Telescopes

Archive for the ‘Bushnell Telescope’ Category

I have a Bushnell North Star "Go To" Telescope. I got it yesterday. I assembled it and then took it outside to search the night’s sky. Although, I couldn’t see anything! Every time I align the red dot with the celestial object, for example, the moon, I look through the eyepiece(20mm) and see total darkness. It says something about looking through the main telescope tube in the instruction manual, although I don’t see why I would….I see nothing in it as well. The instruction booklet is very poorly written. I don’t see what I’m doing wrong here. I took the 20mm eyepiece out of it’s 2 plastic tubes and removed the protective thing off the main telescope tube. Am I missing something here?????
Oh, and earlier today (during day) I looked through my eyepiece when I had the red dot finder scope thing pointed at a tree, and I was able to see the tree clarified and zoomed in on my eyepiece like it’s supposed to be. However when I looked through it tonight, I got zip, nothing, nada.

Sounds as though the sighter scope is not correctly aligned with the main telescope.
The reason the instructions ask you to look through the main tube, is to confirm that the image you see in the sighter scope, is the same image in the main telescope.
Generally, the sighter scope has 3 small screws that you have to carefully adjust, so that it aligns with an objecgt correctly.
You have to repeat the adjusting exercise a few times (sighter, then telescope, then sighter, then telescope etc) a few times to get the alignment correct.

Secondly, lining up celestial objects is harder to do than lining up terrestrial ones such as a tree; this is because the margin for alignment error is greater in the former case, and will continue to be the case until you line up the sighter with the telescope correctly.

Repeat the exercise with the tree, tonight, and sweep toward a really bright object such as the moon or Venus (not sure of your location, so maybe the moon is your best shot)

Be patient, and enjoy

I got it today and i set it up and took all the lens cvers off and the dust covers. there are 3 piece things you put into the eye piece and i think its the magnifiiers. on them it says 12.5mm 8mm and sr4mm. what do they mean? i put the 12.5mm in and i cant see anything except black. i tried focussing it on something but i couldnt see anyting so i couldnt focus it on anything. any suggestions? i really want to use it!!!
heres a link to the telescope intstruction manual:
http://bushnell.com/manuals/telescopes/SkyTour_Voyager.pdf

thank you!!!
haha never mind. i made reallly stupid mistake. the thing that pokes out of the side of the selsecope i thought had to be at the bottom and you look up at the other end. i was wrong. that parts supposed to be at the top. haha and i thought the picture on the instruction manual was wrong. THANKS BOTH OF YOU THOUGH!!!!

Did you remove _both_ parts of the front lens cover? These often come in two parts, like a doughnut and its hole, and you must remove _both_ parts, so that the entire end of the telescope is open. Try using the telescope in daylight first, to get used to how it works, focusing on something at least a quarter mile away. If it’s still black, the telescope may need collimation: alignment of its mirrors. If you look in the eyepiece holder without an eyepiece in place, you should see the secondary mirror. In it should be a reflection of the primary mirror at the bottom of the tube, and in that a reflection of the top end of the tube with the secondary mirror in the middle supported by three or four struts. All three mirrors should be concentric. Adjust the secondary mirror to centre the reflection of the primary mirror, and adjust the primary mirror to centre the reflection of the secondary mirror: ((o))

The three eyepieces provide different magnifications. You will use the 12.5 mm the most: it provides 72 power. The 8mm gives 112x. The 4mm would give 225x, but this is more power than this Telescope is capable of. Use the 12.5mm!

I recommend NightWatch by Terence Dickinson (Firefly) as a good book to help you get started.

I just got it today and assembled it. I went outside and looked into the lens I see nothing why is that?

You’d be better off starting during the day than at night, where you can try focusing on distance objects (trees, houses) and you can see what you’re doing. Make sure you took the lens cap off the end, and that you’ve put an eyepiece in the eyepiece holder and focuses it correctly. After that’s done, if you still can’t see anything, join a local astronomy club. They’ll be happy to help you.