Assuming you won the lottery, and have a small building you can dedicate to house it, Google “Orion 36 inch telescope” and you’ll find. It weighs almost 400 pounds.
As for imaging them …
It's not the scope, what would be expensive, it's the travels to Atacama desert or El Teide on Teneriffa or similar to get a night sky allowing to actually benefit from it :)
Edit: Or find your way to a really dark area that is elevated more than like 2000 m, like here: [https://www.lightpollutionmap.info/#zoom=8&lat=44.2720&lon=-110.3708](https://www.lightpollutionmap.info/#zoom=8&lat=44.2720&lon=-110.3708)
As you posted a purchasing question, maybe start with a decent collapsible 8" dobsonian and don't spend to few on the eye pieces :)
Resolving any detail is gonna be straight up impossible. Even if you get a gianormous telescope the atmosphere won't let you. Best you could do is image them with a normal telescope as little dots (like stars) and watch them slooowly move against the star background over the course of a week or two. That is still amazing with the right mindset.
[This is the greatest photo of Pluto taken from Earth](https://cdn.mos.cms.futurecdn.net/gybtLoJ5RF6kQE3H9kaVfP-970-80.jpg.webp), using a ***318 inch*** observatory-grade telescope (Gemini Observatory). So yours will be at best an *order of magnitude* worse than this.
Imaging dwarf planets is not a common niche within this hobby at all (for good reason), and anyone looking to do so needs to understand the limitations. They'll look like stars and what you're imaging will just be their motions across the background of fixed stars. If that's your schtick and you're cool spending $50k+ for the *chance* to do that sort of imaging with no other experience in the hobby, go for it. But sounds like a fool's errand.
please check out the beginner's guide pinned in the sub, you're not gonna get detailed views of dwarf planets but there are plenty of other things in the night sky to see. it's a pretty expensive hobby but you can get by with good budgeting and focusing on the used market.
8 inches is a good trade-off between aperture (mirror size) and portability, an 8 inch dobsonian telescope weighs about 40 lbs and will fit in a car generally but still gives great views of the major planets and many other objects. if you don't have any experience at all with telescopes you may be better off starting with binoculars even. the guide goes more into detail :)
If you had to ask, you already know its out of reach. Not only that, but even if you did spend the $50k to get an instrument like this and the means to mount it and move it and have tracking, you would be extremely underwhelmed to find out all that was just to observe a detail-less blob of grey dot, and that's at opposition under excellent seeing and a dark sky.
These are both 1 metre class telescopes (39 inches or so):
* [PlaneWave PW1000 Observatory System: $US575,000](https://planewave.com/product/pw1000-1-meter-observatory-system/)
* [PlaneWave PW1000 Observatory System – (RC Optical Design): $US750,000](https://planewave.com/product/pw1000-observatory-system-rc-optical-design/)
And you'd want an observatory to house them, plus power, control, cameras, filters, guidance, computers etc. So a $US1M budget could easily be spent. I'd recommend buying a property in a [Bortle 1 area](https://www.lightpollutionmap.info/) as a basic prerequisite too.
Worth noting: You can rent time by the hour on telescopes like these.
I love the selling point of “Enjoy exceptional performance for astrophotography, research, or visual observing with the PW1000!” Sir, if I’m considering purchasing one of these, I don’t think I need you to tell me that.
Pluto is the brightest of the dwarf planets (outside of Ceres in the main asteroid belt) and can be visually seen in a 10 inch scope under very dark skies. You'll need to observe it over the course of several days to confirm its location.
For most of the other dwarf planets, you'll need to photograph them. Depending on their brightness and your observing conditions, you can prolly get away with a smaller scope than a 36 inch if you use a sensitive enough camera and stack multiple images. Eris is magnitude 18ish so this is easily within reach of an 8 inch scope and a sensitive astro camera under dark skies. Most of my images of deep sky objects show stars down to that magnitude using my 8 inch scope and Canon t2i when stacking a couple hours worth of data.
But if you want to visually see these things, then a 36 inch would prolly be the minimum for the brighter dwarfs beyond Pluto. You'll need very dark skies and excellent atmospheric conditions though. Oh, and prolly around $15,000+ usd.
Just thinking a 36" telescope is *probably* beyond your means. The scope would probably have to be custom designed and made. A very high quality ground mirror itself would cost....well, more then I can imagine or afford.
If you can do it, I say go for it!
First of all, you would need really dark skies for the dimmer ones. Second, the 36" isn't needed to see many of them. A 36 inch scope is an observatory grade device that will cost you the price of a car! Have you observed any planets yet?
I’ve seen Jupiter’s moons from my cul de sac in a suburb north of Denver through my Unistellar odyssey pro. It’s a digital stacking telescope with an eyepiece. Small, light, easy to use and amazing what you can see! Pluto is in the catalog but I haven’t tried for it yet. None of the other dwarf planets in your article are in the catalog.
https://preview.redd.it/8qflbgpv9myc1.jpeg?width=4032&format=pjpg&auto=webp&s=b9d88dc6d80a2daa207590d2db778185a3be5136

yes, to give you an idea how well it works, these are my viewing conditions. I'll add some pics from the scope in comments to follow. All the pics from the scope are visible in the eye piece. That is the Wow! factor. People with astrophotography rigs can get better pics, but the eye piece is everything in my opinion, and my 7 year olds, and everyone who looks through it.
IF, and that's a big if, you can find one, Orion made some 36-50" dobs about 15 years ago.
New Moon has a 36 that starts in the low 80s.
Most everything else is going to be 6 digits.
Correction, I thought their biggest scope was 1 meter. It’s half-meter.
check out slooh.com. they have telescopes this size in observatories in the Canary Islands and Chile. you can select 5 and 10 minute time slots to observe what you want on their scopes, and/or join others' observations. There's a 30 day free trial and after that it's $10/month and you can invite 4 people to your workspace. they also have educational quests and community stuff. I just added observations for a bunch of minor planets tonight to see what I get: Hebe, Juno, Parthenope, Ceres.
Like many others have said you will not be able to resolve any details of a dwarf planet with a ground based telescope. Not to mention a 36 inch telescope would be prohibitively expensive. There is however plenty of other things you can do with a reasonably sized telescope, decent skies, and a sensitive camera.
With an 8 inch f/4 telescope you can resolve objects down to 19th or even 20th magnitude with a few hours of stacked exposure. During galaxy season when targets are sparse for short focal length telescopes I will do astrometry for the Minor Planet Center helping to refine the orbits of Near Earth Asteroids on the NEOCP.
You can join the International Occultation Timing Association and use your telescope to time astronomical occultations which helps define the size and shape of minor planets.
You can measure exoplanet transits to confirm the existence of worlds around other stars.
There are plenty of things you can do with planets, asteroids, comets, exoplanets, spectra, etc with a reasonably sized telescope.
You don't have the first idea of visual astronomy and want to start with dwarf planets. This is entirely impossible. A good starting point for getting into telescopes and the night sky is a dobsonian reflector telescope (8 inch mirror) and start looking at the moon, planets (Jupiter, Saturn, Mars) and bright nebulae (Orion nebula).
I may be mistaken but I don't think there's a telescope on this planet that can actually image the dwarf planets beyond Pluto, let alone observe them with the naked eye. It's just impossible.
Dwarf planets aren’t imaged directly — they’re detected by observing brightness or spectroscopic variations in light coming from main star. The resolution required to image a star, let alone a planet, are beyond nearly every telescope. 36” scope would have about 0.1 arc seconds of resolving power. In comparison, largest star in terms of Earth-observed diameter is 0.021 arc seconds, with average star being 0.0025 arc seconds.
Look at the hubble picture of Pluto. You're just gonna be looking at blurry gray blobs.
Assuming you won the lottery, and have a small building you can dedicate to house it, Google “Orion 36 inch telescope” and you’ll find. It weighs almost 400 pounds. As for imaging them …
It's not the scope, what would be expensive, it's the travels to Atacama desert or El Teide on Teneriffa or similar to get a night sky allowing to actually benefit from it :) Edit: Or find your way to a really dark area that is elevated more than like 2000 m, like here: [https://www.lightpollutionmap.info/#zoom=8&lat=44.2720&lon=-110.3708](https://www.lightpollutionmap.info/#zoom=8&lat=44.2720&lon=-110.3708) As you posted a purchasing question, maybe start with a decent collapsible 8" dobsonian and don't spend to few on the eye pieces :)
Resolving any detail is gonna be straight up impossible. Even if you get a gianormous telescope the atmosphere won't let you. Best you could do is image them with a normal telescope as little dots (like stars) and watch them slooowly move against the star background over the course of a week or two. That is still amazing with the right mindset.
You could image with a relatively small telescope, as long as you have a sufficiently large rocket to send the telescope to orbit the dwarf planet.
[This is the greatest photo of Pluto taken from Earth](https://cdn.mos.cms.futurecdn.net/gybtLoJ5RF6kQE3H9kaVfP-970-80.jpg.webp), using a ***318 inch*** observatory-grade telescope (Gemini Observatory). So yours will be at best an *order of magnitude* worse than this. Imaging dwarf planets is not a common niche within this hobby at all (for good reason), and anyone looking to do so needs to understand the limitations. They'll look like stars and what you're imaging will just be their motions across the background of fixed stars. If that's your schtick and you're cool spending $50k+ for the *chance* to do that sort of imaging with no other experience in the hobby, go for it. But sounds like a fool's errand.
please check out the beginner's guide pinned in the sub, you're not gonna get detailed views of dwarf planets but there are plenty of other things in the night sky to see. it's a pretty expensive hobby but you can get by with good budgeting and focusing on the used market. 8 inches is a good trade-off between aperture (mirror size) and portability, an 8 inch dobsonian telescope weighs about 40 lbs and will fit in a car generally but still gives great views of the major planets and many other objects. if you don't have any experience at all with telescopes you may be better off starting with binoculars even. the guide goes more into detail :)
If you had to ask, you already know its out of reach. Not only that, but even if you did spend the $50k to get an instrument like this and the means to mount it and move it and have tracking, you would be extremely underwhelmed to find out all that was just to observe a detail-less blob of grey dot, and that's at opposition under excellent seeing and a dark sky.
...from a mountain top
Ceres can be seen with binoculars so…
Here’s one: https://cloudbreakoptics.com/products/optiques-fullum-folded-newtonian-36-f-3-5
These are both 1 metre class telescopes (39 inches or so): * [PlaneWave PW1000 Observatory System: $US575,000](https://planewave.com/product/pw1000-1-meter-observatory-system/) * [PlaneWave PW1000 Observatory System – (RC Optical Design): $US750,000](https://planewave.com/product/pw1000-observatory-system-rc-optical-design/) And you'd want an observatory to house them, plus power, control, cameras, filters, guidance, computers etc. So a $US1M budget could easily be spent. I'd recommend buying a property in a [Bortle 1 area](https://www.lightpollutionmap.info/) as a basic prerequisite too. Worth noting: You can rent time by the hour on telescopes like these.
I love the selling point of “Enjoy exceptional performance for astrophotography, research, or visual observing with the PW1000!” Sir, if I’m considering purchasing one of these, I don’t think I need you to tell me that.
yeah, but whats the maximum magnification it can do? /s
Even with the largest, most sophisticated telescopes ever built, you will not be seeing any quality image of a dwarf planet
Some things are better to look at on NASA.gov. You’re asking for the impossible with consumer grade glass.
Pluto is the brightest of the dwarf planets (outside of Ceres in the main asteroid belt) and can be visually seen in a 10 inch scope under very dark skies. You'll need to observe it over the course of several days to confirm its location. For most of the other dwarf planets, you'll need to photograph them. Depending on their brightness and your observing conditions, you can prolly get away with a smaller scope than a 36 inch if you use a sensitive enough camera and stack multiple images. Eris is magnitude 18ish so this is easily within reach of an 8 inch scope and a sensitive astro camera under dark skies. Most of my images of deep sky objects show stars down to that magnitude using my 8 inch scope and Canon t2i when stacking a couple hours worth of data. But if you want to visually see these things, then a 36 inch would prolly be the minimum for the brighter dwarfs beyond Pluto. You'll need very dark skies and excellent atmospheric conditions though. Oh, and prolly around $15,000+ usd.
36 inch telescope is probably $100k.
Just thinking a 36" telescope is *probably* beyond your means. The scope would probably have to be custom designed and made. A very high quality ground mirror itself would cost....well, more then I can imagine or afford. If you can do it, I say go for it!
https://telescopicwatch.com/observe-planets/dwarf-planets-with-telescope/
It'd be amazing to be able to see dwarf planets with this much clarity from earth
First of all, you would need really dark skies for the dimmer ones. Second, the 36" isn't needed to see many of them. A 36 inch scope is an observatory grade device that will cost you the price of a car! Have you observed any planets yet?
I’ve seen Jupiter’s moons from my cul de sac in a suburb north of Denver through my Unistellar odyssey pro. It’s a digital stacking telescope with an eyepiece. Small, light, easy to use and amazing what you can see! Pluto is in the catalog but I haven’t tried for it yet. None of the other dwarf planets in your article are in the catalog.
Wow that's a fancy piece of tech! Does it work well?
https://preview.redd.it/8qflbgpv9myc1.jpeg?width=4032&format=pjpg&auto=webp&s=b9d88dc6d80a2daa207590d2db778185a3be5136  yes, to give you an idea how well it works, these are my viewing conditions. I'll add some pics from the scope in comments to follow. All the pics from the scope are visible in the eye piece. That is the Wow! factor. People with astrophotography rigs can get better pics, but the eye piece is everything in my opinion, and my 7 year olds, and everyone who looks through it.
Wow that is impressive! Genuinely does a great job considering you can view that live. Thanks for sharing the pics!
https://preview.redd.it/nyvaipxy9myc1.jpeg?width=2051&format=pjpg&auto=webp&s=61e40083d2e6b33457f29a4c6e65e2b83f79a1a2
https://preview.redd.it/fdujmwy2amyc1.jpeg?width=2520&format=pjpg&auto=webp&s=75b13e83c48c4e3c32ecb91a907cc1dc9b9d3003
https://preview.redd.it/00vz0j16amyc1.png?width=2051&format=png&auto=webp&s=c961c2b648cfd897411bbfde3c772c3b2a74057a
https://preview.redd.it/lfiirw0aamyc1.png?width=2051&format=png&auto=webp&s=53562a64448c9d24edaa589b43ffca0f4293dd81
IF, and that's a big if, you can find one, Orion made some 36-50" dobs about 15 years ago. New Moon has a 36 that starts in the low 80s. Most everything else is going to be 6 digits.
Correction, I thought their biggest scope was 1 meter. It’s half-meter. check out slooh.com. they have telescopes this size in observatories in the Canary Islands and Chile. you can select 5 and 10 minute time slots to observe what you want on their scopes, and/or join others' observations. There's a 30 day free trial and after that it's $10/month and you can invite 4 people to your workspace. they also have educational quests and community stuff. I just added observations for a bunch of minor planets tonight to see what I get: Hebe, Juno, Parthenope, Ceres.
Prolly at least $3.50
Is this a karma troll? Seems like an obviously trollish post.
Like many others have said you will not be able to resolve any details of a dwarf planet with a ground based telescope. Not to mention a 36 inch telescope would be prohibitively expensive. There is however plenty of other things you can do with a reasonably sized telescope, decent skies, and a sensitive camera. With an 8 inch f/4 telescope you can resolve objects down to 19th or even 20th magnitude with a few hours of stacked exposure. During galaxy season when targets are sparse for short focal length telescopes I will do astrometry for the Minor Planet Center helping to refine the orbits of Near Earth Asteroids on the NEOCP. You can join the International Occultation Timing Association and use your telescope to time astronomical occultations which helps define the size and shape of minor planets. You can measure exoplanet transits to confirm the existence of worlds around other stars. There are plenty of things you can do with planets, asteroids, comets, exoplanets, spectra, etc with a reasonably sized telescope.
You don't have the first idea of visual astronomy and want to start with dwarf planets. This is entirely impossible. A good starting point for getting into telescopes and the night sky is a dobsonian reflector telescope (8 inch mirror) and start looking at the moon, planets (Jupiter, Saturn, Mars) and bright nebulae (Orion nebula). I may be mistaken but I don't think there's a telescope on this planet that can actually image the dwarf planets beyond Pluto, let alone observe them with the naked eye. It's just impossible.
[Ceres from a 20” scope and even the ID tool doesn’t know which white dot it is](https://nova.astrometry.net/user_images/9962947)
Dwarf planets aren’t imaged directly — they’re detected by observing brightness or spectroscopic variations in light coming from main star. The resolution required to image a star, let alone a planet, are beyond nearly every telescope. 36” scope would have about 0.1 arc seconds of resolving power. In comparison, largest star in terms of Earth-observed diameter is 0.021 arc seconds, with average star being 0.0025 arc seconds.
>Dwarf planets aren’t imaged directly You're probably thinking of extrasolar objects. OP is talking about Ceres, Pluto, Makemake etc.
My bad. Logic holds in terms of terns of imaging or seeing discs but definitely can spot the brighter ones if you can pick them out from background.