Looking for a starter telescope for me and my son (Ok, mainly me) So any advice on what to buy. Sure I can get a scope for under £200. Thinking of the sales coming up too.......... any books or websites to give me advice? I have a neighbour down the road I will also pester, who is into this, but looking for more points of view as well. Cheers
google sky app is a great
as is stellarium amazing bit of free software http://www.stellarium.org/
theskyatnight site is good, missus got me a scope off their for xmas a few years back
I was actually out last night for the first time in a while jupiter is a great place to start!
I bought my 10 year old son last Christmas a celestron astromaster 130- which was awesome.
He has since got very into astronomy- more so than me...
But it is a great bit of kit, for not a lot of money.
Aldi is your friend[url= https://www.aldi.co.uk/en/specialbuys/thursday-28th-november/product-detail/ps/p/dobson-telescope/ ][/url]
That Celestron looks great and can get it for £130 too, which will please the missus .....
Thanks for the info so far, its pushing me to get one now.
looking at a Seben 700-76 Reflector Telescope for our 11 year old at £61 looks good value to start with
Will do Graham, cheers. Is there a 'what telescope' type review magazine ?
Found this one for £ 57.52p including rucksack & cd rom
[url= http://www.amazon.co.uk/Celestron-21035-Travel-Scope-Telescope/dp/B001TI9Y2M/ref=sr_1_3/275-3173476-4160047?ie=UTF8&qid=1385852926&sr=8-3&keywords=telescopes ] Travel Telescope[/url]
I would highly recommend the celestron- I have learnt as much as the boy has- which was one of the reasons I bought it for him....
It is totally recommended!
I use it when he has gone to bed!!!!!
What's the (iPhone) app actually called?
A quick iTunes Store search for google sky returns starmap 3D+ and some others but nothing that looks like google?
Don't mind paying a couple of pounds, but want to get something that works!
Star Walk?
Well, been to see my neighbour 4 doors down. yes...... er...he is quite into his astronomy. He has his own built observatory and a permanent live tracking telescope taller than me 😯
I mentioned the Celestron and he opened a box and showed me the exact model, which is for his grandson for Christmas. I am going to a beginners group soon ( next meet is on the wifes birthday and she got a big knife out the cupboard when I mentioned it 🙄 ). He has his own website which I am trying to find at the moment and will post it up here, when I do. A bit more baffled with planetary knowledge than before I started talking to him, but learnt a lot today.
Well, to bring this up to date, I went to a beginners evening at the local astronomy club. Not 'really' my scene, but thought it was worth it to discuss what scope. After , what seemed a very long evening full of odd balls and weirdos ( which I hope didn't rub off) I was told about getting a scope with a 'parabolic' mirror. God knows why, but allegedly better. So, I did. I got one of these.
http://www.firstlightoptics.com/reflectors/skywatcher-explorer-150pl-eq3-2.html
Now, when the box turned up at work, I should have really read the info. This is big and I mean very big. The conservatory is now renamed the observatory. The dog is petrified of the thing. The wife is not amused, one bit. But the good news is, that it works very well. My neighbour popped in and to him, it was like a Ti full suss, King blinged bike to us lot !!
I am going to get a couple of books and use Stellarium and have some fun with it. The only issues are, where to put it and when moving it, is nearly 30 kgs !!
Good effort! 🙂
iphone app = planets