SUNSET: 
Choosing Your Astronomy Equipment
What Are Celestial Coordinates?
"Right ascension" and "declination" tell you where your telescope is pointed in the sky. But what do they really mean?
Choosing Your Astronomy Equipment
Observing from the City
With the stars increasing being lost amid the light pollution of our urban areas, is there no hope for an astronomer in the city? Fortunately, there's still a lot of observing that can be done.
Choosing Your Astronomy Equipment
Optical Aberrations at the Telescope — And How to Avoid Them
Optical aberrations limit the performance of an eyepiece. Here are seven common problems, with solutions where applicable.
Choosing Your Astronomy Equipment
Common Telescope Magnification Myths
Answers to some of the most common misconceptions about telescope magnification.
DIY: Astronomy Projects & Guidance
A Compact Backyard Observatory
A personal telescope shelter doesn't have to take up a lot of yard space.
Choosing Your Astronomy Equipment
How to Choose Your Telescope Magnification
How high can you get? How low can you go? The answers depend on many factors that combine to give each telescope a useful magnitude range.
DIY: Astronomy Projects & Guidance
DIY Dew Heater
With just a little electrical know-how you can make an antidew heater that suits your scope.
DIY: Astronomy Projects & Guidance
My Place in the Dark
Twenty weekends and countless trips to the building-supplies store later, I'd done it — I had an observatory to call my own.
DIY: Astronomy Projects & Guidance
Offsetting Your Secondary Mirror
The secondary-mirror offset is no doubt the most misunderstood aspect of collimation. Luckily you don't need to understand it to collimate your instrument.
DIY: Astronomy Projects & Guidance
An Observatory with Sails
After working at Sky & Telescope for nearly a decade I got the chance to build the observatory I'd always wanted.
DIY: Astronomy Projects & Guidance
My "Flapping Roof" Observatory
By day my observatory looks like an ordinary (if rather grandiose) garden shed. At night the roof sections go down and back up. They "flap" like a bird's wings.
Choosing Your Astronomy Equipment
A Pupil Primer: How Big Should a Telescope's Exit Pupil Be?
Image brightness, magnification, and why the old ideal of a 7-millimeter exit pupil is not so ideal at all.
DIY: Astronomy Projects & Guidance
Accurate Polar Alignment with Your Telescope
Long-exposure astrophotography requires an accurately aligned equatorial mount.
Choosing Your Astronomy Equipment
Telescope Eyepiece Guide
A telescope is only as good as its eyepiece — and a good one can make a big difference. Here's a quick look at the different types of eyepieces available.
DIY: Astronomy Projects & Guidance
8 Backyard Observatory Mistakes to Avoid
Here are a few potential problems that you might not see on your blueprints.
Choosing Your Astronomy Equipment
Binocular Basics: Glossary of Binocular Terms
Exit pupils. Eye relief. Image stabilization. What matters most for astronomers? Our expert explains it all.
DIY: Astronomy Projects & Guidance
Collimation Tools
Three tools are commonly used to collimate Newtonian reflectors.
Equipment: Guides & Recommendations
Meade's RCX400: Raising the Bar
The 12-inch RCX400 telescope from Meade Instruments, shown on its field tripod.S&T photo by Craig Michael Utter. When Meade Instruments announced its new RCX400 line of catadioptric telescopes in early 2005, it created such a buzz in the astronomical community that I visited the company's Irvine, California, headquarters to look…
Equipment: Guides & Recommendations
S&T Test Reports: Telescopes
No matter what type of telescope you're looking for — refractor, reflector, or catadioptric; alt-azimuth, equatorial, or Go To — you'll find examples among the scopes reviewed here.
Equipment: Guides & Recommendations
S&T Test Reports: Binoculars
Almost any binocular can be used for astronomy, but if you really like viewing the heavens with both eyes, you'll check out our reviews of binoculars specially designed for stargazers.
