Am looking at buying a telescope but know absolutely nothing about them. Don’t want anything too expensive but willing to spend a couple of hundred quid, maybe more, for something decent-ish!

A colleague at work reckons he has seen one which you link up to your laptop to find specific stars etc, and also you can take pics with it?? Don’t know whether one like that falls within my budget or not?

As I say, know nothing about these at all so a point in the right direction would be very much appreciated. Cheers.

A colleague at work reckons he has seen one which you link up to your laptop to find specific stars etc, and also you can take pics with it?? Don’t know whether one like that falls within my budget or not?

I’m one of the thousands of people who has picked up a telescope this week. I got a lot of info from StarGazersLounge – http://stargazerslounge.com/forum/19-getting-started-general-help-and-advice/

I ended up deciding I didn’t want to spend as much as they suggested so got a SkyWatcher Explorer 130p which was going cheap. Probably not the best telescope on the market but it’s given me a lot of “Oooooooh…” moments on the evenings I’ve had with it and I’m learning a lot if I want to try and sneak something bigger past the OH later on.

The best advice I saw was to buy something small enough that you’ll actually use it rather than splashing out on a monster that you can’t be bothered to do anything with.

n.b. Going on that website and asking about telescopes is a bit like coming on here and asking about bikes axes. You’ll have to resist the urge to spend a fortune.

Yep, I have a Celestron 114 GT which is a computerised model of the 114mm Newtonian Reflector and it’s awesome. Before buying a telescope, I would advise you to familiarise yourself with different types (refractor, reflector, schmidt cassegrain, dobsonian etc) and their advantages and disadvantages.
Telescope business can be very expensive but I have found a decent forum where you can get some used gear ( a bit like FS part of this forum) http://www.astrobuysell.com/uk/browse.php

I’ve done quite a bit of research but getting more confused the more info I get! Whats the main advantages/disadvantages betwenn refractor and reflector?

Whats the main advantages/disadvantages betwenn refractor and reflector?

Have a read of:
http://stargazerslounge.com/topic/57239-reflector-vs-refractor/

Inexpert Summary:
Reflectors give you more aperture – so more resolution – for your money but they have less contrast. This makes reflectors better for planets/moon but less good for deep sky stuff.

edit: by the by, this seems to be recommended as a good scope for the money you’ve mentioned:
http://www.firstlightoptics.com/dobsonians/skywatcher-skyliner-200p-dobsonian.html

+1 stargazers lounge.
i can also recommend sherwoods photo for scopes and stuff, ive used them a few times no problem.
you will be able to buy a scope with a goto mount for around £200, these can locate and track specific objects in the night sky.

MrsBouy has always had an interest in the Stars, so we’re on the lookout for a decent telescope too…

I’ll be interested to see where this thread goes.

I bought a Celestron Powerseeker 50 for About £35 new with a tripod. Wobbbly as you like, but a real telescope for peanuts.

Might be worth it to see what you think of it, and it’s so cheap you can give it to a friend/child as a present if you dont like it or want to upgrade because you do.

The moon looks amazing with it, much betterer than the pictures on the Celestron website.

hoping to get one of these eventually

Pentax o-gps1, its small and allows tracking on a Pentax DSLR without the need for a telescope/equatorial mount

I used to have Celestron Powerseeker 50 and definitely wouldn’t recommend it to anyone. It has a very weird .965-inch focuser which means that it’s impossible to get any eyepieces for it. The standards for eyepieces are 1.25 in and 2in. It’s like buying a mountain bike with 1 inch head tube.

That’s interesting. Is it worth upgrading anyway? I was going to use it as-is.

well that didnt work, apparently i dont know how to post pics up here after all.

Martymac – may take a trip down there next week, a bit of a trek but would rather get some decent advice than go at it blind. Whats the score regarding taking photo’s, is that something that will add too much expense?

yes, basically.
£200 odd will get something really nice with a goto mount thats suitable for observing, and it will have the ‘wow’ factor.
it will, however, use an alt/az type mount, which tracks an object, but wont take into account the rotation of the earth.
to take pictures you need to use an equatorial mount, which is heavier, more complicated to use, and a fair bit more expensive (my setup cost over £800, and is still, truthfully, the minimum required to get any decent images)
http://www.flickr.com/photos/martymac1968/11888490443/ was taken using a scope, the other moon picture on my photostream was taken with a telephoto lens on the same normal slr camera.

i will add . . .
i have seen saturn through my scope, as have a few of my friends, and without exception we all said ‘wow’ it is an amazing sight.

I know Patrick Moore used to go on like a stuck record about beginners buying Astronomical Binoculars and a tripod… But 30 years of astronomy a massive “dob”, a 200mm goto Celestron, loads of other shite and a pair of good £120 binoculars later… He was right!

Cheers, I’ll be giving the photo aspect a miss, at least until I’ve proved to myself it is something I want to get into to warrant spending a grand or so on.

marthall makes a good point too . .

I asked on here recently about what to get and got some decent info from people. I was advised to get a refractor scope by the local astronomers club ( all a bit weird, they are !!) I looked at the Skywatcher 150P with the equatorial mount. They thought it was a good buy, as wanted to check I had more good bits than bad, like buying a midrange bike, I suppose. I saw the 150Pl for the same price and thought, why not. The L bit meant the long version and is huge. Wife is not impressed , but the things you can see is fantastic. I wont need another scope, that’s it. Was £275 for it, but 30 kg to move it around.

Am tempted by the Skywatcher 200P as mentioned above, just need to get in the good books as just seen a pic of how big it is!!

Mate of mine’s into his astrophotography.

He took this photo of the moon with a webcam, in 2004.

Rest of the site’s worth a read, too.

http://astro.neutral.org/

Built an observatory in his back garden, the mentalist. (-:

Lovely clear night last night. Good opportunity to get out.

As a reference, with the telescope I mentioned above I could spot things like the bands on Jupiter (the spot was round the back when I looked), the Owl cluster, the fish mouth and trapezium in orion, M78 and various other things. That in an area which moderately dark skies. Be good to drag it a bit further north into the county some time.

Ironically a mate called me to say he bought a 200P Skywatcher yesterday and spent the night gazing at the stars and is chuffed. In relation to size, he has a 5 series saloon. He had to put the front seat down and it just got in the car. He is over the moon with it 😀

Cheers lemonysam, spoke to the guys at First Light Optics and ordered the 200P. Apparently I’ll be able to take a few decent pics of the moon, planets etc with the DSLR connection so going to give it a go 😆

*is jealous*

Looks like an ace bit of kit, post up your results when you get them!

gofasterstripes, it’s a good spotting scope however if you want to see some deep sky objects like M42 you’ll need to get much bigger aperture. On my 114GT, i’ve seen Saturn, polar caps on Mars, cloud bands on Jupiter and 4 of its moons, Venus, M42 and loads of double stars 🙂

If i , as a complete beginner, had a very limited budget (say £50-70) is there anything worth considering for a first telescope or forget it?

http://www.jessops.com/online.store/products/89846/Show.html?utm_source=google&utm_medium=cpc&utm_campaign=PLA&utm_term=Mercury%20707%20Telescope&gclid=CJOg3NaplbwCFdShtAodbUMAhQ

You could do something like this, but you may get a bit frustrated after a while and want a slightly better scope. Celestron 130 is £130 and one that was recommended by many here. I did consider it, but decided to spend a bit more.