need a little advice from fellow astronimers(i am a total amatuer)

letsfaceit99

hello,
I have recently bought a new celestron astromaster 114 and was wondering if i can upgrade it by buying a better eyepiece for it..i only have the standard ones that come with it..50 and 100 magnitude.. i had it out for the first time tonight and seen jupiter and its moons but it was still hard to see it clearly, meaning the image was still very small..i paid 200 euro and was hoping to beable to see the planets alot clearer so would a new eye piece help or did i buy a crap scope and could anyone tell me what time i might see saturn tonight.. i,ve being on this site a few times and everyone always seems to be so helpfull in their answers so taught i'd give ya all a go..

thanks a mill for any help..

total amatuer

Tea drinker

You could buy another eyepiece, or see if you can find a cheap but good barlow. Which Will give you 4 different power of magnification 50, 100, ehhh 100 again, and 200.
Maybe some kind soul has something in a drawer for you.......

why not try astro photgraphy, all you need is a webcam, assuming you already have a laptop. All the software is free.
it will give better views when processed.
The moon is a great target for those scopes.

letsfaceit99

Tea drinker wrote: »

You could buy another eyepiece, or see if you can find a cheap but good barlow. Which Will give you 4 different power of magnification 50, 100, ehhh 100 again, and 200.
Maybe some kind soul has something in a drawer for you.......

why not try astro photgraphy, all you need is a webcam, assuming you already have a laptop. All the software is free.
it will give better views when processed.
The moon is a great target for those scopes.

cheers man..thanks for the advice

Kersh

Where are you located. If its close Ill bring my Eyepieces over to you and you can have a look through them to put your mind at ease.
They arent €600 Televues or anything, but I have a few different ones you can try.

backboiler

magnification (not magnitude) is only one aspect of what makes an eyepiece suitable for a particular use.
Field of view and light transmission are much more important for distributed, dim objects like nebulae. You get that with longer focal length eyepieces, which give lower magnification.
For observing small, bright things like craters of the Moon and the brighter planets you can use higher magnifications (short focal length). You can pick up a short focal length eyepiece on ebay for a reasonable price, though they probably won't be of the highest quality, they're a reasonable low-cost introduction.

letsfaceit99

Kersh wrote: »

Where are you located. If its close Ill bring my Eyepieces over to you and you can have a look through them to put your mind at ease.
They arent €600 Televues or anything, but I have a few different ones you can try.

From drogheda man.. that near you

Kersh

Swords here. Pm me when you are free and Ill haul them up, or you can come to me . . ill show you what it all looks like through a 12" scope.

letsfaceit99

backboiler wrote: »

magnification (not magnitude) is only one aspect of what makes an eyepiece suitable for a particular use.
Field of view and light transmission are much more important for distributed, dim objects like nebulae. You get that with longer focal length eyepieces, which give lower magnification.
For observing small, bright things like craters of the Moon and the brighter planets you can use higher magnifications (short focal length). You can pick up a short focal length eyepiece on ebay for a reasonable price, though they probably won't be of the highest quality, they're a reasonable low-cost introduction.

so would you recommend a 4mm eyepiece..sorry

letsfaceit99

Kersh wrote: »

Swords here. Pm me when you are free and Ill haul them up, or you can come to me . . ill show you what it all looks like through a 12" scope.

jesus thanks a million man.. sounds good..i'll be in contact so..the scope i have is the strongest i've ever looked through and that was amazing so looking forward to checking yours out.. thanks again

Kersh

Imo 4mm is way too small for a 114mm scope.

The most popular ones I use are 26mm, 15mm, and sometimes a 12mm and a 9mm . . but 9 is really pushing any of the scopes I have (8", 10" and 12") - the sky must be crystal clear and the atmosphere very very still.

I have put the 6.4mm on Jupiter, but it shimmers and moves about an awful lot. And I always go back to the 12 or 15mm.

What other size ep did you get?

letsfaceit99

Kersh wrote: »

Imo 4mm is way too small for a 114mm scope.

The most popular ones I use are 26mm, 15mm, and sometimes a 12mm and a 9mm . . but 9 is really pushing any of the scopes I have (8", 10" and 12") - the sky must be crystal clear and the atmosphere very very still.

I have put the 6.4mm on Jupiter, but it shimmers and moves about an awful lot. And I always go back to the 12 or 15mm.

What other size ep did you get?

i have a celestron 20mm erecting eyepiece and 10 mm,then i have a H20mm eyepiece not sure what make or what the h stands for and a 4mm ep..when you say 8" or 10" what do you mean by this..? is that the apeture size

Kersh

The erecting ep just turns images the right way up. It has more lenses in it to do this, This makes images fainter/blurrier, so its not ideal.

The 10mm is borderline for a 114mm. But worth a go all the same. The 20mm should be ok, but, as with the 10mm, it is a very basic design, and probably has a lot of false colour to it, esp on planets.

The scope will be fine for learning the night sky, but we will arrange meeting up so you can try some others out.

Yes, by 8", 10" etc its the aperture. Yours being 4.5".

I had a very similar scope to that about 8 years ago, with goto on it . . and look where it brought me to!! There's always something bigger and better . .

Provided you dont get disillusioned at first (if you keep asking questions here, you wont!), this hobby is gonna cost you

Check out http://www.irishastronomy.org . . very very helpful bunch of guys

letsfaceit99

Kersh wrote: »

The erecting ep just turns images the right way up. It has more lenses in it to do this, This makes images fainter/blurrier, so its not ideal.

The 10mm is borderline for a 114mm. But worth a go all the same. The 20mm should be ok, but, as with the 10mm, it is a very basic design, and probably has a lot of false colour to it, esp on planets.

The scope will be fine for learning the night sky, but we will arrange meeting up so you can try some others out.

Yes, by 8", 10" etc its the aperture. Yours being 4.5".

I had a very similar scope to that about 8 years ago, with goto on it . . and look where it brought me to!! There's always something bigger and better . .

Provided you dont get disillusioned at first (if you keep asking questions here, you wont!), this hobby is gonna cost you

Check out http://www.irishastronomy.org . . very very helpful bunch of guys

man your a star, fair play for the help and look forward to hooking up

glenbrook

It sounds like a good starter scope.

You may find that the eyepieces that came with your scope are fairly basic. More expensive ones will have a wider field of view and things look brighter. Poor lenses will show colour aberration, e.g. Jupiter will have a red fringe on one side, blue on the other.

Saturn will rise tonight at around midnight in the east. It is best to wait until it is highest in the sky, it will be due south at about 6am tomorrow above and to the right of a bright blue star called Spica. It looks like a bright yellow star and is unmistakeable through a telescope. It will appear smaller than Jupiter, but you should be able to see it clearly and might be able to make out the division in the rings if the sky is still enough. You should also be able to see at least it's biggest moon, Titan and perhaps the next biggest Dione, Rhea and Tethys. Venus is also visible, lower down and towards the South east, you should be able to see it half-full, like the moon

As for making the planets look clearer, you certainly have room for improvement. As you get used to your scope you will get better at seeing the detail that is there and some nights viewing will be much better when the atmosphere is still. You will never see the planets as they appear in magazines. Most of the pictures you will see are taken using webcams using a technique called stacking. The way it works is that it takes all the frames of a video keeping the clearest ones and adding them all together. It produces a picture which is much sharper than you will ever see through a telescope.

Weather looks good for tomorrow morning!