Celestron CPC Auto align and menu on GPS handpiece

[GaryA]

When I look at the menu on my handpiece, there is no "Wedge Align" in the utilities. Does anyone know why this is? Btw I have made my own wedge and just struggling. Alt azimuth is not good for doing long exposure photography due to tailing on stars.
What I am trying to do is use my scope to do deep space photography but at the moment I have found the setup to be very elusive to do an alignment of this nature as it is not working properly at all. I have tried to contact Celestron but that is very hard to do. Now it appears you have to join up to their chat group that has no question or answers in. Bloody useless!
Also information about finding true celestrial south is not the information that makes a lot of sense. There is a lot of info on finding NCP but next to nothing "for beginners to hone in once" to understand easily finding SCP. Things like 5 degree angle of view re one way to get a bearing of SCP means nothing to a beginner. I am wondering to my self is that the view from my eye to find these stars or from my scope or from my finder scope?
Anyway these stars at that point of "Polaris Australis" will be revolving around also and then at different times the stars will be position else where on a 360degree circle. So if you if anyone has any idea of a well written step by step detailed setup using a Celestron CPC Alt Azimuth scope what we beginners may need to do or find when making these alignments, please help or direct us to these pages
I would dearly love to join a club locally but that active club is about an hour away or more from where I live and meetings start at 8 at night. I am not retired but getting close to it (4years away, I will be 68 then) and late nights in my week are not good for a demanding job.
Then again what is a "rough alignment"mean. Some say near enough and others say spot on?!
Questions like this are discussion points where I am sure have been discussed somewhere in Ice in Space. Any idea where these are and make good sense?

[casstony]

Hi Gary, I haven't used my CPC in Eq mode but I'll try to help. For a start I assume you've set the tracking mode to Equatorial South; then you've done an Equatorial Two-Star align alignment (or Eq Autoalign).

Now you're trying to finely adjust the wedge to be polar aligned. Press 'Align', then 'polar align' then 'align mount', as per the instructions for All Star Polar Alignment (ASPA) on page 21 of the manual.

They seem to use 'align mount' and 'align wedge' interchangeably in the manual.

If you've got an older scope you'll need to update the firmware to the most recent version since the ASPA has only been working for the southern hemisphere for a year or so.

Most imagers use an equatorial mount rather than a wedge mounted fork, so you might get more replies over on cloudynights forum.

[GaryA]

Originally Posted by casstony

Hi Gary, I haven't used my CPC in Eq mode but I'll try to help. For a start I assume you've set the tracking mode to Equatorial South; then you've done an Equatorial Two-Star align alignment (or Eq Autoalign).

Now you're trying to finely adjust the wedge to be polar aligned. Press 'Align', then 'polar align' then 'align mount', as per the instructions for All Star Polar Alignment (ASPA) on page 21 of the manual.

They seem to use 'align mount' and 'align wedge' interchangeably in the manual.

If you've got an older scope you'll need to update the firmware to the most recent version since the ASPA has only been working for the southern hemisphere for a year or so.

Most imagers use an equatorial mount rather than a wedge mounted fork, so you might get more replies over on cloudynights forum.

Hi Tony,
My Scope I bought in 2014 but have no idea when it was made. Any idea how to find that out? I have looked and tried to find how old it is.
Thanks for your reply and I will pop over to Cloudy Nights and ask the Question there. I do follow the Procedure but I am sure I am no way near to the star in auto align they mention. I must say I can see how the wedge works and I am sure I am not that far off but just a little more education and I will be there.
Thanks

[casstony]

Sounds like you'll need to update the hand control to get ASPA working Gary.
Near the bottom of this page are instructions on how to update the Nexstar+ HC and the older Nexstar version 4 HC: http://www.nexstarsite.com/Firmware.htm

Lots of other info on that site too.

[GaryA]

Originally Posted by casstony

Sounds like you'll need to update the hand control to get ASPA working Gary.
Near the bottom of this page are instructions on how to update the Nexstar+ HC and the older Nexstar version 4 HC: http://www.nexstarsite.com/Firmware.htm

Lots of other info on that site too.

Thanks Tony I will go out to my Observatory and try it now.

[GaryA]

Originally Posted by GaryA

Thanks Casstony I will go out to my Observatory and try it now.

also i notice the HC is a nexstar+

[GaryA]

Originally Posted by GaryA

also i notice the HC is a nexstar+

Hi Tony, I finally was able to download and update the GPS HC and yes it certainly hones in now after doing a two star autoalign. However I notice the stars still drift which is not any good for long exposure.
Do I need to adjust the tracking speed now?
Another thing also is when I went to connect my HC to my computer using Stellarium, the HC read out face went dead. That is where I finished up last night
Any idea why that happened?

[casstony]

Did you do an alignment, then ASPA, then another alignment? After adjusting the wedge to get polar aligned (ASPA) you need to do the second alignment.
Also for long exposure imaging you'll need to get into guiding which will take care of any small errors in polar alignment and inaccuracies in the gears. Without guiding you might still get decent images up to a minute.

I haven't operated my mounts with an external computer so I can't help with the stellarium/HC problem.

[GaryA]

Originally Posted by casstony

Did you do an alignment, then ASPA, then another alignment? After adjusting the wedge to get polar aligned (ASPA) you need to do the second alignment.
Also for long exposure imaging you'll need to get into guiding which will take care of any small errors in polar alignment and inaccuracies in the gears. Without guiding you might still get decent images up to a minute.

I haven't operated my mounts with an external computer so I can't help with the stellarium/HC problem.

Hi Tony,
All eq south alignment ask for is correct time, date, country and city then line up the marks on the scope to scope arm. Then after clicking enter on the above Select two star auto align which gives you a list of stars you may want use if cannot get to the right star you want. Like tonight it said goto Sirius and centre then align , then prompts you to hit enter again to go to another star . Centre that star hit enter and prompts align and then comes up as CPC ready to start star gazing. Don't think that's right. Anyway my wedge needs some work to be done to it so after I have sorted that out I will try something different.

[casstony]

Originally Posted by GaryA

........ and then comes up as CPC ready to start star gazing. .

At that point you've done your first alignment of the mount and it is ready for visual observing. The next step is to do the polar alignment by pressing Align, then Polar Align, then Align mount/Align wedge. In this process the mount points at where a star should be then you adjust the wedge sideways and up/down to get the star centered (and in the process have the forks pointing at the pole).

[GaryA]

Originally Posted by casstony

At that point you've done your first alignment of the mount and it is ready for visual observing. The next step is to do the polar alignment by pressing Align, then Polar Align, then Align mount/Align wedge. In this process the mount points at where a star should be then you adjust the wedge sideways and up/down to get the star centered (and in the process have the forks pointing at the pole).

Thanks Tony once I have made the alteration I will give that a go.
I find it puzzling why their is no written data from Celestron about it!

[casstony]

Originally Posted by GaryA

Thanks Tony once I have made the alteration I will give that a go.
I find it puzzling why their is no written data from Celestron about it!

Do you have the CPC instruction manual Gary? Page 21 of my CPC Deluxe HD manual has the procedure for all star polar alignment.

[GaryA]

Originally Posted by casstony

Do you have the CPC instruction manual Gary? Page 21 of my CPC Deluxe HD manual has the procedure for all star polar alignment.

No I don't have the HD edition just the standard CPC instructions manual. I have found the manual on the net and I am right at this moment giving it a go. Fingers crossed:

[GaryA]

Originally Posted by casstony

Do you have the CPC instruction manual Gary? Page 21 of my CPC Deluxe HD manual has the procedure for all star polar alignment.

Hi Tony after some strange reactions with my handpiece I have now had a go at doing the alignment as per HD manual and was very close to cracking it last night but run out of time. I do believe the handpiece does build up some type of memory to how auto align works because twice my GPS dropped out.
Surely takes a long time to do when not fully converse but each time I go back to guiding the star to the Cross hairs I have become quicker in doing it using polar align>align Wedge enter align<Sync> then back again to cancel sync and then go thru the process again.
I may have run out of adjustment on Azimuth direction on my wedge and may have to take off the scope and adjust mounting plate to another position. I hope to find that out tonight.
FYI My wedge is mounted to a secure post in the ground so cannot just move the legs around on the Tripod to get it smack onto SCP
At least making progress Thanks to your help.
Cheers

[casstony]

Good luck with it Gary. Like any task it's easy when you know how but can be confusing at first.

[GaryA]

Originally Posted by casstony

Good luck with it Gary. Like any task it's easy when you know how but can be confusing at first.

Yes true Tony still wondering how it works and why do an autoalign when really it does not seem to achieve anything. However guess one has to look at the whole picture why it's necessary to do the steps required to have perfect alignment.
Summing it up the GPS handpiece is holding a lot of information and it needs to be looked after very well otherwise good night nurse to what one wants to do with the telescope.
It's a challenge and enjoying the chase immensely

[GaryA]

Hi Tony,
I have been doing a bit of work with my scope but there are a few things not going to plan. You may be able to help. After doing the polar align and I go back to start again the alignment is off a fair distance from my cross hairs but moving the wedge in mainly RA I sort of align and after hitting enter says I have align my scope. I uses the Star Sirius to go to but is not close so I do the drift alignment to get the telescope tracking on the star. Once I do that I go to another area like Orians Neb and it's way off. I do again a drift alignment and do a minute exposure with camera but I have tails on the stars. The tail is way worse than when do it using alt az and three star alignment. What am I doing not correct do u think?

[The_bluester (Paul)]

I would suggest a change in how you go about it.

If you are going to drift align, do that first. Unless they have changed the setup since I had a CPC mounted scope, you can fool it to get the RA drive running. Start with the alignment process with a one star align, simply hit enter without aligning the scope on any star and the drive will start running.

Once the drive is running, manually point to a star low in the east to drift align the altitude, then one at it's peak near the celestial equator to sort the azimuth.

Once you have done that you should have a pretty fair polar alignment, switch the mount off and back on again and do the star alignment properly. If you move the mount after doing the star alignment IMO it is best to redo that alignment, better again is to get your polar alignment sorted before doing the star alignment for goto at all, saves wasting time doing it twice.

[GaryA]

Originally Posted by The_bluester

I would suggest a change in how you go about it.

If you are going to drift align, do that first. Unless they have changed the setup since I had a CPC mounted scope, you can fool it to get the RA drive running. Start with the alignment process with a one star align, simply hit enter without aligning the scope on any star and the drive will start running.

Once the drive is running, manually point to a star low in the east to drift align the altitude, then one at it's peak near the celestial equator to sort the azimuth.

Once you have done that you should have a pretty fair polar alignment, switch the mount off and back on again and do the star alignment properly. If you move the mount after doing the star alignment IMO it is best to redo that alignment, better again is to get your polar alignment sorted before doing the star alignment for goto at all, saves wasting time doing it twice.

Thanks Bluster I would like to try that but I cannot get low in the eastern direction. Not much better on the western side either. I will see how I go as low as I can get.

[The_bluester (Paul)]

Well, as low as you can get. You should still be able to be reasonably accurate just it will take longer for drift to show up.

The link below has a pretty decent write up on drift aligning, starting with the azimuth adjustment first where most people I have seen setting up seem to do the altitude adjustment first.

If you do the azimuth first per the link, then if you can't get down low near the horizon then at least you have gotten he azimuth right first so you will not have azimuth error turning up when you are trying to adjust the altitude.

http://www.astrophotography-tonight....ent-procedure/