Posted: 2/13/2013 3:21:49 PM EDT
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I'm looking WSW and I see a semi-bright point of whitish light in the sky. I check Stellarium and see that it's Mercury. I grab my 80mm 20x binoculars and I can see a cream-colored disc. A few degrees below it I can see the dimmer red color of Mars. I can't see much detail on Mercury through the binoculars. Are there any amateur astronomers here and what kind of telescopes do you have? I was thinking of getting an Orion XT8. What kind of detail on Mercury would I have been able to see through an 8 inch reflector? For anyone else who is curious, if your western sky is clear, just after sunset look around 20 or 25 degrees above the horizon, and about 20 degrees south of where the sun sets in your part of the world. You should be able to see Mercury and Mars just below it. |
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Quoted: I had a telescope as a kid. I've always planned to build a large Dobsonian telescope, but just haven't gotten around to it yet. When I was in college the astronomy club the year before me built their own 16 inch reflector. I got to use it once at the dark sky site. We ended looking at Andromeda. |
| Roommate had an 8" Celestron and found a SCREAMING deal on an 11" recently. We set that badboy up in the back yard a couple times to check out Jupiter. It's freaking AMAZING what you can see with that scope. Also the Orion Nebula is easy to see with it, too. We really need to get out to a dark site to see more. Too much light pollution close to the house. |
Telescopes are bad as guns.  My father in law has an Orion 8" Dobsonian and it is very nice for most things. I have an 70mm Orion refractor and it was a fantastic scope for the price. The moon detail is unreal, things like Saturn really come out pretty nice. The Orion nebula is still my favorite thing in the sky. The good news is these days you can get some killer scopes for really pretty amazing prices compared to 10 years ago. When I move out into the country in a few years I plan to go impressive. |