Hi Daz,
Congratulations on purchasing a pre-loved Argo Navis.
As discussed on the telephone, chances are one or both of your
encoder direction sense signs is not correctly established.
These are the +/- signs in SETUP ALT STEPS and SETUP AZ STEPS.
To check the SETUP ALT STEPS sign, perform a FIX ALT REF and then point
the OTA toward the vertical. DIAL up MODE ENCODER. The right-hand displayed
value should be close to +90 degrees. Now push the OTA downward in
Altitude toward the horizon. The right-hand displayed value should
decrease, +89, +88, ... +3, +2, +1, 0 as you go from the zenith toward
the horizon. If not reverse the SETUP ALT STEPS sign and repeat the
test.
Once the ALT STEPS sign is correctly established, perform a FIX
ALT REF and two-star alignment. Now DIAL up MODE RA DEC (not MODE
ENCODER). Point the OTA at the approximate intersection of the meridian
and celestial equator. Now sweep the OTA from that point toward the
East, roughly following the celestial equator. RA should be increasing
on the display (it will wrap at 23:59 back to 00:00). If it is
decreasing, reverse the SETUP AZ STEPS sign and repeat the test.
As mentioned on page 19 of the User Manual, Argo Navis does not require
you to set the date/time and location for general alignment usage. The
User Manual lists the feature set that requires date/time/location. One
of these features is refraction modeling via the SETUP REFRACTION mode.
Inadvertently setting the time zone incorrectly, then setting the local
time and then switching refraction modeling on can result in the horizon
being incorrectly computed and therefore large corrections being made to
object positions even though those objects might have small zenith
distances.
With regard the finder scope, what is important is that when you perform the
Daytime Encoder test that the target is re-centered in the main optics
rather than the finder, which it is. The finder has a wide FOV and for close terrestrial
objects there simply might be a little parallax going on.
Best Regards
Gary Kopff
Managing Director
Wildcard Innovations Pty. Ltd.
20 Kilmory Place
Mount Kuring-Gai NSW 2080
Australia
Phone +61-2-9457-9049
Fax +61-2-9457-9593
sales@wildcard-innovations.com.au
http://www.wildcard-innovations.com.au