Are there any nebulae or other galaxies I can see?

Question

I have a tiny starter meade 70mm refractor 3 inch lens.

I have a 9mm, 25mm, and a barlow 2x. Saturn is very tiny in my scope and I highly doubt I can see any further then that. Though I can see the rings it all appears as one piece.

If there is anything I can see using this scope can someone tell me where it is?

Thanks in advance.

Answer 1

There are lots of things that you can see with the naked eye that would be larger in the scope, and some will be improved with your telescope.

The problem for most of the nebulae is that they are pretty faint, and your 3-inch objective lens isn't going to gather enough more light to really make them stand out.

But for starters, try the Orion Nebula and the Pleiades. The Orion nebula is just slightly below the eastern-most star of the three that make up Orion's Belt. The nebula is often referred to as Orion's sword, and it is a spectacular sight in a large-enough telescope.

http://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Orion_%28constellation%29

http://upload.wikimedia.org/wikipedia/commons/4/4d/Orion_3008_huge.jpg

http://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Image:Orion_Nebula_-_Hubble_2006_mosaic_18000.jpg

The Pleiades (or "Seven Sisters") are a beautiful asterism made up of bright blue-white stars that forn the "shoulder" of Taurus the Bull. Under higher magnification, the Pleaides appear to be covered with a gauzy haze of dust.

http://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Pleiades_%28star_cluster%29

http://upload.wikimedia.org/wikipedia/commons/4/4e/Pleiades_large.jpg

M31 -- the Andromeda Galaxy -- is visible to the naked eye IF you have VERY good viewing conditions, and it is very dark. But for it to start to stand out in a telescope, you need at least a 6-inch objective.

http://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Andromeda_Galaxy

http://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Image:M31_Lanoue.png

You can find more if you get any one of a number of Amateur Astronomy books at either the Library or your local bookstore. Good luck, and enjoy!

Answer 2

i have a refractor with a two inch lens and i could easily see that the rings were separate from saturn. even at only 50x.

jupiter and its moons would be visible.

albireo a beautiful double star in cygnus would be visible.

you could look at the moon, pick any time that isn't a full moon, and pay attention to the areas that are partly in shadow, amazing what you can see there.

the pleiades, the orion nebula, the ring nebula (on a good night). try a low power at first and remember that nothing will look like it does in the books. saturn is still quite tiny even at 100x and your scope shouldn't go above 150x

go to a stie like www.heavensabove.com to find out what you can see in the sky at night.

if you need more help you can contact me.

Answer 3

ok, you should be able to see saturns rings as seperate, maybe you just need to let the telescope get used to the air temperature outside or maybe you are not focusing it properly. if none of these is the problem, then you need a 4mm lens. try using your barlow and 9 mm together. as far as nebulas go the best one to try right now is the orion nebula. go outside right when it gets dark. look towards where the sun sets but a little to the left. you should be able to see orion. you see those three stars in a straight line? thats orions belt, now look right below the left belt star and there should be three faint stars in a line pointing down from orions belt, the middle "star" is the ORION NEBULA. woohooo...it looks like a little cloud. in the summer the best place to look for nebulas is anywhere around saggitarius and scorpio. this area is FULL of nebulas. the best thing to do is get to the darkest spot you can find, because city lights will make it hard to see nebulas. good luck...and buy a star map or a sky and telescope magazine and the maps in there show you exactly where to look for stuff. good luck and i hope you find it!!!!!!!

Answer 4

Yep. Point at Orion - the sword hanging from his belt contains the Orion nebula, one of the largest and brightest in the sky, and it's beautiful. Also, you can see the Andromeda galaxy, the Pleiades star cluster, and M13, a globular cluster. This is all assuming you're in the northern hemisphere.

Answer 5

Messier compiled his list using a 3" 'scope, so you should be able to see all of the M objects. In practice, there's not much chance of that, but it's something to shoot for! The double cluster in Perseus is a nice target for a small 'scope.

Answer 6

if you know where to look for Venus in the n.w. sky at sunset , it will be the brightest star in the sky . also look for the Orion nebula in the west after sunset. you might want to down load a free software from stellarium, it is a user friendly software

Answer 7

You could probably see galaxy M81 with binoculars.

Answer 8

Not really - you'd need a nebula filter to see any of them, if you could even resolve them, which is doubtful.