TO BUY TELESCOPE

[ABHIJIHT GUDI.S]

I would like to buy 1 telescope which one is good to buy below 6000 thousand rupees.
Please help me.I seen in filpkart is't good to buy in online

[sathya kumar Prasanna]

See Abhijith,

Any telescope costing below Rs. 6000 will be considered a toy telescope. I would not waste my money on such things. If you are really serious about astronomy, then you can buy Olympus DPS 10x50 binoculars, use it for a couple years, learn the sky and then invest a good Rs. 25000 at the very least on a 6 inch telescope. I am sure other members will agree with me.

Thanks and Regards

Mr. Sathyakumar Sharma,

Scientific Officer,

Karnataka Science and Technology Promotion Society,

DST, Govt of Karnataka,

Banashankari 2nd Stage,

Bangalore.

 
Phone: +91 8095626184

http://sharma-astronomy.weebly.com

On Mon, Oct 19, 2015 at 8:30 PM, ABHIJIHT GUDI.S <abhijit...@gmail.com> wrote:

I would like to buy 1 telescope  which one is good to buy below 6000 thousand rupees.
Please  help me.I seen in filpkart is't good to buy in online

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[Sanath Kumar]

Hey,
i second that, when i first started out even i was shocked that even entry level amateur telescopes cost 25,000/- and it is true that the lower apertures are more or less toys, please realize that these instruments are no different from lab instruments and are made with keeping in mind a lot of tolerances, hence the cost, the best way to go around this would be to participate in observing sessions and learn and then slowly buy a decent 8”, i wouldn’t recommending making one unless its a truss design, the PVC tubes are not as good as ready made ones and are heavy .




Regards,
Sanath Kumar

………………….
Sent from OS-X

[Karthik Subramanian]

On Tuesday, 20 October 2015 11:09:57 UTC+5:30, sathya kumar Prasanna wrote:

Any telescope costing below Rs. 6000 will be considered a toy telescope. I would not waste my money on such things. If you are really serious about astronomy, then you can buy Olympus DPS 10x50 binoculars, use it for a couple years, learn the sky and then invest a good Rs. 25000 at the very least on a 6 inch telescope. I am sure other members will agree with me.

Sound advice. 

Your money on the binoculars won't be wasted even if you decide later that stargazing is not for you.

Binocs are multipurpose, and are a good way to find out if you are really into stargazing or not.

K.

[Anish Kumar]

Hi Abhijith,

Celestron Firstscope has positive reviews. You may want to read comments on amazon.com for this scope before you buy on Amazon.in or other Indian websites. Once you read the comments you will know what to expect. Ofcourse, nobody on this forum or any astronomy forum will consider this as a telescope but that's the way it is going to be. Its a little like going to a sportsbike enthusiast forum and asking if Honda Activa is a good buy.

Personally, I found Binoculars to be a pain in the neck. They are heavy and you need to prop your arm on a wall or something to use them for more than a few minutes. And then comes the issue of pointing your head to the sky.

The second best thing is to find deals for used telescopes on olx or quikr etc. You will find them as not a lot of people that buy telescopes end up using them after the first couple of years have passed. It is a bit like fitness equipment and me. I got a cycle for myself in 2014 March. It was in the balcony over the last few months and now I have shifted it to a room inside to shield it from the sun. I used it twice to cycle myself to the nearest KFC and get a burger, fries and Pepsi.

Regards,

Anish

--

[Raghu Vamsi Gumma]

On Tuesday, October 20, 2015 at 11:07:00 AM UTC+5:30, ABHIJIHT GUDI.S wrote:

I would like to buy 1 telescope  which one is good to buy below 6000 thousand rupees.
Please  help me.I seen in filpkart is't good to buy in online

Buying a sub-par scope is definitely a bad idea. You will not be able to see much and it will be a frustrating experience. Definitely go for binoculars first, get used to the night sky and decide whether you want a reflector or refractor telescope and then purchase a good one. A good scope can be a once in a lifetime investment.

-Raghu

[Raghu Vamsi Gumma]

Couple of points to be made here:

1) Many amateur and experienced astronomers will definitely suggest that you go for a good scope and a solid mount for your first purchase. This is because astronomy can be a frustrating hobby when you are starting out and having a bad telescope only makes it worse. I made the same mistake when I was starting out; I bought a 4.5 inch reflector because it was cheap and on sale, and I had a very bad experience with it. 

To expand upon your motorcycle metaphor, any biking enthusiast will recommend that you purchase a higher end motorcycle with more features because they spend a lot of time riding their bikes and know what is important to make the experience more pleasurable. Without their experience and comments, you will have newbies attempting cross-country trips on a Honda Activa. While this may be possible, I'm sure no one would enjoy the experience. :)

2) While binoculars (like everything else in the world) have their pros and cons, it is very difficult to directly buy a telescope and start observing the skies without knowing what to look for. I personally love my binoculars, but if you don't like them, it is better to attend star parties and look through other scopes and get familiar with the skies first before buying any telescope. Binoculars offer a cheap and easy way to start out and in my opinion should be a prerequisite for any budding astronomer. The Celestron Firstscope recommended by you looks to be a 75mm Newtonian priced at round Rs.4000, I think you can get much better images from binoculars at the same price, without the overhead of collimation and buying eyepieces. In the same budget, you can get a pair of 10x50 binoculars and a tripod to mount the binoculars. :)

-Raghu

[Sunil G.R.]

, i wouldn’t recommending making one unless its a truss design, the PVC tubes are not as good as ready made ones and are heavy .

Sanath,

Can you explain why you are saying this? From long time i am looking to make one scope instead of buying.

Even if wont use it, atleast i will get the joy of learning and making (DIY).

What exactly is 'truss design'? And what disadvantages you see with PVC tubes or 'non-truss design' self made telescope?

Thanks,

Sunil.

[Karthik Subramanian]

On Tuesday, 20 October 2015 12:52:55 UTC+5:30, Anish wrote:

Ofcourse, nobody on this forum or any astronomy forum will consider this as a telescope but that's the way it is going to be.

It doesn't always have to be this way :) You'll notice a lot of experienced stargazers swearing by their small scope - be it a 60mm refractor, or a 4.5" reflector (the Starblast, for instance).

The trouble is, it takes a little experience to get /something/ out of small scopes. If you're short on patience, the experience could well drive you away from stargazing. Then again, to each their own.

Personally, I'm not against small scopes, but I do hesitate to recommend them over binoculars to a beginner.

 

Personally, I found Binoculars to be a pain in the neck. They are heavy and you need to prop your arm on a wall or something to use them for more than a few minutes. And then comes the issue of pointing your head to the sky.

Fair enough, not every piece of equipment works for everybody. But ... have you tried using binocs with a monopod and a chair? A chair (preferably slung low) works wonders, and saves your back and neck a good deal of pain.

K.

[Karthik Subramanian]

Oh, and lest you get the impression I'm experienced - I'm not :) I'm more like an old beginner - so yes, everything I say needs to be taken with plenty of salt. YMMV :)

K. 

[Anish Kumar]

For a lot of people, what draws them in is the telescope. I mean, you could talk to them about radio astronomy or anything else.. even binoculars but for a lot of people I met, it is a telescope that is the gateway to astronomy. Incidentally, I started an astronomy club for my neighbourhood and one of the members have this telescope. I hope I will be able to look through it one day and give a first hand review. I feel it is going to be similar to the 10x50 only a little less intuitive. Couple of them also had the 60az (I think) from celestron. It was a refractor, a terrible one at that. Completely unusable for astronomy but I have a lot more hope from this little reflector. One of the amazon reviews mention that the owner was able to place this on his lap and look at the moon. Nice no? :-)

K. 

--

[sathya kumar Prasanna]

My personal experience with the 76mm Reflecting telescope is that it is a waste. The eyepieces are made of really cheap plastic, are of non standard size. The finderscope and its bracker are plastic and can break if not handled like an egg. The tripod wobbles worse than Mithun Chakraborty doing the break dance. There is also no provision to collimate this instrument.

I would not advise buying this toy in my wildest dreams.

Thanks and Regards

Mr. Sathyakumar Sharma,

Scientific Officer,

Karnataka Science and Technology Promotion Society,

DST, Govt of Karnataka,

Banashankari 2nd Stage,

Bangalore.

 
Phone: +91 8095626184

http://sharma-astronomy.weebly.com

[Anish Kumar]

You Seem to have mistaken this for some other telescope. The firstscope doesn't come with a finder and it has a kind of dobsonian mount.

[Sanath Kumar]

Hey all,
an interesting discussion indeed!!, one thing to note is that this hobby requires “patience” and people who don’t have it will quit it with discontent or lack of patience and frustration, the beginner scope although matters but the self interest of learning and time invested into it matter much more, i only had an old 10X50 when i started and it was a WOW moment when i could see the jupiter with its moons, i was hooked, although visual astronomy is not all that complicated and is more of a experienced driven hobby.

although a bad beginner scope may prove to be not so useful, i think its enough to make an interested person more welcome to this hobby, people who are interested will find ways to observe and enjoy, its not that difficult specially for us bangalore folks who have a lot of members and equipments and facilities around, so lets make best use of it, we had a club of around 650 members in our 12th standard and only 4-5 members are active even now, only few end up becoming serious in this due to various reasons, so i would conclude saying, any telescope can help give an experience which is sometimes enough to bring the interested folks into this field.

[Abhijith Gudi]

Which one  good to buy telescope

ABHIJITH GUDI S

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From: Anish Kumar
Sent: ‎20/‎10/‎2015 05:31 PM
To: b-...@googlegroups.com
Subject: Re: [-BAS-] TO BUY TELESCOPE

[Abhijith Gudi]

Ok

ABHIJITH GUDI S

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From: Karthik Subramanian
Sent: ‎20/‎10/‎2015 11:33 AM
To: Bangalore Astronomical Society

Subject: Re: [-BAS-] TO BUY TELESCOPE

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[Abhijith Gudi]

Ok I interest in this hobby  & study  which one is good to buy
I think one should need very patience .I think required good time spending  in night and one should be ready to time  in night.

What would like to say about this hobby

ABHIJITH GUDI S

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From: Sanath Kumar
Sent: ‎20/‎10/‎2015 06:49 PM
To: b-...@googlegroups.com

Subject: Re: [-BAS-] TO BUY TELESCOPE

[Abhijith Gudi]

Is binoculars good for first time user 

ABHIJITH GUDI S

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From: Raghu Vamsi Gumma
Sent: ‎20/‎10/‎2015 01:30 PM
To: Bangalore Astronomical Society
Subject: [-BAS-] Re: TO BUY TELESCOPE

--

[Abhijith Gudi]

What must be starting  range to buy good telescope

ABHIJITH GUDI S

---

From: Anish Kumar
Sent: ‎20/‎10/‎2015 12:52 PM

To: b-...@googlegroups.com
Subject: Re: [-BAS-] TO BUY TELESCOPE

[Karthik Subramanian]

On Tuesday, 20 October 2015 17:20:32 UTC+5:30, Anish wrote:

Couple of them also had the 60az (I think) from celestron. It was a refractor, a terrible one at that.

And therein lies the rub.

I (still) have a scope of this kind. As telescopes go, they're not really all that bad. 

The /mount/ is total crap, however, and (in my experience) is what renders the setup

near-unusable for astronomy. These small scopes usually[*] acquit themselves

reasonably well on better mounts.

The catch is, if you're just starting out and have enthusiastically blown a few thousands

on a scope like this, there's no way in hell you're going to blow more good money on a

better mount (which will easily cost more than the scope that you just bought). 

Instead, you're more likely to get frustrated and get driven away from stargazing.

This is why I hesitate to recommend small telescopes, and push for binoculars instead.

It takes a fair bit to get anything out of a small scope; it takes much less to use binocs well.

K.

[*] Modulo the plastic eyepieces and broken finders that Sathya mentioned.

[Akarsh Simha]

Hey Karthik

You might find something interesting to do with that telescope. Since
it is fairly light, you should be able to put it on a motorized mount,
and put a camera on its prime focus. Small refractor astrophotography.

Regards
Akarsh

[Karthik Subramanian]

Haha, yes! That's exactly what I've been doing with it :)

I have a sawed-off webcam, and I used it to take pictures of Jupiter, the Moon, and the Sun.

The last one also needed some Baader Astro-Solar film, of course.

The next thing I've planned to do is to mate it with a board camera.

I'm just waiting for sufficient free time /and/ clear skies :D

K. 

[Anish Kumar]

Hi Karthik,

The Celestron firstscope appears to have a solid mount so that is not going to be an issue for it. Also the reviews for it are quite favorable. The issue with the 60az was definitely the plastic tripod but even the focuser was moving all over the place and eyepeices appeared to be of a single element. Terrestrial objects looked terrible through it. I am not sure of the single element EP but it was a tiny one. On the contrary, nice things have been said about this celestron firstscope. Luckily, I have access to one and will write back once I see through it.

Regards,

Anish

regards,

Anish

--

[Akarsh Simha]

> I have a sawed-off webcam, and I used it to take pictures of Jupiter, the
> Moon, and the Sun.
> The last one also needed some Baader Astro-Solar film, of course.

Why don't you share them? I'm curious to see what you got with that setup.

[Karthik Subramanian]

This shot of the moon is the only one I have at hand. I lost the others in a laptop crash :/

This one isn't great - but I guess it's OK for a quick shot without tracking. 

The colour balance was off since I'd removed the webcam's IR filter, so I had to do

a little post-processing to remove a pink tint.

K. 

 

[Karthik Subramanian]

On Wednesday, 21 October 2015 20:32:36 UTC+5:30, Karthik Subramanian wrote:

This shot of the moon is the only one I have at hand. I lost the others in a laptop crash :/

This one isn't great - but I guess it's OK for a quick shot without tracking. 

The colour balance was off since I'd removed the webcam's IR filter, so I had to do

a little post-processing to remove a pink tint.

I should add, I'm a total beginner with imaging - so I'm not even sure what I got right, and what I got wrong.

K. 

[Karthik Subramanian]

On Wednesday, 21 October 2015 17:14:26 UTC+5:30, Anish wrote:

The Celestron firstscope appears to have a solid mount so that is not going to be an issue for it. Also the reviews for it are quite favorable. The issue with the 60az was definitely the plastic tripod but even the focuser was moving all over the place and eyepeices appeared to be of a single element. Terrestrial objects looked terrible through it. I am not sure of the single element EP but it was a tiny one. On the contrary, nice things have been said about this celestron firstscope. Luckily, I have access to one and will write back once I see through it.

Hi Anish,

I'd definitely be interested in knowing how you found the firstscope.

If it turns out to be better than the 60AZ and its cousins, that would be really good.

K.

[Sanath Kumar]

Hello all.
although this is unusual, but i would recommend a celestron 70EQ power seeker (not astromaster), i just love that scope and the optics are awesome, i think satya will agree to this, i have used this scope a lot and i have seen most of the M objects with it, even galaxies, it has a proper finder although plastic, unlike the red dot on astro master telescopes which are non functional, and i think for a casual observer, this is a good scope, it comes with a really good quality 20mm eyepiece and a 4mm eyepiece, both are plossls and are good quality, the mount itself is stable and good.


The above is if you are a student and can’t afford a decent 6” or higher telescope, if you can somehow get a 6” dob then please get it, don’t look back at these products .

[sathya kumar Prasanna]

Sanath has rightly said that he has seen many M objects with it. However one must be aware that it takes a lot of hours of standing in the dark before one reaches the level of expertise Sanath has reached. For an absolute novice, it can be used, but unless you have the passion that some of the members have, like Sanath, one cannot see anything through this  telescope or any for that matter.

Thanks and Regards

Mr. Sathyakumar Sharma,

Scientific Officer,

Karnataka Science and Technology Promotion Society,

DST, Govt of Karnataka,

Banashankari 2nd Stage,

Bangalore.

 
Phone: +91 8095626184

http://sharma-astronomy.weebly.com

[itspo...@gmail.com]

Maybe for just a little extra you could get this ?

Celestron AstroMaster 130 EQ Telescope

for 19k the 70 EQ priced at 14K

--

K Ponappa Subbaiah
be.net/ponappa
flickr.com/photos/ponappa

[Sanath Kumar]

Please stop saying astromaster, let me explain, why not to buy it !!!

[ismailjabi]

This is not good guide telescope with illuminated led cross.

Ismail 

[itspo...@gmail.com]

Thank You Sanath, Now its Clear ... why not to buy...

Thanks

[itspo...@gmail.com]

Oops

Sorry...

It would be great if we [newbies] get a list of what we can best buy

within a sensible budget of around 20k [what we can see/value/basic photography/portability]

Thanks

[Akarsh Simha]

That looks like a regular sight made with illuminated dots instead... why does it not work?

Regards

Akarsh

[Sanath Kumar]

Hey,
firstly sorry for the harsh reply, but make it a habit of reading the whole thread before sending an email. i read it whole before commenting .

Akarsh: it has 2 led’s and uses the concept of internal reflection to point to an object, the dots are separated by a distance and in theory is supposed to work like a red dot, except that it doesn’t, its very hard to use it and the dot moves as you move yourself which is very unusual also i would prefer non electronic finders, as you won’t have to worry about the batteries.

[itspo...@gmail.com]

Cool... Sorry I am following the thread but had a blip moment on your astromaster comment... Apologies for that...

I was looking at the specs and not the finder scope... can I pass it as a newbie mistake? :)

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[ABhijith gudi s]

Ok tell me which one to buy

---

From: Sanath Kumar
Sent: ‎22-‎10-‎2015 01:30 PM
To: b-...@googlegroups.com; itspo...@gmail.com

Subject: Re: [-BAS-] TO BUY TELESCOPE

[Karthik Subramanian]

On Saturday, 24 October 2015 13:15:39 UTC+5:30, ABHIJIHT GUDI.S wrote:

Ok tell me which one to buy

Abhijith,

That's a decision you'll have to make.

If you have made up your mind that you really want to buy a scope right away, then:

 (1) If you have Rs. 20K - 30K to spare, and don't mind blowing that kind of money, talk to Sathya and you can get hold of a good SkyWatcher reflector.

 (2) If your budget is around 5K, then get yourself a pair of binoculars; /or/ wait for Anish's review of the Celestron firstscope.

If you've not made up your mind, then wait for the next BAS star party, attend, look through a few scopes and binocs, and then make a decision.

Hope this helps,

K.

[ANAND LATHA]

Hello Sir,

I HAVE GROUND A 6 inch Mirror TO 1200mm Focal length.could anyone give
me information about aluminizing or silvering it.or please give me the
address of universities that provide such services

THANKS,
ANAND.K.N.

[Abhilash .P]

I believe ABAA can help with aluminizing the mirror. I do remember the author of the famous DIY telescope book P.N Shankar mentioning that RRI(Raman Research Institute) does the work.

[Akarsh Simha]

ABAA used to send mirrors to Optics and Allied Engg. (http://opticsindia.com/)

Regards
Akarsh