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cerror
Feb 11, 2008

I have a bad feeling about this...

blugu64 posted:

I think I saw andromeda in my galileoscope last night. Hard to find, and it was just a gray-ish mass. Need more power I guess. Also while gawking at pleiades a meteor flew across my field of view. :awesome:

Like others mentioned, it's just a matter of how much light your scope is collecting. With my 5" reflector Andromeda is pretty obvious, though I don't get much detail. A series of long exposures with a camera though, and voila!

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Jekub
Jul 21, 2006

April, May, June, July and August fool
Something for any UK based astronomy goons, Astrofest 2010!

http://www.astronomynow.com/astrofest/

Enjoy two whole days of astronomy based lectures and the chance to spend way to much money at the dealer stands. I've been several times now and it's always pretty good.

micron
Nov 15, 2005


This thread has made me start looking to take the plunge in, but holy poo poo there is a of options. I am somewhat a amateur as I haven't owned a decent scope ever and haven't used one since I was a kid. I have used star maps, can follow my way though the different stars/planets, and always had an interest in the stars. It also doesn't help I just finished "A pale blue dot" by Sagan.

My budget is around 250-350.
I'm somewhat interested in one day maybe doing some photography.
Ease of set up is "somewhat" important but seeing what my budget is I doubt anything I'd get would be to much of a pain.

From the reviews from http://www.cloudynights.com/ it seems Orion makes a nice scope.

How would be either of these?

http://www.amazon.com/Celestron-NexStar-114-Computerized-Telescope/dp/B0007UQNNG/ref=pd_cp_p_3

http://www.amazon.com/Orion-SpaceProbe-130ST-EQ-Telescope/dp/B0000XMSJI/ref=sr_1_50?ie=UTF8&s=electronics&qid=1258594785&sr=8-50

The Celestron is motor controlled but I dunno about the brand compared to orion. Help me see the stars goons.

Edit: Also I live about 60 miles from NYC but it seems I'm in the out-skirts of orange for light pollution. Most of the use would be at my home.

micron fucked around with this message at 03:44 on Nov 19, 2009

Loztblaz
Sep 8, 2004
1-14-04, Never Forget.

micron posted:


How would be either of these?

http://www.amazon.com/Celestron-NexStar-114-Computerized-Telescope/dp/B0007UQNNG/ref=pd_cp_p_3

http://www.amazon.com/Orion-SpaceProbe-130ST-EQ-Telescope/dp/B0000XMSJI/ref=sr_1_50?ie=UTF8&s=electronics&qid=1258594785&sr=8-50

The Celestron is motor controlled but I dunno about the brand compared to orion. Help me see the stars goons.

Edit: Also I live about 60 miles from NYC but it seems I'm in the out-skirts of orange for light pollution. Most of the use would be at my home.

Celestron is one if the big mass produced brands, but that isn't a bad thing. Their NexStar system is very solid for the price (I use a NexStar 8" SCT). If you want tracking and go-to, you won't do much better than that nexstar unless you buy used . You could probably get a larger go-to scope used, but buying used is a little intimidating when you're new to the hobby. I ended up buying my first scope new, and even though I ended up getting a different one, it was worth it to not worry about support and documentation.

If you don't think you need go-to and tracking, you can't go wrong with an Orion XT8 Classic. This is a very simple telescope that has no electronic frills, but you get a lot of aperture (203mm vs 114/130) and a dead simple mount.

micron
Nov 15, 2005


Loztblaz posted:

Celestron is one if the big mass produced brands, but that isn't a bad thing. Their NexStar system is very solid for the price (I use a NexStar 8" SCT). If you want tracking and go-to, you won't do much better than that nexstar unless you buy used . You could probably get a larger go-to scope used, but buying used is a little intimidating when you're new to the hobby. I ended up buying my first scope new, and even though I ended up getting a different one, it was worth it to not worry about support and documentation.

If you don't think you need go-to and tracking, you can't go wrong with an Orion XT8 Classic. This is a very simple telescope that has no electronic frills, but you get a lot of aperture (203mm vs 114/130) and a dead simple mount.

With that Orion how does the stand work? Doesn't look like it comes with any stand\mount and also any accessories. Could I "One day" buy all nessesary equipment? I think I may need a "go do this shithead" type of thing with the budget I have. I'm somewhat flexible either way. I'll assume I'm going to need a few different eye pieces etc.

Loztblaz
Sep 8, 2004
1-14-04, Never Forget.

micron posted:

With that Orion how does the stand work? Doesn't look like it comes with any stand\mount and also any accessories. Could I "One day" buy all nessesary equipment? I think I may need a "go do this shithead" type of thing with the budget I have. I'm somewhat flexible either way. I'll assume I'm going to need a few different eye pieces etc.

The XT8 mount is a Dobsonian style mount. It's a simple alt-az mount that you operate with your hand, here's the wiki page on this style of telescope if you want to read up on it some more.

It does include a decent setup, click the Included Items link and you'll see a full list. Here's the important stuff though:

25mm Sirius Plossl eyepiece (1.25")
EZ Finder II reflex sight
Collimation cap
Dust cap

You'll probably want to get a 8-10mm eyepiece for higher magnifications, as the 25mm is only good for 48x. I know this website looks straight out of 1999, but it's legitimate and the eyepieces are decent enough.

http://www.owlastronomy.com/superplossl.htm

There's much (MUCH) better eyepieces out there, but if you're wanting to stay near the 350 range for a complete setup, that's the easiest way to do it.

If you're willing to spend more, the Baader Hyperion 8-24 Click Zoom is an amazing deal for anyone starting out. It runs about 180-200, but it's a zoom eyepiece that allows you to worry less about changing eyepieces in the dark, and concentrate more on space.

TomR
Apr 1, 2003
I both own and operate a pirate ship.
I just tried Deep Sky Stacker and got this:


Pretty good, but I only have a photography tripod. I used a Canon 70-200mm 2.8L with an XSi. It was 24 shots at 4 seconds each. I did that to avoid the star trails. What kind of motorized head would I need to track the stars and hold my camera with lens, it is about 4 or 5lbs or so all together. Something that locates cool stuff to take pictures of would be good, I'm new to this and really don't know anything about space.

Dassiell
Apr 3, 2009
I won a Tasco Luminova Telescope on Club Bing, are these any good? I am pretty sure it is 660x60mm.

Loztblaz
Sep 8, 2004
1-14-04, Never Forget.

Dassiell posted:

I won a Tasco Luminova Telescope on Club Bing, are these any good? I am pretty sure it is 660x60mm.

It's hard to beat free, but it's not a very good scope. You'll be able to see some solar system objects, and some of the bright deep space objects, but that's about it. M45 (Pleiades), M42 (Orion Nebula), and M31 (Andromeda Galaxy) are some objects that are naked eye or nearly naked eye depending on your sky, that should be easy with binoculars or a small refractor.

I have no experience with that scope, but you'll probably struggle with tripod and mount stability. You may be able to modify it to make it more stable though, as Jekub described earlier this page, so give that a try if you have problems.

Jekub
Jul 21, 2006

April, May, June, July and August fool

TomR posted:

What kind of motorized head would I need to track the stars and hold my camera with lens, it is about 4 or 5lbs or so all together. Something that locates cool stuff to take pictures of would be good, I'm new to this and really don't know anything about space.

This is going to be heavily dependant on some key factors :

1) Budget
2) How far would you like to take this? Will you want to put a telescope on this at some point?

First of all you are going to want to get some ideas in mind of the type of thing you want to photograph, with a DSLR and standard lens you are going to be limited to wide angle objects for the most part. Don't expect to be picking up faint deep sky objects. However, areas like Orion, and objects like andromeda (see my photo a few pages back) will be in your range.

Basically you're going to need an equatorial mount with motorised right ascension and declination axis, you also say you would like goto on top of that. On the first page I made an overly long post listing the most popular mounts, in various price brackets that people would consider suitable for serious astrophotography, that is deep space, though I also listed the astrotrac for wide angle DSLR photography. But there other option, especially within the EQ range of mounts.

But basically it comes down to your budget.

TomR
Apr 1, 2003
I both own and operate a pirate ship.
Thanks Jekub.

I'm looking at this thing: http://www.telescope.com/control/product/~category_id=mounts_and_tripods/~pcategory=accessories/~product_id=15203

I'm really only going to put my camera on it. I don't want to spend more than $400 or so.

Jekub
Jul 21, 2006

April, May, June, July and August fool
I couldn't tell you anything about it as a mount, but as a general rule it is not of the type that would normally be used for deep sky astrophotography. It's an alt/az style so in order to track objects is has to move two separate axis, which doesn't make for a perfectly smooth motion.

It will work OK for the wide field imaging you will be limited to with a standard lens, and I have found some examples of short exposure (less than 1 minute) deep sky photography and some good lunar and solar images as well.

As for the goto, the vast majority of objects in it's data base will be either far to small, or almost invisible to your unmodified (IR filtered) DSLR. However, by adding a small scope at some point in the future you'll be able to do a lot more.

Wanderer89
Oct 12, 2009
Does anyone have any experience with using green lasers as replacement finderscopes? And can recommend a good mount? I have inherited a nice 1988 celestron powerstar 8" Schmidt-Cassegrain with motorized equatorial wedge setup and moto-focus from my father, which I've since had to take apart and unfreeze the corkscrew gear to operate, but now works great. I also have a 50mW green laser that's powered by two AAAs, ideally I'd like to mount it as a secondary finderscope complete with calibration knobs / external constant power source.

I really just use it to check out planets and the usual amateur suspects, but I'm really looking to get more involved since getting the motorized wedge working along with learning how incorrectly the tripod was setup and how to polar align and such.

tl;dr: I've seen different mounts for green lasers as finderscopes for sale around the net, which do you recommend?

Loztblaz
Sep 8, 2004
1-14-04, Never Forget.

Wanderer89 posted:

Does anyone have any experience with using green lasers as replacement finderscopes? And can recommend a good mount? I have inherited a nice 1988 celestron powerstar 8" Schmidt-Cassegrain with motorized equatorial wedge setup and moto-focus from my father, which I've since had to take apart and unfreeze the corkscrew gear to operate, but now works great. I also have a 50mW green laser that's powered by two AAAs, ideally I'd like to mount it as a secondary finderscope complete with calibration knobs / external constant power source.

I really just use it to check out planets and the usual amateur suspects, but I'm really looking to get more involved since getting the motorized wedge working along with learning how incorrectly the tripod was setup and how to polar align and such.

tl;dr: I've seen different mounts for green lasers as finderscopes for sale around the net, which do you recommend?

I used to use a green laser pointer as a finder scope, but switched to a telrad for several reasons. The biggest reason was not wanting to drill holes on my 8" SCT to mount the pointer, but I also found the telrad easier to use during winter months (laser pointer shows up less in clearer atmospheres) and at star parties. If you still want to use the pointer, you'll need to find out what type of mounting bracket your telescope has for a finder. Most laser pointer brackets now are going to use different dovetails/screw holes than what you have on your scope, which is why a telrad is nice, it just sticks on the tube.

Jekub
Jul 21, 2006

April, May, June, July and August fool
Telrads are the best, but I always, without fail, forget to turn mine off. Happily they'll run for weeks on a set of batteries so I normal catch it before it runs flat.

there are a bunch of good options for telrads as well, right angle mirrors and flip dew shields to name a couple. The other advantage with the telrad as a finder is that the circles it projects accurately represent ½, 2 and 4 degrees, which can be used on charts such as these. Making finding things easy.

micron
Nov 15, 2005


Another few questions:

Does anyone have any opinion on the "intelliscope" scopes from Orion? For the price of an 8" Orion intelliscope scope I could go up to a 10" regular Orion Dob scope. How much performance wise is a 8" vs 10" and what would you guys do? I can see the use of it but I don't know which is more cost effective.

Loztblaz
Sep 8, 2004
1-14-04, Never Forget.
You'll only notice the extra 2" of aperture if you have access to good skies (bortle scale green or below). The intelliscope system itself is solid, but they don't tell you everything you need to get it working correctly. The bottom encoder (circular metal disc) slips around when you move the scope unless you tape it down with double sided tape (clear double sided, not the foam stuff). This causes you to be unable to find a drat thing, and caused me a month of frustration until I found out about that 10 cent fix.

Also consider the size, the 10" intelliscope is longer than the 8", which may cause problems in transportation. I personally started with an 8" intelliscope and even though I moved on to a goto SCT, I don't regret starting there at all. You may want to try and find a star party before deciding for sure on your purchase, you'll find people more than happy to give advice and let you check out their equipment.

AstroZamboni
Mar 8, 2007

Smoothing the Ice on Europa since 1997!
I can't believe this poo poo. I've been a goon for 3 years and an amateur astronomer for 15, and I only just discovered this thread.

Are there many amateur astronomer goons in the Phoenix, AZ area? I sometimes run public star parties at the Arizona Museum of Natural History. I think it would be fun to organize a goon star party.

Jekub
Jul 21, 2006

April, May, June, July and August fool
This is the first amateur astronomy thread I've seen on SA make it past two pages!

Clear skies forecast for the entire UK, but with a full moon so I guess I'll be imaging that tonight as anything else will be lost in the glow. I might try some close ups with the webcam.

It's also chance to test out my new shoestring autoguiding interface, which I'm hoping will reduce some of my backlash issues.



Might as well edit here as post a new comment...

Beautiful night last night, crisp and clear and temperatures dropping below freezing. I took a bunch of full frame moons shots on the DSLR, then ended up attempting a mosaic using the webcam. I took about 17gb of video data, which is probably going to take me another week to process! Hopefully I didn't miss anything.

Jekub fucked around with this message at 12:37 on Dec 1, 2009

Bolkovr
Apr 20, 2002

A chump and a hoagie going buck wild

micron posted:

Another few questions:

Does anyone have any opinion on the "intelliscope" scopes from Orion? For the price of an 8" Orion intelliscope scope I could go up to a 10" regular Orion Dob scope. How much performance wise is a 8" vs 10" and what would you guys do? I can see the use of it but I don't know which is more cost effective.

I've got the 12" Intelliscope, and frankly, I haven't plugged the Intelliscope system in in a year. A Telrad to get you to the right part of the sky and then the 9x50 finder scope in concert with a decent sky atlas is 100% as effective and so much less hassle. Personally, I find it to be more fun as well.

edit: I would take the additional aperture of the 10" over the 8". Assuming pi=3*, the 10" has 75 sq in of aperture vs 48 for the 8". That's a big jump.

* cuz astronomy isn't a science or anything

Bolkovr fucked around with this message at 22:04 on Dec 3, 2009

Jekub
Jul 21, 2006

April, May, June, July and August fool
Moon stuff (click for big)!



So this is a mosaic taken with the webcam on the 250mm reflector. It is composed of 27 individual images. Each one of those images is created from a 1000 frame video using registax. For my first attempt at lunar webcam imaging and mosaics I'm happy with that.

I used the panorama tool in Windows live photo album which is an amazing bit of kit.

Also I got this while playign with video capture on the DSLR :



One more from the same night, but a different technique. 30 full frame raw images captured with the canon 1000D at prime focus on the 250mm reflector. Stacked in registax and with the saturation pushed way up to bring out the surface variations.

Jekub fucked around with this message at 00:00 on Dec 4, 2009

Loztblaz
Sep 8, 2004
1-14-04, Never Forget.

Jekub posted:

Also I got this while playign with video capture on the DSLR :



Nice. I always love when I'm out observing during a meteor shower and I just happen to get a nice streak across the eyepiece. Of course I have no way of snapping a picture of it so I just yell about it a bit.

blugu64
Jul 17, 2006

Do you realize that fluoridation is the most monstrously conceived and dangerous communist plot we have ever had to face?

Jekub posted:



C-17?

TomR
Apr 1, 2003
I both own and operate a pirate ship.
The moon shots come out so clear.

Here is one I did the other day:


200mm lens with a 2x teleconverter. It's not near as sharp as the stacked photos.

Jekub
Jul 21, 2006

April, May, June, July and August fool

blugu64 posted:

C-17?

I have no idea, I was going to post it in the pilots thread to see if someone could tell me.

Vaporware
May 22, 2004

Still not here yet.
I'm pretty sure it's a C5 since it has the elevator at the top of the tailfin.

Those moon shots are so freaking 3D I feel like I'm there.

Jekub
Jul 21, 2006

April, May, June, July and August fool

TomR posted:

It's not near as sharp as the stacked photos.

It is really worth getting as many shots as you can and pumping them into registax. With the moon, even if you don't have tracking registax has motion prediction so it should be able to handle it. If not you can manually align a stack, though that is time consuming when you're dealing with large images.

But the stacking and wavelets filters do amazing things to your images, and the software is free so definitely try it some time.

Vaporware posted:

I'm pretty sure it's a C5

It was heading towards London so I was guessing commercial. A US C5 would be a pretty rare bird to be flying round here, though not totally unheard of as I'm right in the middle of a network of military routes.

Vaporware
May 22, 2004

Still not here yet.
No, you're right at first glance, it was a C-5, but second time it's too short and missing the rear landing gear bulge.

Elder Postsman
Aug 30, 2000


i used hot bot to search for "teens"

It looks like a BAe-146 to me.

grover
Jan 23, 2002

PEW PEW PEW
:circlefap::circlefap::circlefap:
:circlefap::circlefap::circlefap:
:circlefap::circlefap::circlefap:
:circlefap::circlefap::circlefap:
:circlefap::circlefap::circlefap:
:circlefap::circlefap::circlefap:
I wanted to get my 7-year old daughter a telescope for christmas. I was thinking about a $50-ish refractor but ended up deciding against it after talking with a few people, because I guess you can't see crap with a telescope like that and it would be boring and just go into a closet? People here seem happy with theirs, but eh ;) I ended up rethinking the gift and decided on a 4.5" reflector instead, that will now be a gift to the whole family. I ended up ordering Celestron AstroMaster 114 with the equitorial mount and tracking motor. I hope it's not a mistake. Wish I'd have remembered this thread was here, or I'd have asked here first!

I took an astronomy course as a kid and still have my old star charts, but I know little else. We tracked the ISS a few months ago which was awesome, and I can find a handful of constellations from memory, but I've never tried to find any galaxies. My area (Hampton Roads, VA) is light polluted all to hell, which hurts. I imagine the video with the telescope will talk about setting it up, but what's the best way to find planets and galaxies to look at?

grover fucked around with this message at 23:16 on Dec 5, 2009

Loztblaz
Sep 8, 2004
1-14-04, Never Forget.

grover posted:

I wanted to get my 7-year old daughter a telescope for christmas. I was thinking about a $50-ish refractor but ended up deciding against it after talking with a few people, because I guess you can't see crap with a telescope like that and it would be boring and just go into a closet? People here seem happy with theirs, but eh ;) I ended up rethinking the gift and decided on a 4.5" reflector instead, that will now be a gift to the whole family. I ended up ordering Celestron AstroMaster 114 with the equitorial mount and tracking motor. I hope it's not a mistake. Wish I'd have remembered this thread was here, or I'd have asked here first!

I took an astronomy course as a kid and still have my old star charts, but I know little else. We tracked the ISS a few months ago which was awesome, and I can find a handful of constellations from memory, but I've never tried to find any galaxies. My area (Hampton Roads, VA) is light polluted all to hell, which hurts. I imagine the video with the telescope will talk about setting it up, but what's the best way to find planets and galaxies to look at?

For finding objects to look at, try stellarium. It'll show you what's in the sky at any time or date you want to see, and it allows you to adjust the sky quality so you can exclude things that are too faint to see in a red zone.

To actually find the objects, it's going to be hard to beat a red flash light and some star charts. If you want to avoid fumbling with a book or binder, a planisphere is easy to toss in your bag, and will show you quite a few objects.

If you happen to have an iphone, there's Star Walk and Starmap. Star Walk is simpler, but Starmap has more features. These are basically stellarium-lite, useful to find planets or see when X is rising, but nothing that you can plan a session with.

TomR
Apr 1, 2003
I both own and operate a pirate ship.
I have found that I can take pictures of stars okay with my photography stuff. I am still trying to read up on what gear I should get.

Here are some pictures from tonight.



Jekub
Jul 21, 2006

April, May, June, July and August fool
Autoguiding test from last night, this is a single 5 minute exposure of the Orion Nebula with my new Astronomik CLS CCD filter in place. It's badly flooded out by the bright moon but I'm really happy with the guiding.

This is also one of my favourite visual objects and is worth hunting down even if you only have a small scope due to it's size and brightness.



Now I just need a good clear night so I can get a proper imaging session completed.

the
Jul 18, 2004

by Cowcaster
I need recommendations for a good lens for a Canon Rebel XTi.

vega
Nov 6, 2003
Any Color You Like
tl;dr: me and a friend have a combined 3500$ budget - what telescope should we get?
has to be motorized and able to take photos with.

Long story:
I've had a interest in astronomy as long as I can remember, but can't really say it's been a hobby until now. I have a 200$ telescope but I've lost the "magnifiers/lenses". Don't even know what it's called, or how to get replacements.
Edit: When I think of it, I'll take some pictures of the thing and post it here. Maybe some of you can tell me what it is...

Anyways, A friend (also goon) of mine and have a 3500'ish $ budget, and we're interested in a telescope. We've been talking about buying one for some years now.

Problem is that we don't know poo poo about what to get.

My only experience is from playing around with the 200$ telescope, but I could only see the moon and it wasn't even "big"...

The 'scope should be:
- Motorized (GoTo?) - because I'm afraid we would freeze our asses of while calibrating it, and trying to find something as easy as the moon. I think my friend want to do stuff "manually", but I don't think he's ever been outside his house at night :colbert:
- able to take photographs with (Canon EOS 450d - have 70-300mm lense, and 2x teleconverter)
- We want to have a good look at galaxies and nebulas, and other awesome stuff;
A look at planets in our own solar system is not what we want to spend alot of money on, so that brings me to the next (stupid) question:

What type of telescope should we go for?
Newtonian, refractor, reflector, Catadioptric (had to Copy&Paste that one).
I've tried to read about the differences, but my head hurts and I can't figure it out.

Mount:
I've read good things about the EQ6 mount, and on some other forum they recommended it if you're gonna take photos (stability I guess). But just that costs about about 1500$ in a Norwegian shop.
This mount-thing brings me to another question:
Every telescope I've looked at seems to have a mount included, but it looks lovely. 'sup with that? Does a EQ6 mount fit on whatever telescope you put on it?

We live in Norway, and it gets pretty cold here at nights. zero to -15C in the winter.
Should we take that into consideration when buying the 'scope? We have a 5 minute drive to complete dark areas.

oh, by the way... about the 3500$ budget:
Please note that we're norwegians, and everything that people want as a hobby costs $$$$ due to greedy importers and 25% taxes:
Meade ETX-125PE in Norway cost 2100$
and in USA it costs 799$

So in reality we have a 1400$ budget if we could buy the equipment in USA.
Just had to mention this in case some of you Americans go ahead and recommend some Hubble-type stuff that would cost us 10000$ here in Norway :)

Jekub
Jul 21, 2006

April, May, June, July and August fool

the posted:

I need recommendations for a good lens for a Canon Rebel XTi.

You'd probably be better off asking that in the equipment or Canon thread in the Dorkroom, unless you want to put a telescope on instead of a lens, in which case give us some more information on what you are trying to achieve.

vega

Lots of questions, I'll put in my thoughts and advice for what they are worth after work this evening. Though if you can give me some thoughts on your astrophotography aims that would help, I assume you want to do deep sky work, where you use the telescope itself as the camera lens, as well as being able to piggy back the camera and it's own lens onto the scope? Basically the mount is the single most important factor in deep space work, but I'll go into more detail later.

Jekub fucked around with this message at 13:37 on Dec 18, 2009

micron
Nov 15, 2005


I just picked up an 8" intelliscope for 206.50 on ebay (think I did pretty good). I have not picked it up yet but what should I look at or for before payment is made on a used scope? Like what should I inspect etc besides normal broken parts and such?

Loztblaz
Sep 8, 2004
1-14-04, Never Forget.

micron posted:

I just picked up an 8" intelliscope for 206.50 on ebay (think I did pretty good). I have not picked it up yet but what should I look at or for before payment is made on a used scope? Like what should I inspect etc besides normal broken parts and such?

Check the mirror for damage, dust can be cleaned off (if it's REALLY bad, otherwise don't bother). Test out the azimuth movement, since with an intelliscope you can't easily see the teflon bearings without taking the box apart. Make sure the focuser moves easily through it's full movement. Look through the focuser without an eyepiece to check the secondary mirror for problems.

If the mirrors are badly damaged, I'd probably walk, but the rest of those issues are easy enough to fix. I'd also suggest at least turning on the intelliscope computer and making sure it works. Look on pages 21 and 22 of the intelliscope manual to see how to enter the diagnostic mode.

If this scope is in good condition, you got an amazing deal on it.

Bolkovr
Apr 20, 2002

A chump and a hoagie going buck wild

micron posted:

I just picked up an 8" intelliscope for 206.50 on ebay (think I did pretty good). I have not picked it up yet but what should I look at or for before payment is made on a used scope? Like what should I inspect etc besides normal broken parts and such?

The mount is melamine-covered chipboard (IKEA furniture, basically). Check it for chips and water damage. Rack the focuser in and out. Shine a light in the tube and look down the tube at the mirror. General dust and such is fine, but big scratches or corrosion are a deal-breaker. You'd probably pay more than $200 to get it recoated. Make sure you get all the parts: tube, mount, the 2 knobs, Intelliscope and cable, finder scope, 26mm and 10mm eyepieces and the collimation cap, which is a plastic piece that fits in the focuser and has a tiny hole in it and reflective foil on the inside. You use that to align the optics, which is really important and also fairly confusing. The manual (which you can download from Orion if you don't have it) talks about it, but you can also google 'reflector collimation' and read up on it. It will make your brain hurt until it clicks and then it becomes easy.

Before it gets dark, take the scope outside and put the 26mm eyepiece in it. Point the scope (not at the Sun!) at a distant treetop or cell tower or whatever. Then using the knobs on the side of the finder scope, adjust the finder scope to also point whatever the main scope is pointing to. Then put in the 10mm and readjust it. That will align the telescope and finder scope. (I point this out only because it's counter-intuitive and trips up a lot of people, myself included, when they first get a telescope)

Neptune is very close to Jupiter right now in the southern sky, so grab a PDF chart and go find a planet.

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Jekub
Jul 21, 2006

April, May, June, July and August fool
Vega It's late and I've been to busy watching TV, stupid weather said snow and full cloud cover tonight so I promised the wife I'd have a night in front of the TV, every time I've looked out the door it's been clear!

This does mean however that I've not got round to a decent reply, so to make things short I'm going to post a site which should answer just about every question regarding astrophotography with a DSLR anyone might have from deep space through lunar and planetary to widefield and everything you might need to know about the equipment :

http://www.astropix.com/HTML/I_ASTROP/TOC_AP.HTM

There is a huge amount of useful material to be had there, have a read and come back with any questions, there are a bunch of very knowledgeable people here so I'm sure we can help you make an informed choice.

I will just give some quick answers to your more specific questions :

Mount:

You won't go wrong with an EQ6, the majority of scopes these days come with a dovetail which will fit the clamp on the EQ6 which uses the standard Vixen style dovetail clamp. If your aim is to photograph deep space objects (galaxies, nebulas, etc) then it is the best start you could go for.

Telescope :

Newtonian reflectors give the most bang for the buck and for photography they will be more than fine for the beginner, you will need to learn to maintain one as well. Refractors are lovely for visual work but for photography you really need apochromatic optics which gets expensive. By the time you outgrow your telescope you will have enough experience to know what you really want.

Able to take photographs with :

Your standard camera lens is mostly irrelevant if you want to image through the telescope. You would instead get a t-ring to fit your camera and an adapter to screw into that so you can slot it into the telescopes focuser, thereby using the telescope as the lens.


So my recommendation for getting started in deep space astrophotography is get the best drat mount you can, get a reasonable telescope to go on top of it to get you started and the adapters to attach your camera. With that in place you can start taking pictures, then the real hard work begins.

Some time after you start taking images you'll run into things like periodic error correction, backlash compensation, autoguiding, the joy of focussing and many other fun topics. Many of which your EQ6 can manage but by which time you will hopefully have regained some budget for all the other kit you need.

Just remember that the mount is the foundation, get that right from the start and you'll suffer a lot less frustration further down the line. Astrophotography is a deeply technical, time consuming and often expensive hobby, but it is a fantastic challenge and massively rewarding.

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