Quote:
Originally Posted by gregbradley
Hi Chris,
Yes the PMX often sounds like it needs extra grease. I haven't yet though. Its not that old really and lightly used. But yes I have the grease. Is there a video or tutorial on how to grease it?
My place does not go below about 4C and the last time I used it I got round stars at my dark site.
I did some more T-Point and autoguiding massaging last night and am getting round stars now. They could be a bit better but they are acceptable.
I'll do another large T-point run and perhaps a fresh PEC. Can't hurt.
I find Pempro a very nice piece of software. Very bug free and easy to use. Hat's off to Ray Gralak for making such a reliable piece of software. That's a standout.
I'm also thinking of replacing the belts as a lot changed their belts over to the newer grey ones from the original black ones.
The dew heater works well. The optics have been dew free in the morning now since I installed it.
I am familiar with dew heaters. It seems fairly warm like an electric blanket. I have it turned down to a really low level and have the strap under the thermal blanket. It has a sensor but its warm all the time. Is that normal?
I am noticing that this scope does show up bad guiding more than others. I think that's because its F.8 and a star off centre even for only a short time records a fairly bright spot so errors show up in the image more. Of course the plus side is the stars when done well really look good.
Greg.
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Hi Greg,
There is a link for the PMEII/MX/MX+:
https://youtu.be/qe11z6sQzz4
For the PME:
https://youtu.be/yl2mqN0py08
I would perform this every 12months for low use, or 6months for high use. Then follow up with a new PEC run. I do 6monthly just because of the variance in conditions here.
They're good mounts, but like anything moving, it needs a service to be running at optimum. If your polar alignment is bang on, which I suspect it is, its worth at least just checking your PEC is correct by checking it with Pempro. I do around 5 cycles, any seeing issues should process out anyway. Assuming its all good, you should have corrected PEC within an arc second. Mine is around +/- 0.2" and +/- 0.3" for the PME and PMX respectively, with PEC applied.
Here in Canberra I've found that I really need to maintain my PEC seasonally, my dome completely freezes up, ice everywhere. I started by chasing my tail thinking that my polar alignment had somehow slipped, so I used PEMPRO wizard to refine it.... end result was horrible and off significantly. I went back to TPOINT polar alignment, synch east near home, small calibration runs to the east to refine it to 0/0 using the wizard and my camera, then do a large 200-300 point run, but the tracking issue was still evident. I performed a new PE collection with Pempro, applied it, and boom... Mount is perfect again.
Hope you can isolate the issue soon and have everything running at optimum.
Cheers,
Chris.