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Telescopes for Home Use?
PDubNYC asks: "Just thought this was a good place to ask about telescopes. My father is turning 70 shortly, and I thought a telescope would be a good gift as he was an air force navigator back in the day, and loves viewing nature's beauty (bird watching, safaris etc...). So, any ideas what to look for in a home telescope, from $500-$1000 (split by 6 kids) that would enable him to punch in coordinates and have the motor turn, give a great view of nearby celestial bodies (maybe Saturn's rings), and it'd be great to hook up to a laptop (a Mac would be even better, but far from necessary). Any advice would be great." PDubNYC is also on a budget, so please refrain from suggesting the ultra expensive $1500 scopes.
Get the largest aperature you can afford. Both Meade & Celestron make models with an 8" apperature with auto goto in the price range you suggest. You can easily hook either of them up to a laptop by using a webcam. Sample photos from a webcam of Jupiter can be found here.
Use a Philips webcam (Forget the name of it, but it is mentioned on the web page listed above) because it has the most sensitive CCD of the webcams, and takes the best photos. You can also get an adapter for around $20 to hook up the webcam to your computer, or you can easily make one.
Also, if you don't absolutely need the auto goto, you can get a good Dobsonian mounted telescope pretty cheap. Check out Orion Telescopes for some good Dobsonian mounted scopes, and some good Newtonian reflectors in the price range you wanted.
And oh yeah... $1,500 is by no means an ultra expensive telescope! A high quality mirror alone can cost several thousand dollars.
Not that there's any harm in repeating it, but you may want to read the responses from the last time this was asked and the time before that.
What I'm listening to now on Pandora...
I forgot to add in my earlier post, but avoid at all costs any telescope that has advertised on its box that is has x amount of magnification. You don't measure a telescope based on its magnification powers, it is measured on it's light gathering ability. A good rule of thumb is that a telescope will only be able to get 50x magnification under perfect viewing conditions for evey inch of aperature. For example, a 4.5" telescope would only be able to magnify up to 225x, and an 8" would be able to magnify up to 400x. You can easily change the magnification of any scope by changing its eyepiece.
A telescope that is selling itself based solely on it magnification is more than likely an extremely cheap item, and will likely not be able to reach any level near the magnification that it is advertising.
On a budget is fine, but $1500 is not exactly an "ultra-expensive" telescope for an amateur..
$1500 is ultra-expensive for casual hobbyists on a budget.
My dad payed about $150 for a telescope back during the Haley's Comet era, and it still works pretty well: I can see the rings on saturn and the spot on jupiter, from my urban-light-polluted-backyard near Oakland and San Francisco.
I'd like new telescope with a wider apature, but I don't see why I would need pay 10X as much as I did in 1986 (Or the year of haleys comet).
"Can of worms? The can is open... the worms are everywhere."
When reading astronomy-related magazines, I have found what I thought waas excellent advice. Instead of investigating in high-priced telescopes, focus your attention on a pair of some of the best binoculars you can find and some star charts. Then, give yourself several months of identifying objects in "constellation XYZ" and see if your still interested in astronomy, with its late nights and great needs for patience. (Add some OpenSource astronomy software, for planning your evenings, and viola!)
Once you've gotten this far, then go buy the scope, armed with patience, excellent astronomy knowledge, a great pair of spotting binoculars, and some star charts you can read.
That way, you won't spend lots of bucks on something that collects dust.
Besides, Galileo would have gone nuts for some great binoculars and star charts.
For something with a bit more learning curve but more light gathering ability, that can really be a blast if you just want to slew around a dark sky... take a look at some of the larger dobsonians.
An Orion 10" dobsonian can be had for around $600 as well. Buy a low magnification widefield eyepiece like the orion deepview 35mm 2" eyepice or orion optilux 40mm and bring large chunks for the sky into sharp bright relief.
I would recomend looking at a few guides like this and this.
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I'm going to assume you want this for astronomy, not peeping tom activities.
I agree with the folks who say "small". I bought a Meade 4.5" equatorial reflector (Mead 4500, no longer in production) a few years ago and I'm very happy with it. My only regret is that there are no computer controls available for it. At the time, it was important to me to learn to use a telescope. I'm ready to move up to a 6" or 8", but I'm not in a big hurry.
When I did the research, I looked at a number of 'net articles by astronomers - the consensus recommendation to the amateur novice was 4.5" minimum with an equatorial mount (easiest for manual tracking). My telescope is fairly portable - I can easily drag it into the back yard, but does take a little work and care to take it anywhere else. Reflectors are very long, but mine fits across the back seat of my bronco.
I recommend:
Earlier someone recommended the Meade ETX series. I think if I were buying right now, that would be at the top of my list. Right now they're even offering their AutoStar tracking system ($149) and tripod for free with a purchase. I would think the 105 or 125 would do very nicely. With a little legwork, you might be able to get a better price than the standard retail. We ended up driving down to Phoenix and spending all day going through the camera and astronomy shops (keep in mind this was 1996 or so) - fun and saved about $100.
First, I'd strongly suggest avoiding anything you can buy in a mall. The quality just isn't there, and the capabilities are often a little, er, overstated. (for a good rule of thumb, look for no more than 50x magnification for each inch of telescope aperture. That is, if you see a 3-inch refractor advertising "300x Magnification!!", then don't buy it. You might, under extremely bright and ideal conditions, achieve 300x, but it'll probably look like crap.)
In the astronomy club I used to be a part of (NOVAC, I quit 'cause of time constraints), there were some pretty strong differences over Meade, a fair consensus on quality Celestron (though I seem to remember they were going through a change in ownership that may have affected their reputation), and there are a lot of smaller semi-custom telescope manufacturers out there in a decent price range.
My best advice would be to go to a local astronomy club for information and advice -- they'll have people who REALLY know their stuff, and can give a good recommendation for just about any price range. The NOVAC link above has (under "Resources") a nice page with lots of different "how to buy a telescope" pages. Personally, I've heard "moderatly good" things about Orion 'scopes (wouldja believe, they're at telescope.com), and they've got a nice catalog with decent prices.
A key criteria is what you think he'll be looking for. Planetary scopes need better magnification, but not as much light-gathering capability. Plus, a smaller 'scope is easier to outfit with an errect-image prism for daytime use (birdwatching, for a politically-correct example). If he's more apt to go after "faint fuzzies," like galaxies, clusters, and nebulae, then a larger diameter scope (like 8-16 inches) becomes more of a requirement because of the better light-gathering capability. (Plus, he should definitely check out the Messier Marathon, "held" each March, as an observational challenge).
There're lots of other resources out there (one national-level organization is the Astronomical League, which has lists of many local groups which could provide you with input into telescope selection, and, most importantly, could provide your father with the support and encouragement to help him turn a cool gift into a favorite hobby. Too many people (myself included) simply buy a 'scope and then never make the effort to enjoy it, by being a part of a good, active club, he'll be likely to get infected by their enthusiasm and explore avenues he might not otherwise think of.
Good luck!
http://www.scopereviews.com/
Just realized something else.
There are differences between standard "astronomy-based" telescopes and spotting scopes (or binoculars.)
Binoculars and spotting scopes show the image right-side up, due to an extra lens. Most telescopes for astronomy are up-side down and can be hard, for the unitiated, to track objects, due to earth's movement....
A high-powered pair of binoculars that are easy to attach and detach from a tripod is a great way to learn astronomy and still be able to do "spotting" work, such as bird watching.
My dad bought an excellent Leica spotting scope, used for watching American eagles, vultures, and the like, from his cabin on the lake.
This same spotting scope was nice for seeing the moons of Jupiter on one of its closest recent approaches. (It also helps that the cabin has a very dark night sky, very far away from city lights at night.)
The Leica is only a "20 to 60 power" scope, but it has excellent lenses, so images are very sharp and you can see well in the dark. (It's *much* better than what Galileo had to use, and he discovered the moons of Jupiter!) It'll see the planets, comets, etc., and can be mounted to a camera, with the right attachment.
I'd strongly recommend the Leica, but it ain't cheap!!!
Yes, you do... Unless you have a monster (expensive $200 plus) eyepiece there's no seeing the rings on Saturn or far galaxies with a small scope. I had the ETX-105 and felt mislead when I was told I could clearly see the planets. They show up so small it's hardly worth it. When I purchased my 8" scope (gathers so much more light-seems like a zillions times better) I could see so many objects I had no idea were right there in front of me. It's well worth it and most times cost similarly to 4" and 6" scopes--especially if you get a deal on an auction.
Ok, guess I was smoking crack. It was more then $150.
How funny, I still have the receipt in the lens box right here.
Bushnell Banner Astro 454, 60mm refractor telescope, full set of lenses & filters: $275 with tax in 1985.
Not great, but far less then but I can see the sunspots quite clearly, the stripes & spot of Jupiter, and the stripes and rings of Saturn pretty well.
"Can of worms? The can is open... the worms are everywhere."
I've been an amateur astronomer for quite a while, and have unfortunately seen many people purchase telescopes and then quickly lose interest. Many times this is because they either buy something of very low quality and get frustrated, or because they buy a scope that is good but doesn't really fit their needs.
Advice #1: Get a good quality telescope. Stay away from the plastic-lensed Tasco 2" refractors at your neighborhood department/hobby store. Take a look at Orion Telescopes -- everything there is good quality.
Advice #2: Base the rest of the decision on how you'll use the scope. At your price limit, you'll find that you can get one but not all of the following in a good-quality scope:
The ideal thing is if people can learn about the sky first before jumping into an expensive telescope purchase. A star chart and an inexpensive pair of 7x50 binoculars will let you see a surprising amount: Binary stars, some galaxies, lots of star clusters, all of the planets except Neptune and Pluto, the Galilean moons of Jupiter, amazing detail on the Earth's Moon, etc.