New wanna be astronomer

Dear List,

I'm wanting to buy a telescope for my family and I to start gazing at the
planets, stars, and nebulae. Can anyone suggest a good brand, model of
scope to buy? I'd like to be able to view all our planets, galaxies, and
hopefully view these beautiful nubulaes that I've seen photos of on the
internet. I'm not even sure if that's possible since I have very little
knowledge of astronomy.

Any help would be appreciated. I was thinking of spending up to $1000
give or take. Can I find a scope that would allow me to view the above
mentioned scenarios and with this type of money? Also I've noticed on some
sites that people use several different eye pieces. Do these normally come
with a scope or do they come seperate?

Also I'm concerned about viewing from where I live. I live in North Fort
Worth, TX and was curious if one has to drive to the country to view the
stars and planets or does the surrounding light of the city interfere? Oh
well enough rambling on. Again any help is appreciated.

Paul

Telescope Buyers FAQ
http://home.inreach.com/starlord


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towards an east that would not know another dawn.
But elsewhere the Stars were still young and the light of morning lingered: and
along the path he once had followed, Man would one day go again.

Arthur C. Clarke "The City & The Stars"

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"Paul" wrote in message
...
Dear List,

I'm wanting to buy a telescope for my family and I to start gazing at the
planets, stars, and nebulae. Can anyone suggest a good brand, model of
scope to buy? I'd like to be able to view all our planets, galaxies, and
hopefully view these beautiful nubulaes that I've seen photos of on the
internet. I'm not even sure if that's possible since I have very little
knowledge of astronomy.

Any help would be appreciated. I was thinking of spending up to $1000
give or take. Can I find a scope that would allow me to view the above
mentioned scenarios and with this type of money? Also I've noticed on some
sites that people use several different eye pieces. Do these normally come
with a scope or do they come seperate?

Also I'm concerned about viewing from where I live. I live in North Fort
Worth, TX and was curious if one has to drive to the country to view the
stars and planets or does the surrounding light of the city interfere? Oh
well enough rambling on. Again any help is appreciated.

Paul




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"Paul" wrote in message
...
Dear List,

I'm wanting to buy a telescope for my family and I to start gazing at
the
planets, stars, and nebulae. Can anyone suggest a good brand, model of
scope to buy? I'd like to be able to view all our planets, galaxies, and
hopefully view these beautiful nubulaes that I've seen photos of on the
internet. I'm not even sure if that's possible since I have very little
knowledge of astronomy.


The FAQ listed by another poster is a good place to start. But right after
you read it, go find your local astronomy club (there should be a large one
in Ft. Worth) and attend a few of their "star parties" where you'll get to
try various types of scopes out first hand. Amateur astronomers are always
willing to let visitors take a look through their gear and are a great
source of info. Once you decide what you want to buy, the locals will be a
great source of support and fun.

BTW, don't get your hopes up too high about seeing the objects as depicted
in long time exposure photography...your eyes are simply not sensitive
enought to detect the colors that CCD's or film can detect when exposed for
a long time. However, you will right away get a kick out of stars, star
clusters, planets and some of the brighter nebulae. Once you get accustomed
to viewing faint and diffuse objects (it takes practice), the galaxies and
dimmer nebulae will give you a lifetime of enjoyment teasing out their
detail.

Just remember, all othe rthings being equal, there's no beating
aperture...the bigger the better. Therefore a good starting scope is a
Dobsonian (8" or 10" is a good place to start) equipped with a Telrad
finder. Take a look at the Orion series of Dobs at www.telescope.com. I've
always found them to be resonably priced and with good optics. While you're
there, pick up a copy of "Turn Left at Orion" which will teach you about
navigating the sky.

Good luck and let us know how you do!

Hap Griffin

Astrophotos at www.machunter.org

Thanks Starlord and Hap for the info.

Paul

"Paul" wrote in message
...
Dear List,

I'm wanting to buy a telescope for my family and I to start gazing at
the
planets, stars, and nebulae. Can anyone suggest a good brand, model of
scope to buy? I'd like to be able to view all our planets, galaxies, and
hopefully view these beautiful nubulaes that I've seen photos of on the
internet. I'm not even sure if that's possible since I have very little
knowledge of astronomy.

Any help would be appreciated. I was thinking of spending up to $1000
give or take. Can I find a scope that would allow me to view the above
mentioned scenarios and with this type of money? Also I've noticed on
some
sites that people use several different eye pieces. Do these normally
come
with a scope or do they come seperate?

Also I'm concerned about viewing from where I live. I live in North
Fort
Worth, TX and was curious if one has to drive to the country to view the
stars and planets or does the surrounding light of the city interfere? Oh
well enough rambling on. Again any help is appreciated.

Paul

Hello Paul. DO read the following links:

"Purchasing Amateur Telescopes"
http://www.perkins-observatory.org/FAQ.index.html

"The Heretic's Guide to Choosing and Buying Your First Telescope"
http://findascope.com/

"So, You Want to Buy a Telescope?"
http://www.astroleague.org/al/astrnote/astnot19.html

Now that that's out of the way, here are my 2cents. I'd recommend an
8" or (if you can handle the weight) a 10" Dobsonian either from
Discovery or Orion. You'll have money left over for plenty of
accessories and maybe even a pair of 50mm or larger binoculars (which
I would recommend buying and using even before you get a telescope).
Dobsonian mounts are easy to use, even for a beginner. Bear in mind
however, that they don't have GOTO and work best if you learn to
star-hop. Nonetheless, they will show you the most for the buck.

You won't see nebulae and galaxies like they appear in the photos
(even from a dark sky site thought it helps a LOT), since our eyes are
insensitive to color in faint light, and photons can "burn" onto a
film or ccd chip in a way that our eyes cannot, even with large
aperture telescopes. From urban skies, only a handful of galaxies are
observable compared to rural skies.

There are no goto scopes under $1000 that would have the
light-gathering ability that you probably want, even though they would
help in finding objects, especially in the city. An 8" goto scope
starts around $1200 or so. One option would be to purchase digital
setting circles for the 8" or 10" dobsonian. This would bring the cost
right about to $1000, though you would have to hassle with installing
the encoders and such.

Please do more research before you make a decision. In addition to the
above links, check out the newsgroup sci.astro.amateur
90% of the threads center on telescopes and accessories and is much
more active than alt.astronomy

Hoped this helps
Malcolm
"Paul" wrote in message ...
Dear List,

I'm wanting to buy a telescope for my family and I to start gazing at the
planets, stars, and nebulae. Can anyone suggest a good brand, model of
scope to buy? I'd like to be able to view all our planets, galaxies, and
hopefully view these beautiful nubulaes that I've seen photos of on the
internet. I'm not even sure if that's possible since I have very little
knowledge of astronomy.

Any help would be appreciated. I was thinking of spending up to $1000
give or take. Can I find a scope that would allow me to view the above
mentioned scenarios and with this type of money? Also I've noticed on some
sites that people use several different eye pieces. Do these normally come
with a scope or do they come seperate?

Also I'm concerned about viewing from where I live. I live in North Fort
Worth, TX and was curious if one has to drive to the country to view the
stars and planets or does the surrounding light of the city interfere? Oh
well enough rambling on. Again any help is appreciated.

Paul

Also, you're going to need at least 1 low power eyepiece. It depends on the
focal length of the telescope that you end up buying, but try for something
that gives you at least 1/2 degree field of view (maybe a 50mm or so Plossl
or Erfle.) Higher powers are nice for looking at things like the moon and
Saturn, but they are not ideal for deep sky objects like galaxies and
nebulae. First, you would only be able to see a small portion of the object.
Second, higher powers attenuate the already faint light (although seasoned
amateurs have a use for this kind of view sometimes.) And third, if you are
trying to find deep sky object at higher power, you will get frustrated.
They have a very small field of view and getting something like the veil
nebula centered at 150x is a quick way to go insane. The smaller millimeter
rating an ocular has, the higher power it will provide at any given focal
length. So a 30 millimeter eyepiece will be lower power that a 6mm one.

Also, I have been out of the loop for a while, but I found that a decent
nebular filter can work wonders when observing nebulae from slightly
light-polluted areas. It increases the contrast between emission nebulae and
light polluted skies and makes finding the objects easier. They can also dim
the object in question somewhat, so you'll want to obseve both with and
without and see which you like better. It just depends on the object and the
type of light pollution. My own bias says that I never met a Barlow I liked
(they double or more the effective magnification of a given eyepiece at a
lower cost than buying the correct eyepiece) because even good ones do not
perform as well as using the correct eyepiece in the first place.

Finally, all the FAQs recommended here are fabulous, but I just want to add
one thing: if the telescope you are considering accepts eyepieces which have
a .956" outer diameter for the steel barrel, run, don'y walk away. These are
ALWAYS garbage. The standard is 1 1/4 inch, and although that doesn't
necessarily mean it's a good scope. .965 does mean it's a bad scope. As far
as I know, there is not a single .965" ocular which is worth even
paperwieght status.As far as I know, no quality astromonical ltelescope will
offer a terrestrial inverter as standard. (Images through astronomical
telescopes are inverted or upside-down. This doesn't matter for looking at
space where there really is no up or down. They are ommitted because they
only degrade the image quality by introducing multiple unnecessary optical
surfaces. Cheap telescopes come with them because people want to look at
their neighbor's swimming pool right-side up.) Along the same lines as .965
oculars, if the telescope comes with a "solar filter" thats screws into the
eyepiece, then it is a dangerous and cheap sham of an instrument. No solar
filter EVER screws into the eyepiece; safe ones always go in front of the
objective (for obvious reasons) and with these, it is worth spending good
money. Blind astronomers don't have any fun.

"Malcolm" wrote in message
m...
Hello Paul. DO read the following links:

"Purchasing Amateur Telescopes"
http://www.perkins-observatory.org/FAQ.index.html

"The Heretic's Guide to Choosing and Buying Your First Telescope"
http://findascope.com/

"So, You Want to Buy a Telescope?"
http://www.astroleague.org/al/astrnote/astnot19.html

Now that that's out of the way, here are my 2cents. I'd recommend an
8" or (if you can handle the weight) a 10" Dobsonian either from
Discovery or Orion. You'll have money left over for plenty of
accessories and maybe even a pair of 50mm or larger binoculars (which
I would recommend buying and using even before you get a telescope).
Dobsonian mounts are easy to use, even for a beginner. Bear in mind
however, that they don't have GOTO and work best if you learn to
star-hop. Nonetheless, they will show you the most for the buck.

You won't see nebulae and galaxies like they appear in the photos
(even from a dark sky site thought it helps a LOT), since our eyes are
insensitive to color in faint light, and photons can "burn" onto a
film or ccd chip in a way that our eyes cannot, even with large
aperture telescopes. From urban skies, only a handful of galaxies are
observable compared to rural skies.

There are no goto scopes under $1000 that would have the
light-gathering ability that you probably want, even though they would
help in finding objects, especially in the city. An 8" goto scope
starts around $1200 or so. One option would be to purchase digital
setting circles for the 8" or 10" dobsonian. This would bring the cost
right about to $1000, though you would have to hassle with installing
the encoders and such.

Please do more research before you make a decision. In addition to the
above links, check out the newsgroup sci.astro.amateur
90% of the threads center on telescopes and accessories and is much
more active than alt.astronomy

Hoped this helps
Malcolm
"Paul" wrote in message
...
Dear List,

I'm wanting to buy a telescope for my family and I to start gazing at
the
planets, stars, and nebulae. Can anyone suggest a good brand, model of
scope to buy? I'd like to be able to view all our planets, galaxies,
and
hopefully view these beautiful nubulaes that I've seen photos of on the
internet. I'm not even sure if that's possible since I have very little
knowledge of astronomy.

Any help would be appreciated. I was thinking of spending up to $1000
give or take. Can I find a scope that would allow me to view the above
mentioned scenarios and with this type of money? Also I've noticed on
some
sites that people use several different eye pieces. Do these normally
come
with a scope or do they come seperate?

Also I'm concerned about viewing from where I live. I live in North
Fort
Worth, TX and was curious if one has to drive to the country to view the
stars and planets or does the surrounding light of the city interfere?
Oh
well enough rambling on. Again any help is appreciated.

Paul