here are some guesses we both came up with.

1.- A galaxy, Nebula, or double star distorted by the atmosphere.

2.Orion, a nebula.

3. Mars, betelguese.

4.A galaxy, a nebula, Andromeda

All help on finding out what these could have been is greatly appreciated.

Also, on a side note I am purchasing a webcam tommorow, I will be using it for recording personal videogame maps that I have built, maybe to chat with friend through and I want to use it on my sopes [sort of a multi-purpose cause]

I was wondering what would be a good webcam to buy for the pricerange of 50-$100?

I am going to be buying it at the store. Also, do I have to hook it up to a laptop or computer while I am recording necissarily? Or can I record it on spot and then look at it later on a computer or laptop? [I realize bringing out a laptop would be easier because looking at the object on screen would make things much easier and I will have access to a laptop sometimes while I do this but other times I may just have to record and look at later on my computer.]

Thanks for the help.

http://www.stellarium.org/
This is great freeware that you can download. Tell it where you are and it will tell you what you see. Ask it where something is and it will show you. This FREE program will be able to tell you exactly what objects that you ask about.

You did not tell us what directions that you were looking when you saw most of the objects that you saw, except the north purple one, so no one can do much more than take a few wild guesses. My guesses would be that the flashing you saw was the star Sirius and that the reddish thing you saw was Mars. The flashing is due to atmospheric disturbances in the Earth’s atmosphere.