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Post by timwalsh on Apr 1, 2010 22:39:22 GMT
hi all , really chuffed to say I saw Saturn for the first time tonight with my we second hand astromaster 114. it was difficult to make out at first but with the 10mm lense I was able to see the ring and some moons relatively clearly.
I was surprised by how quickly it moved across the optic at high magnification , after a quick botch i got both slow motion adjusters working and was able to track it clearly.
once the hands went numb it was time to go in , pleased to find it ( by pure luck I admit as I havent set it up to true north as yet... still getting round to it ;D
cheers , Tim.
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Post by paddyman on Apr 2, 2010 20:51:28 GMT
Hi Tim, Your getting good use out of your astromaster114 already, thats good work. I used to have a celestron 114 firstscope and wonder if it was something similar to yours? If so your having much better luck than I had, it would take me ages to find what I was looking for  Never got around to polar align it though which may have helped (didnt know at the time what that even ment, lol) Did you get the new camera tried out yet? Hope to see you at an observing night in Delamont sometime if its not too far for you to travel. Good luck, Paddy |
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Post by timwalsh on Apr 2, 2010 21:55:21 GMT
cheers Paddy , it is a bit of a dark art using the star finder, not a great design by celestron. The view of saturn was admittedly , tiny  but the rings and moons were visible, I'm buying a barlow lense shortly but I can see me outgrowing this scope pretty quickly ... getting used to the camera as we speak , got a sony alpha 100 , seems good , bulb mode etc , tmount and adapter ordered also so looking forward to getting her hooked up and using its 10mp potential , I can see how this hobby becomes addictive lol hope to see you down there too , I'll try and make it to the next one , but I have to admit , at the moment i dont have a notion lol cheers for now , Tim ;D |
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Post by paddyman on Apr 3, 2010 21:50:39 GMT
Its all a good learning experience I have only been to the last 4 observing sessions and learned a lot already, though I can see that there is soo much out there to grasp that if I lived 100 years it probably wouldn't be enough to take it all in. If you get talking to Philip or David or the others some evening down there you can learn to find a lot of interesting sights in a short time, they are very helpful and good at explaining things. Im still trying to figure out the constellations and how people decided what they looked like (definately takes a good imagination for some of them,lol) I got a quick search for your camera on google, it seems pretty good for the job, seen a couple of good reviews on astronomy sites about it. Clear skys and happy hunting, Paddy |
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Post by timwalsh on Apr 6, 2010 19:34:59 GMT
cheers Paddy , yeah it seems to be a good job. Still waiting for the t-mount to get her mounted to the telescope. Still having grief with te starfinder , some nights it seems spot on then others i cant find anything ... usually if pushed for time etc , definately need to slow down methinks hope to post some pics soon when the gear arrives .. hopefully soon cheers , Tim. |
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Never got around to polar align it though which may have helped (didnt know at the time what that even ment, lol)
but the rings and moons were visible, I'm buying a barlow lense shortly but I can see me outgrowing this scope pretty quickly ...