Telescopes and Astronomy

[Python14]

Well, the time I have feared has come. I have to sell my paintballing equipment for a cheaper hobby(I'll still be on here though). I was thinking and weighing options and figured Astronomy would be a wise hobby. I know it will probably end up costing me more than paintball, but hey, atease I can go months without spending a dime and still enjoy it. Anyway, I have been looking through all my old Sky and Telescope magazines and can't really find anything that suits me. I looked at telescope.com(Orion telescopes) and found an 8" EQ Newtonian Reflector for a decent price. I'm still hesitant to buy anything though. I know a few people on here are into Astronomy so could I get any opinions about it. I'm looking for something that provides a good image ,particularly of Deep space stuff like the Messier Objects and things like that(I'm not much for the planets or moon). I also want something portable, but I am willing to sacrifce some portablity for aperature. It just can't be a permenant thing, or insanely heavy(less than 50 lbs for the tube and tripod) Anyone got some ideas?

[Blennidae]

Try to contact FactsOfLife. I know he will be able to answer your questions.

[FeelTheRT]

sorry that i can't help answer your questions, but good for you! Space is a real neat thing. I want to get into career relating to cosmology in the future. I'm acutally writing this huge paper on astronomy right now for school.

dont worry everyone... i'll straighten out this Universe bizz in several years ;)

[Python14]

Oh yea, Isn't FactsofLife the owner or president of some telescope company?

BTW, Mr. Kaye, if you see this, do you have any opinion?

[Blennidae]

Originally posted by FeelTheRT
I want to get into career relating cosmetology in the future.


You like cutting hair?;)

[ChucktheMAGician]

Originally posted by Blennidae


You like cutting hair?;)
Thank you for confirming that I'm not the only one who thought he mentioned Beauty School!;) :D

[FeelTheRT]

Cosmology... sorry

Cosmology- The study of the physical universe considered as a totality of phenomena in time and space.


Cosmetology- The study or art of cosmetics and their use.


lol big difference
edited first post ;)

[magking1971]

This is something I wanted to know also.
(plus it is a bump to the top:D )

[FactsOfLife]

Python,

I sent you a PM. I think you're on the right track as far as what you want to use for the type of observing you're into.

A Schmidt-Newtonian on a goto mount is about unbeatable for looking at a lot of stuff in an evening.

go have a look at the Meade LXD55 8 incher. I've looked through a few of them and they are very nice affordable scopes. Well built, easy for one person to deal with too. If you buy a new Meade, jump on the eyepiece deal they have going too. 99 bucks for about 700 worth of Meade series 4000 Ep's is a steal.

Get the UHTC. You won't be disappointed for the extra hundred bucks or so.

Check out TelescopeReview.com (http://www.scopereviews.com/)

Weasners LXD55 Info Site (http://www.weasner.com/lxd/index.html)

Hope this helps.

[Python14]

Is GOTO really that neccisary? I was thinking and it just feels like something more to go wrong. I know it would be nice, and I'm pretty sure I'd be lying if I said I'd never use a telescope with an electronic do-dad. And I'm definitely gonna get a polar tracker or whatever it's called so I don't have to track manually. So I might go with one of the newer Orion newts because it's just a little less to mess with when I go skywatching out in the woods.


But wait, if you are the President of Red Shift Telescopes, why haven't you mentioned what you have to offer? Thanks again.

[FactsOfLife]

Yes goto is worth it. What's the main point of looking through a scope? To look at stuff right? Having goto makes finding it easier, and you can find a LOT more things in an evenings viewing than you ever will starhopping. It's as simple as that. :)

I have my LXD55 AR6 connected to my laptop running StarryNight Pro. With that hooked up, I can control the slewing of the mount to whatever I click on on the pc. It's so slick it's amazing.


I didn't talk about my scopes because they are for the most part, very expensive compared to the types of scope you're looking at. My lowest priced scope is an 8 inch, and it starts at 2250 with standard optics. They only go up from there.

My scopes are generally bought by people that have been into astronomy for a long time. The average is about 7 years.

[Python14]

I see. Maybe, someday down the road, I'll be calling you up.

Anyway, yea, I'm probably gonna go with an Orion and then getting an aftermarket controller. It should be a nice setup. The only thing steering me away from Meade, if you are wondering is that they don't seem to be very upgradable. I'm still teetering though, so who knows, I have plenty of time.

[FactsOfLife]

Not sure what you mean by upgradeable. Most scopes, and especially newts are upgradeable with different focusers, mounts, tripod legs, and so on.

Me personally after having owned a lot of scopes am sold on goto. You just can't beat being able to slew to a DSO and find it nearly centered in the EP. About the only thing comparable are the digital SkyMaster setting circles I install on my scopes. They don't slew the scope but they do direct you to the object you're looking for very nicely.

Autostar has been around a while now and is extremely robust and just about foolproof. Celestron's goto system is very similar and works well too. Take a look at their scopes. They have nice newts too.

There are lots of forums out there that are dedicated soley to autostar and meades in general, and for the most part all of them are very helpful with questions. Same for Orion and celestron.

the one other thing goto mounts do extremely well is guide/track for astrophotography. If you ever get the interest to capture some of the images you see in the EP, having a mount that tracks the object for you is handy. you can certainly do this with a Right Ascension drive on a German EQ mount. but your polar alignment and the scope setup has to be spot on to track properly for long exposures.

Gotos take that hassle out of it for you. :)

[Jack_Dubious]

Astronomy is on my long list of things i wanna "get into". But living in the middle of LAs lights and smog, isnt too conducive to nighttime star watching. And I have a hard enough time getting out of the city to play some pball...much less going to the mountains and setting up a scope...


JDub


besides...once the mothership comes to pick me up i wont need a telescope........er...did i say that out loud?

[Python14]

Astronomy is one of those things that I think everyone at one point wants to do. I mean, can you look at the Horsehead Nedula, or the 7 sisters and say "Wow, totally not cool". No, you just have to keep looking at it because you know the awe-inspiring effects of it. So yea, Jack, even if you live in LA, it is still possible to do some decent stargazing, even if you are limited to the brighter things. It's all beaufiful anyway.

[FactsOfLife]

http://home.rochester.rr.com/jammertime/images/lxd55_1.jpg

[Python14]

Holy guacamole dude. That is one nice peice of equipment. I'm a little scared to ask what the rest of the arsenal looks like.

BTW, One tech question, well, sorta. When people are writing down journals of what they see, alot of people include some stats on each object. things like RA, Dec, magnitude, size, etc. But sometimes they include "seeing" as a stat too. I understand what it means, but I don't really understand how they come up with it. Is there some internationally accepted gauge to judge seeing on, or is it just up to each astronomer to make his/her judgement on it? I mean, for me a very excellent night might be considered a horrible excuse for darkness to another astronomer. Also, if it is a judgement thing, what is the system that most people use to come up with it? Thank you so much.

[FactsOfLife]

I have 3 scopes for personal use at the moment. That AR6, an Orion 120ST, and an 18 inch RedShift Dob.

As far as the scale for seeing goes, there's a couple of things associated with it. Transparency, light pollution, and seeing.

Seeing usually is measured the same as transparency on a scale from 1-10. 1 being solid cloud cover, 10 being perfect clear skies. And the seeing being 1 bad turbulence/atmospherics and 10 being perfect clear pinpoint stars with no atmospherics.

Light pollution is kind of subjective. You might live in what could be considered a super dark skies area like the middle of the country, and have a bonehead neighbor with unshielded sodium vapor lamps all over the place.

You could see a night with poor seeing but it's transparency is up in the high end of the scale. Maybe a front came through and the atmosphere is very turbulent. Images in the EP fade in and out of focus and you can't get pinpoint stars at focus. You might scale the night like this:

Transparency: 8
Seeing: 3

[Python14]

I see now. So it's really just the astronomers good or bad judgement. Good. Makes it easier on newer guys like me.

How is that Orion 120ST? I've been hearing good things about it, especially with DSOs. It's definitely in my price range.

Also, Do you have any astrophotos from any of your scopes? I'd love to see them.

[FactsOfLife]

The 120 is a nice little scope for quick viewing. It is nice for some DSO work. The downside of it is the real short focal length means low power only. It starts to get mushy much past 120x.

For the price I'd go with a Newt or a Mak before I bought another one of these.

Yeah a lot of observing is subjective. What one person may be able to see, or claims they can see will not be visible to another.

Yeah lemme dig up some stuff I've imaged. I have a new setup I'm playing with now and have to get some clear skies. It's been horrible here for nearly 2 weeks now.