After a long while, I’ve finally managed to write a few lines on my telescope. In addition it’s the last chance to motivate you to see the rings of saturn from your own garden.

Telescope? Why?

Honestly? Because I always wanted one. As a kid my parents got me a cheap refractor telescope in a set with a microscope. While (as far as I can remember) it was fun to look at the moon and the forrest line from my window, it only turned tiny stars into less tinier tiny stars. And planets, well, stars :) Still I’ve always enjoyed just looking at the stars, the moon, over the years finding planets, watching satellites whiz by, waiting for falling and the obvious UFO (a distant shiny dot that moved back and forth like a helicopter would). Thus with bored after a few months in the pandemic I decided to place an order and wait…

Basic Setup

After a few weeks of reading (far too man weeks of reading) and a few very helfpul mails with the guys at Astroshop.de I decided to finally place an order in August of ‘21. Sadly, due to various supply chain issues, I had to cancel my order in November and finally bought the telescope and the tripod at Telescope Service / teleskop-express.de . Though, as the service from Astroshop was just great, I continued ordering various extras from them!

My initial order consisted of:

Skywatcher Explorer 200PDS Newton Teleskop 200 mm f/5 - OTA mit 2" 1:10 Crayford
- The PDS version was recommended to me, as I wanted to be able to connect my DSLR and take pictures
Skywatcher HEQ5 Pro SynScan - German GoTo Mount up to 14 kg
- Being an electronic mount, it’s able to follow the earth’s rotation and thus make taking pictures with longer exposure times by far easier

To be able to actually connect my DSLR I also needed an extra lense and an adapter ring

Looking at the prices while writing the blogpost, wow they went up! In return: Post COVID, the parts are available ;-)

The WOW moment

While I guess we all know that there are stars and a few planets up there in the sky and we’ve all seen pictures of them, the first view from the garden, through a bunch of lenses one just set up themselves is impressive and just overwhelming. Being able to see the shady paterns on Jupiter in a line with it’s moons is just the start. The moment you actually manage to see saturns rings is just..simply…crazy…

Additions

The way things go with many hobbies and stupid ideas: They grow. After a short while I got my self a TS-Optics Okular Expanse 5 mm . While it’s a pain to find something with it, especially when looking at the planets, it’s just an awesome improvement on size and detail. In addition, due to wanting to take pictures, I added a TS-Optics Bahtinov Mask , which helps me with focusing. Also I couldn’t resist to get myself a sun filter .

A Few Notes

Have a look at the SkyView App for Android, quick start to finding out what one is actually looking at
Want to automate? Have a look at Stellarmate
My tripod / mount is too small for my telescope with attached camera, the servos aren’t happy, so I only rarely use the camera
I was super surprised, that the mount is the most expensive part of the overall setup, but looking at the physical setup, it does make sense
Aiming for Polaris is super tough, when you’re on the wrong side of the house…

Summary

You need to get an actual telescope. Too expensive? - Yes it probably is, try to borrow one somewhere. Actually being able to see Saturn’s rings with your own eyes from your garden is special!