DAE spend six months thinking their telescope was broken before realizing...

I picked up a used Orion 8 inch Dobsonian about a year ago and for the first six months I thought the mirror was just scratched or something. Every time I tried to look at Jupiter all I got was this fuzzy, shapeless blob that didn't look anything like the photos I saw here. I was about to sell the thing when a guy at a star party in Flagstaff asked me if I had let the scope cool down first. Turns out I was dragging it straight from my 70 degree apartment out into 40 degree desert air and immediately trying to look at planets. The heat wave off the mirror was basically ruining every single view. I felt like a complete idiot but now that I let it sit outside for 45 minutes before observing, Jupiter looks crisp enough to see bands and the Great Red Spot. Has anyone else gone months blaming bad equipment for user error?

3 comments

3 Comments

nancy_ross11d ago

Get a lot of star party guys who think they know everything. Had my 10 inch Dob for three years now. Left it outside for two hours on a humid Arizona night once. Got dew on the mirror so bad it looked like I was looking through a glass of milk. Letting it cool helps sometimes. But sometimes the atmosphere just sucks and no amount of waiting changes that. Not every blurry planet is operator error.

rileyp4911d ago

Nancy, you're straight up right about this. I've been doing this for like five years now and the gatekeeping from some of those "experts" at star parties drives me nuts. They act like you bought the wrong scope or aren't doing it right when it's just the atmosphere being trash that night. Had a buddy with a 12 inch dob on a perfect cold night and Jupiter still looked like a wavy blob. Sometimes the sky just hates you and no amount of collimation fixes that. Solidarity on the dew story too, been there with my 8 inch and it's brutal.

henderson.wesley9d ago

Spent three months thinking my collimation was off before I figured out it was just the tube currents from my house. Left the scope in the garage for an hour before a session and suddenly Saturn had rings. Felt like a total moron but hey, we all learn the hard way.