Telescope Reviews: Galileoscope observations

I happened to wake up at 5:30am this morning, so I figured what the heck, why not set up the telescope? Venus, Mercury, and Saturn are all up in a line right before sunrise, which let me see a total of four planets

in just a few minutes. Venus was up first in the east, bright and unmistakeable. Then as the sky started to glow from the sunrise, another bright light was visible. A couple days ago I saw this one at 25x, but wasn't able to see any more before clouds rolled in, so I wasn't sure if it was Mercury or Saturn. As it turns out, it was Mercury, very small, even at 50x, but I could tell that it's phase was about 50-75% full, same as Venus.

Since I had checked online (http://www.neave.com/planetarium/), I knew where to expect Saturn, but I had trouble seeing it since it was dimmer than Mercury and a bit lost in the glow over the horizon. Binoculars picked it up just fine, though. After seeing it once with binoculars, I could see it easily with averted vision and then was able to see it enough to line up the galileoscope sights.

Since it's so hard to aim and focus at 50x I first focused on Venus at 50x and then aimed at Saturn, wiggling around until it zinged through the view. At 50x, I could just barely make out the rings - now just a horizontal line striking through it. It's hard to say how much was wishful thinking, given that I knew roughly what to expect.

At that point, I took out a 12mm plossl eyepiece I bought recently - for 80x including barlow. Again, I focused on Venus, and then carefully aimed at Saturn. I got it in view, and the horizontal line of the rings was unmistakeable.

Saturn was tiny in the eyepiece at that magnification (especially compared to the views of Jupiter I've gotten used to), but it was beautiful and amazing to see it directly for my first time. My 6 year old son came out, having gotten dressed in a hurry, and I was able to put him up on a step stool to see. It took a couple of tries - the 12mm ep has short eye relief - but he was able to see it and the rings as well.

I plan on going out again in a couple days, on the 8th - to see just how close Mercury and Saturn come as pass each other, and then on the 13th, when Saturn and Venus will be about a half a degree apart - small enough to both fit in view at once.

(I should add that valuing my eyes and the eyes of curious kids that might peek into the telescope, I took down the telescope long before the sun came up over the horizon and did not leave it unattended.)

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Orion XT8i - 8" f/5.9
Nikon Action 10x50 Binoculars
Galileoscope 50mm f/10 (20mm ep + 2x barlow)
25mm, 10mm Sirius Plossl eyepieces (1.25")
12.5mm Black Knight OWL Super Plossl
2x Knight OWL Barlow