Which telescope.

[The Rover]

Evening.

I fancy buying a telescope, not to perv the lady over the road but because I’m a bit of a nerd!

I’m going to spend up to £150ish which I know is only going to get me a fairly basic one but I was wondering if anyone on here had any recommendations?

Cheers Stuart.

 

[Drago]

These days that puts you into half decent reflector territory. Less chromatic aberration than a refractor. Likely a Newtonian or Cassegrain.

 

[C R]

These days that puts you into half decent reflector territory. Less chromatic aberration than a refractor. Likely a Newtonian or Cassegrain.

A Newtonian with a well corrected eyepiece should be good. Try first if you can, though. The cheaper ones can have low quality eyepieces with bad chromatic aberration. The other thing to keep in mind is the mount, again, cheaper ones can have reasonable optics but unstable mounts that make it hard to see anything clearly at higher magnification.

 

[Drago]

Do people still use eye pieces? The few astronomers I'm still in contact with (undergrad in Planetary Studies, Postgrad Celestial Mechanics) all use optical sensors that feed their laptops.

The amount of kit your money buys you these days is phenomenal. Motorised equatorial mount linked to your computer and you can set the telescope up in the garden and sit in a warm house to do the on service or recording.

 

[C R]

Do people still use eye pieces? The few astronomers I'm still in contact with (undergrad in Planetary Studies, Postgrad Celestial Mechanics) all use optical sensors that feed their laptops.

The amount of kit your money buys you these days is phenomenal. Motorised equatorial mount linked to your computer and you can set the telescope up in the garden and sit in a warm house to do the on service or recording.

It depends on how much you spend. The sort of kit you mention would start at around £350, a reflector with manual equatorial mount can be had for half that.

 

[sight-pin]

Have a word and look at 'For Sale / Swap' in 'Stargazers Lounge'.

 

[Drago]

Oh aye, his basic telescope comes in on budget, but my point being that in days of yore such stuff would have been unimaginable, and 15 years ago still the domain of universities and organisations with deep pockets, and now so some astonishing kit is within easy reach of amateurs. I've never been a practical astronomer- it fascinates me, but ive always been a theory and facts chap - but what an amazing era it is now for the hands on folks.

 

[cisamcgu]

Search on amazon for this :

Celestron 31051 AstroMaster 130EQ Reflector Telescope Motor Drive

£166 - equatorial mount, motor drive.

 

[Rooster1]

I have a manual telescope, A bresser reflector and unfortunately due to my low intelligence I have never managed to align it to a planet. I desparetely want a computerised one that I can tell the PC to align to a planet. I have been looking and I have a shortlist. Quite affordable too.

 

[Joey Shabadoo]

I would like to get one for my wife, ideally one she could access remotely from her wheelchair but there's more streetlights round here than the Las Vegas strip.

 

[numbnuts]

I would like to get one for my wife, ideally one she could access remotely from her wheelchair but there's more streetlights round here than the Las Vegas strip.

That in one reason why I gave up the other was too many cloudy nights

 

[SpokeyDokey]

A thoroughly disappointing hobby unless you can afford a whopping great telescope, computerised mount and decent digital photographic gear linked up to it.

Once the novelty of looking at the moon, a smudge of red that could be Mars and a blurry outline that might be Saturn's rings wears off then the telescope ends up in the attic - much like many shiny new bikes end up as spider homes in garages.

I wouldn't be surprised if a good many people buy a telescope expecting to see glorious colourful images of distant galaxies etc just like on the TV or web. It's never going to happen.

Same with stars. Where I live we get a fantastic view of the Milky Way, millions of pinpricks of light. Looking at it with a reasonably chunky telescope (6" refractor) and what do you see? - millions of pinpricks of light.

Apologies in advance; that sounds a bit grumpy. Not meant that way. Just might save some people some wasted money.

 

[cisamcgu]

The picture of Saturn to the left, was taken with my 8" reflector, stacking about 20 webcam images. It looked pretty much like that through the eyepiece too on a good night.

I gave it away a few years ago to my daughter's school because we moved to a new house with little viewable sky from the garden, and surround by street lights.

I also had a small computerised Celestron, which was fun, but still took a bit of setting up.

It is a reward hobby if you put the effort in, but in British skies, planets are superb, but deep sky objects very much less so, unless you live very rural

 

[captain nemo1701]

Evening.

I fancy buying a telescope, not to perv the lady over the road but because I’m a bit of a nerd!

I’m going to spend up to £150ish which I know is only going to get me a fairly basic one but I was wondering if anyone on here had any recommendations?

Cheers Stuart.

Well, £150 will just get you a 'toy' scope, either 70mm refractor or a 150mm reflector. But if that's what you want, I would suggest going with a refractor.
Ok, Chromatic abberation may be an issue (glass lenses focus red & blue wavelengths to different focal points resulting in a coloured 'ring' around bright objects). On the other hand, you'll have to be careful with a reflector as the mirror is silvered on the exterior and this can wear in time due to atmospheric pollution etc. Can be re-silvered). Try to get a decent mount otherwise they wobble like a jelly.

This site has decent scopes, check out Skywatcher:

https://www.365astronomy.com/SkyWatcher-Refractors/

A 70mm jobby will let you see the rings of Saturn and moons of Jupiter.

 

[sight-pin]

I wouldn't be surprised if a good many people buy a telescope expecting to see glorious colourful images of distant galaxies etc

Unfortunately our eyes are limited and can't pickup most of the colours, Most of the images we see are stacked images as you know.
I sold a Meade 12" LX90 after some years, the optical tube assembly was so heavy to set up i was worried about dropping or damaging it whilst trying to mount it.