Any amateur astronomers here?

[bansuri]

I admire all of you who've taken the time familiarize yourself with the stars. I love reading about the cosmos but have always felt daunted by the first steps. The sky in st. Louis looks nothing like what I see in pictures representing what it should look like but when we go camping or far away from the city I am amazed.
On a good night I can pick out some of the major stuff, So I think I'll try out an app for the iPad and see if I can at least figure out some of the basics.
Thanks for the inspiration.

 

[StarHalo]

On a good night I can pick out some of the major stuff, So I think I'll try out an app for the iPad and see if I can at least figure out some of the basics.

Any app that allows you to do sighting (holding up the iPad to the sky displays that region on the screen) will allow you to identify and memorize everything you can see in a city night sky in literally minutes. Especially if you set the app to only display brighter objects, so it's less confusing. By the next night you'll be able to point out constellations to your friends and family with no guide at all.

I usually start out facing dead north, since ~35 degrees above the horizon is where the North Star always is. Left of that is the Big Dipper, right of that is Cassiopeia (it looks like the letter P, for Cassio*P*eia), straight up is Vega, dead left is Arcturus, dead right is Jupiter, back is Scorpio, etc. It doesn't take that long to learn once you know what you're looking at. Get a portable radio and tune it to something engaging, bring a fine beverage, make an evening of it.

 

[TedTheLed]

Explanation: In the shadow of Saturn, unexpected wonders appear. The robotic Cassini spacecraft now orbiting Saturn drifted in giant planet's shadow for about 12 hours in 2006 and looked back toward the eclipsed Sun. Cassini saw a view unlike any other. First, the night side of Saturn is seen to be partly lit by light reflected from its own majestic ring system. Next, the rings themselves appear dark when silhouetted against Saturn, but quite bright when viewed away from Saturn, slightly scattering sunlight, in this exaggerated color image.

http://apod.nasa.gov/apod/ap110904.html

 

[Phil_508]

I have an ETX125 and I have fun with this map to find places to go

http://skymaps.com/downloads.html

Its a free monthly publication.

 

[bansuri]

Wanted to check out Venus and Jupiter since they're bright enough to see here, my wife had received a telescope as a gift from work, (unopened still), and I got this little beauty from a friend who was cleaning out his basement. Checked into it and it's at least 30 years old. Read a little online and most people said the mirror would be shot by now, opened it up and it looked great, until I looked at it from an angle and saw that it was indeed deteriorated. Tried it out anyway tonight and was sad to see that the planets looked worse when viewed through this. Unless I'm just doing something horribly wrong it adds distortion to the image that makes it impossible to get a clear view with. We'll break out the other telescope tomorrow night.

Question for those in the know: is there any reason to hang on to this? It is pretty well made compared to the junky stuff that is mass produced today, but that doesn't mean anything if the mirror adds distortion.
Nice, heavy base. an assortment of lenses, any parts of this keepers?
Am I overestimating the reflector's damage and am missing some aspect of setup that is causing the image issues?
Didn't come with a manual, but I looked at a similar model and it didn't seem like the setup was too intricate.
Thanks,
Robert

 

[Scottiver]

Tell us more about the scope. Make, model? Size, type (reflector, refractor)?

I used to be really into astronomy, still have two scopes, a 12.5" Dobsonian reflector and a 104mm (4") Orion Maksukov/cassegrain on a german mount tripod. Don't use them too much these days, but since I got into flashlights 7 years ago I started taking my dog for a nightly flashlight walk and each night I look at the stars and keep track of where all the constellations and planets are, and of course keep an eye out for meteors (my favorite).

 

[bansuri]

Tell us more about the scope. Make, model? Size, type (reflector, refractor)?

.

Ah yes, I was so excited to post I forgot the important stuff!
It's a Jason Comet 480. I guess you'd call it a reflector type since it has a mirror in the back. (?)
Worst-case scenario is that I show the kids how it works and salvage any useful parts off it.
It may even be that there is a haze on the prism that gathers and redirects the image that the mirror in the back sends to it, perhaps it was stored with the top lens tube uncovered at some point.
Either way, we'll be breaking out the new-in-box model also tonight, looks like it's going to be a beautiful, clear night.

 

[bansuri]

Just tried out the other one, a Meade RB-70, 70MM | 2.75" altazimuth refracting telescope. So much effort went in to making this product and a newb like me should probably just keep my mouth shut, buuuuttt, the majority of the product is made of plastic we found it almost unusable. I'm used to micrometer adjust x/y tables and precision machinery at work, getting this thing to stay in one spot wasn't worth the effort. You'd have to go above the point and hope that the slop would let it settle back on the planet. The image was not much better than the little Jason reflector. Maybe would be ok for looking at the Moon, but the mounting system doesn't adapt to my tripods as the Jason does so I'm stuck with their system.
Think I'll give the Jason a second or third look.
I guess a decent telescope with precision horizontal and vertical adjustment costs a fortune, given the amount of light pollution in my area I doubt it would be worth the investment.
Oh well, there's always Hubble photographs!