More on First Scopes

Hi all I have been thinking about first scopes for the past couple of days. I have put together this pin-board to refer people too in the future. The problem with first scopes is complicated so I think it would be best to put all of my thoughts down on paper. (so to speak)

It is a cliche at this point to point out that there are a bunch of really bad options for your first scope, but these generally fall into the category of a small refractor (50-90mm in aperture), it could be on an equatorial mount or not, it could also have a clock drive. None of the bells and whistles matter, whatever you do do not buy an instrument for visual use that is in this aperture range. The problem has to do with the fact that while they are light and portable you cannot see anything with them. Usually they have terrible quality optics but mostly the problem is that the sky will swamp out anything other than the brightest of objects in the city.

Now your going to ask me why I don't have any Catadioptric Telescopes on this list, the reason is that there focal lengths are so long, but mostly it has to do with the way they are mounted. No initiate amateur should ever deal with an equatorial mount, the set up is too complicated resulting in whole nights wasted trying to make things work. The only other option is a fork mount and there we have a whole other set of problems. Since forks grow with the aperture of the telescope you are restricted to single arm fork mounted telescopes 8" in size if you are going to use it more than once or twice. This is a hard truth to understand but the fork is both heavy and weirdly shaped resulting in it being uncomfortable to carry. This means that you won't use your telescope. Don't believe me? Go to ebay (or Astromart) and search for the phrase "only used once" or "only used once or twice" when looking for a telescope.

While we are on the subject, you may think that you will get a deal buying second hand telescope. This is a terrible idea for the following reason, you don't know who owned it. Telescopes are sensitive instruments meaning that if they are misused or mishandled in any way they may require costly repairs or be utterly unusable. For the most part GOTO scopes will have issues with there motors and gears, Newtonian telescopes will require collimation. These are issues you do not want to have to deal with without a stout warranty and some guidance.

The truth is that the only way your going to get into the hobby and staying in it is to have a telescope that performs well visually while at the same time being portable enough to take into your back yard at night. This leads us to the Dobsonian telescope. Basically you take a Newtonian telescope put some castors on the sides of it and put it on a rotating platform and you have an altitude-azimuth telescope. Add optical encoders to each axis and a computer and you have something that can be used to tour the sky with relative ease.

For the impatient this is the best option in less than an hour you will have your telescope setup and be exploring the sky with 6" or 8" of clear aperture. You won't track objects but you will be able to find them. If your a patient person then I would suggest something without the computer, since it will enable you to learn the sky the hard way, finding objects by star hopping.

I would not recommend GOTO telescopes for your first scope. Why? Because they are pieces of technology, slightly anachronistic since they have a digital computer, only in the most rudimentary sense. Usually GOTO telescopes end up being unusable, leading to a great deal of frustration with no objects being viewed through the scope.

Now the last and most important tip is this, Amateur Astronomy is a frustrating hobby no matter how you do it. There are very few shortcuts that don't end up being headaches at some point. The point I am trying to make is that perseverance is a necessary and sufficient condition no matter which road you chose to make astronomy your hobby.