P1Fanatic

Never owned one. Guy at work is selling a Tasco one for £50. Wondering if its a good buy for a first telescope. What do you reckon after reading this spec?

For Sale:
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Tasco 302059TF 60mm aperture astronomical telescope.

This is a refractor telescope, on an alt-azimuth mount, very easy to carry, set up and use, and would be a great first telescope. It can also be converted to a correct-image telescope for land or wildlife viewing. It also looks good set up in a corner of your lounge

What can I see?
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Right now, the moons of Jupiter are clearly visible; at high powers you can make out cloud banding on the planet. The rings of Saturn are clearly visible. The close opposition of Mars this summer will make excellent viewing in this telescope.

What's included?
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Telescope optical tube, 60mm coated objective with dew shield
Full size lightweight, adjustable tripod Alt-azimuth mount with elevation crank for comfortable viewing 5 x 24mm finderscope (helps you steer the telescope to a target)Star diagonal (makes viewing easier at high elevations)25mm, 10mm and 6mm eyepieces (36x, 72x and 150x magnifications)3x Barlow lens (3x multiplier for all eyepieces, giving up to 450x mag.)1.5x correct image lens (turns telescopic images 'right way up' for land or wildlife viewing)Dust caps for all optical surfaces (these are often lost and are ALL included)
Rand McNally Moon and Star maps, and Astronomy Guide
10y Manufacturers Warranty (7y remaining)
All original packaging, manuals.

Excellent condition, all optics are unmarked and have been kept covered when not in use. Selling due to upgrade.

These 'scopes frequently fetch around £60 on eBay, for sale at £50 ono. Happy to demonstrate.

PiNkEyE69

Can't speak about the model but I had a tasco telescope when I was in schoola and use the 'gaze at the stars' (my fave was spotting galaxys).
They're a good make.

carl

Tasco 'scopes are pretty crap (you can buy them in Argos ).

Alt-az mount is nowhere near as good as equatorial -- the apparent motion of the stars on the sky is equatorial, not alt-az.

It doesn't say whether it's a refractor (big lens as primary) or a reflector (big mirror as primary). Reflectors are usually better, but 60mm is small for either.

If you want a cheap telescope, you could do a lot worse than looking at some Russian-made ones.

Nimbus

Sounds very similar to one I have. It was small enough to be portable, but large enough (apature) to get some good images. I found the lower power eyepeices to be better. High power only means a less sharp and less bright image. It's the apature that's important. Bought mine about 15 years ago an is currenlty sitting in the loft..

Not a bad price IMHO. If you are just looking to get started and don't want to spend loads then it sounds good. Although if I was buying now I'd go for a reflecting one.

Nimbus

carl,

It's a refractor as per his message.

The one I have is not Tasco, and I would agree that they are not the best make. What is important is who made the optics.

IWatkins

60mm refractor Tasco ? That is going to bit quite crap indeed.

Most Tasco stuff is OK for looking at birds/wildlife fairly close in, but because the optics are terrible, using them for astronomical use will put you off astronomy for life.

As a first telescope it'll probably be OK, for all of a week, then you will want something more.

Take a look at some Russion stuff or even Meade (USA). I think even Jessops do Meade telescopes these days.

Cheers

Ian

P1Fanatic

I dont want it to be amazing. Just want to know it its worth £50 and will I actually be able to see anything of note through a telescope of this spec.

Simon.

alcazar

iTrader: (2)

Optics???? Drrrrrrink! Drrrrrrink! Fek off then!
Alcazar

TonyG

Have to agree with carl on this one, although Tasco telescopes are now better quality than they used to be. The magnification claims are correct, but the highest mags just aren't usable if you're looking at anything other than the Moon. In telescopes, size of the lens/mirror really does matter, and 60mm is a bit too small for anything even remotely seroius on the astronomy front.
Having said that though, if you're looking for something cheap and cheerful that you can use for looking at the Moon (or anything on the Earth), it's fine. If it's used for anything else (other than the moons of Jupiter), prepare for a bit of disappointment.
A good pair of binoculars is always a good starting point for stargazing.

[Edited by TonyG - 3/14/2003 11:32:12 AM]

carl

Doh! I only read the 'detailed spec' bit and missed the bit about it being a refractor

Agree with what you're saying about the high-powered lenses -- you can only get out what comes in at the end of the tube: magnifying it at the bottom doesn't help

If you search the Argos site, you'll find these are £79.99 new.

Nimbus

I can not remember the make of mine, but it had similar specs to the one above. I could quite clearly see the moons of Jupiter (well 4 of them ) and it's clound bands, the rings of Saturn (that as a wow! moment for me ), Venus and Mars. The moon looked pretty good and I could navigate my way around the fetures pretty well (PS. if you get a moon map, make sure it's an inverted one).

carl

Guide to buying your first telescope here

Pete Croney

I have a 150mm Celestron reflector. Its pretty good and many a summer night has been spent gazing skywards. The planets are pretty good to see, but I like finding nebulae. Whilst the Celestron looks quite big, 150mm is regarded as entry level if you are a keen astronomer.

I think you will quickly get bored with anything less powerful.

P1Fanatic

How much is that Bad Boy then Pete?

Pete Croney

Not really sure as it was a Christmas pressy a couple of years ago.

It came with a full set of plossls, barlow lens, filters and a skymap programme so I guess about £500 in total.

King RA

Go here http://www.scopereviews.com

Brendan Hughes

I just spent 70 quid on a new Bressler for my son at Christmas - although the guides had warned that anything under 300 quid was crap, I don't think that's a good price for a kid's prezzie! Can anyone tell me if it's got good upgradable optics, or have I just got what I paid for?

We haven't had much chance to use it in the flat - waiting to move house when more sky is available!

carl

Never heard of a Bressler, sorry

Pete Croney

Bresser is a european brand name for Celestron

carl

Ah! Well I've definitely heard of a Celestron
What sort of Celestron can you get for £70?

Brendan Hughes

Thanks Pete. At the risk of sounding too scoobynettish, is it easily upgradable? I know little about telescopes, but I will guess the optics consist of two parts, the mirror(s) and the eyepiece. Doubt I could upgrade the mirror, but eyepieces are small and perhaps would give an improvement?

carl

All telescopes will accept different eyepieces. Your Celestron should have decent optics. I guess it's one of these. The 'improvements' will be limited by the size of the primary -- if it is the model above then it doesn't actually have a mirror at all, just a lens (bit like a telephoto lens).

Gets more fun if you have a 35mm camera mount, or even better a CCD detector (but then you have to start lugging around power supplies and stuff).

[Edited by carl - 3/14/2003 3:08:38 PM]

Pete Croney

Hi Brendan

You will be able to get more powerful eyepieces (plossls) but the problem with small units is they don't let much light in and its the light that you are magnifying. With very good optics, the rule is don't use over 50x per inch of diameter as the chromatic abberation gets too high (rainbow colours around the object).

I'm sure it will be good for looking at the moon and for looking at planets when they are in close orbit, plus the bigger nubulae. Should be ideal for a youngsters first telescope. Well worth getting a PC skymap. You tell it where you are in the world and what the time is, it tells you where everything is and shows the constellation names and even comets etc, if they are in orbit.

Carl, I need to get the collimation re-done on mine, do you have anyone in the south east that you would recommend?

carl

Pete -- I hate to admit it but I've never actually owned a telescope!

Used plenty of fairly big ones at university, and TBH I realized I couldn't achieve the same sort of results without serious investment.

PS: 'PC Skymap'? I used to use a planisphere (bit of cardboard with a slidey bit on top that shows you where the constellations and 'interesting' objects are -- usually just the Messier stuff).

[Edited by carl - 3/14/2003 3:22:12 PM]

Brendan Hughes

Uh-uh, mine's (oops, his) is a reflector. Phoned the wife, apparently it's a Bresser (not bressler) classic line Venus, and the Bresser website is in German. They seem to be partnered with Meade. hey, and I found that the main UK dealer is in my local town!

I'll email them, see if they scoff at me...

Brendan Hughes

Pete, thanks for the info, we cross-posted. The link I posted (does that help with your problem? They're Tunbridge Wells) says about eyepiece diameters, and "toy" scopes have different diameters to those for serious people. As they don't seem to stock my model, I can guess what mine is. I'll put up the result when I get it.

EDIT - if I got him a PC Skymap, he wouldn't ever look at the flippin' sky...

[Edited by Brendan Hughes - 3/14/2003 3:40:29 PM]

King RA

I was looking into buying a decent telescope and all the reviews pointed to this one here. It's quite expensive but then all the reviewers say you have to spend this amount of money or you'll get put off easily by inferior quality and crap images.

carl

TBH I always wanted some sort of Cassegrain, because the optical length is essentially three times the length of the tube (the light comes down to the primary, back up to the seconday, then back down through the hole in the middle of the primary). Schmidts are a bit weird as they use a spherical mirror rather than a parabolic, then correct the resulting aberration either on the secondary or somewhere below the hole in the primary. (Parabolics focus to a point, whereas sphericals focus to that odd pattern you get when the light shines through the side of a beer glass).

BTW Pete, the link above tells you how to collimate the scope yourself.

[Edited by carl - 3/14/2003 3:37:01 PM]

Pete Croney

King it would need a good stand but thats a great price for a 200mm!! I just found a UK site listing my 150mm at £670

Carl, sorry, which link?

Brendan Hughes

Pete, here and near the top of the page, look for the link.