How to locate saturn moons through a skywatcher 130mm 650 focal?

Question

Have been looking at saturn recently (the only planet to be seen across the norther winter skies) I reside in vancouver, British Columbia.

I wonder how to locate the moons of saturn since I am unable to find them.

Also Im using a 10mm eye piece and my objective is 130mm but I do not see the details of the planets very clearly. Would barlow help and is there anything else I can do to optimize the image I see to observe more details of planetary surfaces. ?

Thanks

Answer 1

well,Saturn has 56 confirmed natural satellites and
appears to the naked eye in the night sky as a bright, yellowish star varying usually between magnitude +1 and 0 and takes approximately 29 and a half years to make a complete circuit of the ecliptic against the background constellations of the zodiac.Optical aid (large binoculars or a telescope) magnifying at least 20X is required to clearly resolve Saturn's rings for most people.

While it is a rewarding target for observation for most of the time it is visible in the sky, Saturn and its rings are best seen when the planet is at or near opposition (the configuration of a planet when it is at an elongation of 180° and thus appears opposite the Sun in the sky). In the opposition on January 13, 2005,Saturn appeared at its brightest until 2031, mostly due to a favorable orientation of the rings relative to the Earth..

and i dont think u can see all the 56 satellites from earth..!

hope this helps..

Answer 2

Your telescope is a bit small to resolve objects around the size of the Moon or maybe a little bigger, IE Titan at that distance.

Ideally you should have 250mm to 300mm assuming you are using a reflector of some kind (newtonian or cassegrain) as an absolute minimum.

Atmospherics on Earth and the glare of Saturn itself will obscure an object the size of the Earth at that distance, using such a small instrument.

A Barlow X2 will double the focal length of your instrument and cause a much greater magnification but a much dimmer and smaller field.

You talk about an objective, so are you using a 130mm refractor?
If you have a refractor that big it would cost hundreds of thousands of dollars and would require expert knowledge to use and house and weigh about 2 to 3 tons. You would need Pan Achromatic lenses of the highest quality and $20000 would not be out of the question for the eyepieces alone. So I'm assuming you are using a reflector.

If you are using a reflector, a 10mm Plossel or Hygenian are fine. Some kind of wide angle eyepiece would be useful.

The fact is you are driving the telescope to its limits and if the atmosphere or viewing conditions are less than perfect you are not going to see what you are looking for.

You can use a Charged Couple Device instead of the eyepiece and use a computer to stack the images using software such as Registax and this will give you absolutely the best view but don't hold your breath.

Hope this helps, Jules Australia.

You will get much better results studying the Jovian moons because Jupiter is twice as close as Saturn.

Answer 3

you might see Titan as a small white dot near Saturn - I can with my 8" f/7 reflector. But that's the best you can hope for.

The 4 main satellites of Jupiter are more impressive. Io, Europa, Ganymede and Callisto can be seen easily. Of course, you'll get no surface detail on them at all, but Io can be quite dramatic when it casts a shadow on Jupiter's atmosphere. Sky & Telescope magazine has listings on when you can see said phenomenon.