60mm Refractor Jupiters Belt

[smiley smiley]

I have read in different places that I should be able to see Jupiter's belts with a 60mm refractor.

My wife purchased a 60mm refractor used, as a gift for me. When viewing Jupiter, all I see is a white disk. I see three dots (moons) also. I have tried 24mm, 12.5mm and 4mm eyepieces & tried them in combination with 2 different barlow lenses, also.

Q: 60mm refractor overstated capability or is the telescope just lousy?

If the Tasco 40-060578 Luminova is lousy, can replacing anything improve it's performance: the aperture or star diagonal or other eyepieces?

Thanks, Mike

[farklemairgle1]

hi there, i have also recently started out in astronomy. i started with a 60mm tasco 58t refractor, almost identical to yours i think but a bit older. I found that the 60mm tasco was not up to the job when it came to gathering the light required for more detail. Ive upgraded to a sky watcher 8 inch dob and i can now see more details on the planets and deep space objects. Replacing eye pieces can improve things but I would suggest a bigger scope, dobs in my opinion are great for beginners, just point and look basically, no complicated eq mount or drive to fathom out. Your telescope is not lousy its just not the biggest aperture so your not getting the views you want. Hope this helps.
Tony

[admin]

thats what they call dept store telescopes- very lightly coated lens- plastic EP,s and focuser- youll see alot of tasco and meades in this catagory at stores like walmart and kmart- best to stay away from them- thats 450X advertised on the boxes is unrealistic- as far jup goes with your scope- it will look white with probably 2 fuzzy bands

[the.chosen.one]

Bigger telescope give you more light to get details! 6" F 8 is 1200 mm and 10" F4.7 is almost 1200mm. Use 10mm eyepiece would be 120 power. 6" and 10" that Jupiter size is about the same but 10" give you more details as belts, colors and clearer! Dobsonian is the best telescope for low cost! Orion 4.5" and 6" dobsonian is good telescope for new astronomers. I can see Jupiter's belts on my 10" as low as around 40 power. Save your money for a better telescope would be last for lifetime!