EQ6 initial allignment

[Terry B]

Dear All
I ordered an EQ6 goto from NVT and it arrived today. I must say that they were very helpful. I ordered it at the "special price" advertised but that offer had expired. He searched around and decided that I could have one for the same price. When I opened the boxes today, low and behold it's the "pro" version. I am very pleased.

Now I have a question. (It's cloudy off course so I can't test this myself)
Does it matter which way the dovetail fastening bolts point when initializing the scope? The manual tells me to start with it aiming south. but depending on which way the bolts are pointing this could be either north or south to the scope or is it clever enough to work this out.
My GP mount with SS2000 started with the scope aiming east with the motor uppermost. If you put it the other way is started aiming for the ground.
Thanks in advance and enjoy the clouds.

[ballaratdragons (Ken)]

Gulp! I never thought about that!!!

I have mine on the Mount-head controls side. I don't know if that is the correct side or if there even is a correct side. But it works fine.

This is a pic of mine:

[iceman (Mike)]

Why should it matter? The dovetail bolts are just for bolting the dovetail, and allowing the dovetail bar to move forwards and backwards to balance the scope.

I never thought it would matter which side they're on.

[Astroman (Andrew Wall)]

I have mine opposite to Kens, but I have realigned the saddle plate so I can see through the polar scope when the OTA is pointing at the SCP. It doesn't matter which way it goes as long as you know where the Dec release handle is and can get to it if you need to move the scope.

When you first start up the mount and scope should be pointing at the SCP, so the scope is sitting over the RA axis pointing upwards towards the pole, this is known as the park position.