How big should a telescope be?
The most significant way to measure a telescope is its aperture. With refractors aperture measures the diameter of the lens at the top of tube. This is the lens that collects light. A refractor should measure at least 2.4 inch, or 60 millimeters across. For reflectors the measurement is the diameter of the mirror at the bottom tube, which collects the light. For reflectors the minimum should be about 4 inches. Schmidt-Cassegrains, like reflectors, the aperture is a measurement of the diameter of the light collecting mirror at the bottom of the tube, and should measure about four inches. Although there are exceptions, these are minimum aperture worth considering. These telescopes range in price from a low of about one hundred dollars to a high of about one thousand dollars. Larger is better, but a smaller, high quality, telescope is to be preferred over a large, poor quality telescopes without any of the accessories. A three to four inch refractor, a six to eight inch reflector, or an e
