HEQ5 Pro alignment problems

[troypiggo]

First really decent night last night to use my newly acquired mount and telescopes, so decided to make the most of it. While the weather has been bad and cloudy, I have been reading heaps and practising setting up the rig so when the time comes I at least look like I know what I'm doing. But haven't been through the alignment side of things yet, because there haven't been any stars to align to.

I am really taking up this hobby to get into the astrophotography side of things, but for the moment I'll be happy to just be able to setup, align, view and track with just the mount and synscan. Then I'll worry about the notebook, webcam, PHD guiding etc.

Unfortunately where I was last night was north of Brisbane city, and the stars that I had thought I was going to align to were blown away by the city glow. Overhead, east and west etc were all fine and plenty of stars. Learning experience. Didn't have any "backup stars", and didn't know what to do.

Set up the mount to point roughly south. Thought I'd at least try a single star align using the setup on the synscan controller. Chose "Achernar" and hit enter so that the mount pointed roughly in the direction of the star, and the message on the controller said something like "use direction keys to point to target". But the direction keys on the controller didn't respond. They do when escaped out of that menu and just general moving around. Any ideas there? Should they be working?

I adjusted the knobs manually to point to the star hit enter etc. Thinking I'd be "near enough" for some rough guided tour type fun, I hit planets/venus in the hope that the mount would swing around and point to where I could see venus. But I pointed almost straight up, some 60 odd degrees too high. The other axis looked roughly correct, not perfect, but somewhere near where it should be.

I've obviously got some serious misunderstanding going here, and will go away to read more. But I'd appreciate someone with similar mount giving a completely idiot-proof walkthrough of how you set up using the synscan alignment setup including clarification on those directional keys.

[niko]

From my very limited experience I would suggest you try adjusting the rate of slew - the scope defaults to a slew rate of 2 which is pretty slow. So, when you get to "use direction keys to point to target" hit the rate key and select maybe 5 - tbhis should get things moving. Manually adjusting won't allow the mount to know where you are - you need to use the direction keys.

hope that helps

cheers

niko

[troypiggo]

Thanks for that. Pretty sure I had a rate of 9 set, but will certainly check that next time. Thanks.

[DJDD]

Hi,

I had a fair bit of trouble initially and a lot of help from other members.
See my thread: http://www.iceinspace.com.au/forum/showthread.php?t=38427

Please do not be offended if you already know, or have checked, the below suggestions. These are just some of my initial problems and solutions.


Slew Rate:
I found the slew rate needed to be reset or checked when the controller displayed "use direction keys to point to target". Just hit the rate Key then the number 9 (or 5) and then enter. Do not manually shift the mount, always use the direction keys.

2. 1-star alignment:
I found that a 1-star alignment was not enough after doing a rough alignment on South. I needed to do a 2-star alignment and slewed to the two alignment stars.

Also, i found that the telescope was pointed a long way from both alignment stars during the process but once aligned (using the direction keys) the GOTO worked well on other stars/objects.

3. Rough alignment on South
I made an alignment jig (20 minutes work), which helped with the rough alignment. The instructions are in Projects & Articles, "A Simple Polar Alignment Jig for a GEM Tripod" (http://www.iceinspace.com.au/63-499-0-0-1-0.html (http://www.iceinspace.com.au/forum/../63-499-0-0-1-0.html))

4. Ensure the mount is level
This made a big difference, as well.

5. Choice of alignment stars- choose by magnitude not Auto-select
The whole of the west is blocked from view from my viewing spot, as is a lot of the north, hence the alignment stars chosen by the controller are not very useful for me.
I changed the choice of alignment stars from "auto-select" to "by Magnitude". Find this option under the setup menu. also, this needs to be changed every time the mount/controller is turned on, i think.

6. latitude setting
Make sure the latitude is x degrees from horizontal. i.e. for melbourne, teh latitude is roughly 38 degrees so I set my mount to (90-38) = 52 degrees. My mount has 0 degrees displayed at vertical and 90 degrees at horizontal. this made a BIG difference.

Hopefully, this helps you.

DJDD

[Glenhuon]

As DJDD said, I found I had to reset the rate on my EQ5 too, otherwise it moves very slowly, About 5 is OK, any faster and it gets hard to centre the alignment star. 2 star alignment is what I use, and again like DJDD I'm limited to SE through to NE where I am. Use the left arrow key on the bottom of the keypad to scroll through the available stars till you find one thats in your field of view. At this time of year I've been using Achernar and Canopus. Learn how to drift align, it makes it so much easier when you do the Synscan alignment, your usually pretty close if the mount is near to alignment to begin with.

Cheers
Bill

[troypiggo]

Thanks guys. The kind of tips I was after.

[dluth]

Is this right? I have been setting the latitude on my EQ5 mount at 38 degrees (for Melbourne). Should it actually be at 90-38=52 degrees as DJDD says?

[saturn c]

i had the same problem , just takes time and alot of trial and error. eventually it becomes easy .good luck mate!

[dluth]

so is the answer to use 52 degrees or 38 degrees?
thanks

[cruiser]

Where I am in Sydney its about 33deg and that is what I set it to and it works fine. But as DJDD says you must check where your 0 & 90deg marks are. My 0deg is on the horizontal while the 90deg is vertical (top).
If yours is the same as mine then you would set it to 38deg from the horizontal.

[bmitchell82]

its 38 degrees.

Analogy,

put a ball on the ground then a small ball ontop of it, draw a line though the middle of the big ball, then move to where it would be infinity (just a point so to speak) from that point looking back at the small ball is your Declination aka 38 degrees and thats why the further you go towards the south pole the higher your declination becomes, because your looking more and more towards Azmith.

If your looking at it your way you would say that Azmith at your your present location is 90 degrees - 52 degrees from azmith will be the SCP which will land you on 38 degrees anyhow.

One other test is that if you look at where the SCP should be gestimate it, does it look like 40 degrees or 50?