What is the problem with my telescope.?

Question

It is a Celestron Powerseeker 114EQ Newtonian. I cant see any detail on planets. I cant even see them as clear cut discs. I cant be looking at the wrong places as where I am looking lines up with my star maps . The telescope is 4.5 inch by the way. I have tried mags up to 350x with no luck. Is it possible that the collimation could be out. I can get perfect views of the moon but that doesnt prove anything.

Thanks for the help.I didnt go straight up to high mag. I worked up to high mag starting from 45x. My main problem is that the increase in mag doesnt seem to increase the size of what I am looking at , ie. no planetary disc.

Thanks again everybody. You have given me a lot to check out. It was Mars I was looking at last night as it was the only bright object in the north west from early night. I dont think my collimation is too bad as without an eyepiece in my eye reflects straight back at me. One person suggested that going from a warm house to the cold outside could be a problem & I must try that tonight as I keep my scope in the kitchen which is very warm. Keep the ideas coming They are all appreciated.

Answer 1

Hello, Ret...
Someday they will ALL get it...
Being a newtonian telescope, with a clear aperture of ~4.5", (sorry, I live in the U.S.), your telescope SHOULD be able to bring out a LOT of detail on planet's surfaces (or cloud- tops).
It sounds to me that your situation may be co- related to one of two primary problems...
a) Either your viewing site is in an atmospherically disturbed location (i.e. mountain side, looking across house tops (it's winter, now, remember?), while heat is escaping the structure in your path (thereby producing 'heat waves', or a 'shimmering' effect), or your optics are just out of alignment...

Or...

b) You are now the proud owner of inferior optics.
I know, that last statement sounded pretty crass, but it IS a possibility.
Try collimating your 'scope.
It's worth the effort!
If an excercise in collimation doesn't work, try asking this same question of this group of great guys (and ladies) I've met here... :

http://tech.groups.yahoo.com/group/telescopes/?yguid=322074455

This group is moderated by one of the leading answerers on this forum, Mr. Geoff G

If he can't help you with your problem, I don't know who else would!
I wish you the best of luck, and I hope you get it straightened out!
Clear Skies!
Bobby

Answer 2

First of all, 350X is rarely achievable even with telescopes several times as large as yours because of the turbulence in the Earth's atmosphere. That is even when they have optics that an interferometer shows to be of excellent quality. A 4.5-inch telescope simply can't be pushed that far without image quality breaking down. You could go to about 250X or so, with excellent optics before the images merely get bigger, dimmer and fuzzy.

I assume you are using the eyepieces that came with the telescope. Sometimes you get an eyepiece that will not reach focus because the focuser can't rack in or out far enough. Since you indicated this is occurring with all of your eyepieces, I think what you really have is either really bad seeing, heat waves from warm optics in the cold night air, or a serious misalignment of the mirrors.

Bad seeing is caused by the proximity of the Jet Steam, the passage of weather fronts or the presence of materials and buildings that release a lot of heat. The air become like water boiling in a pot, and there's no way you will get a sharp image unless you try again on a calmer night and go to a site away from buildings, roadways and other heat traps.

A telescope needs to cool off to the ambient temperature before the views become sharp. A scope just taken from a warm house into frigid winter night air can take an hour or longer before the image settles down. You can spot this when fuzzball, boiling stars get tighter and sharper as you continue observing. Let it chill down or otherwise adjust to the ambient temperature, then you can observe in ernest.

Mis-collimated optics will produce blurry views that do not focus correctly. What you need to do is first make sure the diagonal or smaller secondary mirror is properly lined up with the focuser. Next, adjust the tilt of the diagonal so the outline of the primary mirror is concentric with the outline of the diagonal mirror. Then adjust the tilt of the primary mirror so the reflection of the diagonal mirror in it is centered. When you are finished, it should look like a bullseye on a target. Your telescope is a short focus telescope, for whom collimation is very critical. There are collimation tools that will help you get it accurate every time, and your image quality will be noticably improved even when the seeing's bad. Check it every time you set up.

If after all of that is done and your views are still terrible, you may have got some really bad eyepieces. It's well worth the money to get a good quality low, medium and high power eyepiece, plus a barlow lens.

Finally, I own a 4 1/4, 6 and 10-inch reflecting telescope, and only rarely can I exceed 250X even with my 10-inch. On a few occasions I can go to 375X with that telescope, but most of the time all I see is boiling blurry mess. I think you could have a combination of poor seeing, and poor collimation. There's little you can do about bad seeing except try to avoid the things that create heat blooms that ruin the view all night long. But you can fix collimation problems. If all else fails, a local astronomy club will help you solve the problems with your telescope.

Answer 3

When you say planetes, which planets have you tried looking at? I ask because neither of the planets which are the most rewarding for amateur telescopes, Jupiter or Saturn, are readily visible at the moment, and Mars is almost always disappointingly small in anything but a large high quality scope.

Everything the others have said is correct: you need to make sure your scope is collimated, and keep the magnification well under 200x. Mars will definitely show a disk in your size of scope, but it will be a very tiny one. There is currently not much detail visible on Mars because the North Polar Cap hasn't fully formed, and there is still a lot of dust in the atmosphere from dust storms earlier in the season.

Answer 4

. That's because what you see is usually what you get! Most telescopes don't show much on planets except the rings around Saturn but only if they aren't lined up in the same plane as the viewer, and the planet Jupiter which shows the dark band around it. The pictures you see in mags. are from huge observatories with very large lenses. And some are time lapse to enhance the picture and then put on very fine grain film then enlarged. If you like to see the moon with the telescope and the sun spots Thu a filter, then you will enjoy it. But don't asked too much more. If you get a perfect view of the moon, then you're scope is doing it's job. That's probably why you see so many telescopes at garage sales. People expect more than they can deliver. This last summer I personally bought 4 at sales at 5 bucks a piece. Sorry but I'm just trying to be truthful.

Answer 5

The kind of detail you want to see is rarely achievable unless you are at high altitude or in an area where there are no lights, no heat shimmering or other atmospheric disturbances. I have a 4.5" reflector, and when I look at Mars, which is very bright and full now, I can see stars behind it in perfect pinpoint focus, but Mars has little or no detail, even at 200 power magnification. I have tried going up to over 600, but it just gets worse. I think if I tried viewing in the desert or high in the mountains, I would see more. The pictures you see of high detail on the planets are taken with extremely expensive high-definition cameras, extremely high-quality optics, and under the absolute best circumstances.

Answer 6

If increasing magnification does not show a disk, then you are definitely looking at a star and not a planet. 45x is enough to show a small but clear disk on Jupiter as well as it's 4 largest moons. 45x is also enough to see the rings of Saturn or the phases of Venus. Venus is the REALLY bright star in the southeast just before dawn; bright enough to see well into morning twilight. 100x would be better.

100x is enough to show the disk of Mars. Mars is the brightest star in the northeast early in the evening. Most people have trouble seeing any detail on Mars. It looks all bright and washed out visually. You may see the polar ice cap. Try 200x for that.

Do not go over 200x, because your telescope is too small for that. All you will get is a big, dim, blurry blob.

Answer 7

Try much lower magnification. High magnifications always give fuzzy images. Also adjust your focuser very carefully -- it can be a challenge to get it just right.

Are you trying to observe with or without eyeglasses on? Try it both ways and even with your other eye to see if there's any difference.

ADDED:

Try targeting something like a far off street light at various magnifications to see if you can get that to change size at different magnifications.

There's always the chance that you are indeed missing your target planet and looking at some star near it, too.

Answer 8

Can you give more details on exactly what you've been looking at? There's only one planet, Mars, in the evening sky right now and, while it shows a distinct disc at moderate to high power, it's still quite small.

Sorry if I'm insulting your intelligence, but are you sure you're not looking at stars? They'll only show a point, unless they're out of focus.

Answer 9

It is possible that it is out of collimation, but more importantly 350X magnification is well above the useful magnification of your telescope. The max for that scope will probably be closer to 270-275X. That could be why you are lacking detail.

The maximum magnification of a telescope is usually in between 50-60X for each inch of aperature. Depending on the quality of optics.

It is said that planetary detail is better seen around 30X per inch of aperature, but for some reason people think magnification is everything.

Answer 10

kbilyak is correct. Even 60x per inch is way too much magnification. I have a 12" meade SCT and rarely view the planets over 200x.
Back off the mag and you will get better views.