Telescopes & Binoculars

Be sure to read my tips on which telescopes and binoculars are best for you further below on this page.

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Which Kind of Telescope is Best for You?

REFRACTOR TELESCOPES use glass lenses to bend and gather light to focus an image:

Advantages:

• Unlikely to need alignment or cleaning
• Provides a steady and crisp image
• Easy to use and maintain

Disadvantages:

• Provides a smaller viewing area than a reflector telescope (a bit harder to look through for younger children)
• Object may appear slightly off color

REFLECTOR TELESCOPES use mirrors to gather light to focus an image:

Advantages:

• Somewhat cheaper than refracting telescopes of the same size
• Larger viewing area (easier to look through for young children)
• No color aberrations

Disadvantages:

• Easy to knock the alignment off
• Need to clean the lens regularly

Ten Things you Need to Know BEFORE buying Telescopes or Binoculars

I wish someone had told me this when I was twelve. Fortunately, Santa Claus and a telescope savvy friend steered me right. Let me help you…

1. Refractor telescopes are easier to use and maintain than reflector telescopes. However, reflector telescopes are easier to look through for younger children.

2. Even low-end telescopes ($125-$350) will show phases of Venus, craters on the moon, four moons of Jupiter and some bands on the planet as well as the rings of Saturn.

3. Don't buy a telescope for less than $100. It's probably more like a toy and will be disappointing to use.

4. Don't buy any extras for your telescope at first. It will come with everything you need to get started and you can build from there based on your interest.

5. Without an erector lens which comes with most telescopes, things you look at on the ground will appear upside down. This does not matter when viewing astronomical objects since there is no direction in space.

6. Your telescope will come with several eyepiece lenses. An eyepiece lens has to be attached to the telescope in order to see though it. Start with the lenses with the higher "mm" on it. For example use the 25 mm eyepiece before the 4 mm eyepiece.

7. The magnification at which you see the object is a ratio of how long the telescope's tube is (focal length) and the focal length of the eyepiece. As stated above, use the higher numbered eyepiece first as it is easier to see through, though less magnified than the lower numbered eyepiece.

8. Many telescopes will come with colored filters which can be placed over your eyepiece. Certain object features can be seen more clearly if a color is filtered out. For example a light-green filter will bring out the craters on the moon and a light-blue filter will bring out cloud details on Jupiter.

Binoculars

1. Binoculars are good for looking at objects that span a larger part of the sky than a planet and don't require the steadiness of a tripod stand.

2. For example, binoculars are good for viewing the International Space Station as it moves across the sky and open star clusters like the Pleiades. Binoculars are not good for things that require a steady hand of more magnification like the moons of Jupiter or the rings of Saturn.