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Can you see Saturn in good detail? I'm interested in picking up a telescope.

• malfist 2y ago
  An SCT11 should have no problem making out the rings of Saturn and maybe a band or two. But it's not a good beginner scope. Long focal lengths are hard to manage if you don't know what you're doing
  • deleted 2y ago
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• leeoniya 2y ago
  i have the 6" celestron sct, and on a clear night this is pretty much the amount of detail i can make out directly: https://www.reddit.com/r/telescopes/comments/pmlbne/jupiter_saturn_and_maybe_neptune/ https://www.reddit.com/r/telescopes/comments/pmlbne/jupiter_... i'm sure with tracking and stacking it would be much more.
  • ghxst 2y ago
    Just to clarify is that the detail you can make out with the naked eye or a digital censor? If you meant digital censor, how much of a difference with the naked eye would you say it is? I've had this telescope on my list for some time but am not sure if my expectations are realistic.
    • carl_dr 2y ago
      Yeah, naked eye, although with a 6” telescope, I’d expect it to be a bit fainter - certainly that is the case through my 9.25” scope. I can often see a band in its rings. It also depends a lot on atmospherics, if there is a lot of turbulence in the atmosphere it makes things less crisp (well, “dancey”, like looking through a heat haze.) Look up your local astronomy group and go along one night, and see for yourself before buying anything. Saturn isn’t great at the moment (assuming London-ish latitudes) but Jupiter is around all night and you should be able to see it through a variety of scopes and eyepieces if you went along to a sky party. Honestly, the first time I saw Saturn through a telescope I nearly cried. Truly amazing.