Celestron Nexstar 127 SLT Mak Failing To Align

[Cornelius Varley]

1 hour ago, Arlington1 said:

I tried inputing long and lat and what a nightmare that was. I had to do a self learing session on this when I saw there are fifferent formats and then several different amount of digits. I ended up with

050.53.02

00.37.20

Is that right for Hastings and how much does it matter if I put that in or can I chose the nearest city option (nearest City is Brighton, 32 miles away, as the crow flies).

The coordinates should be 000 37 20 E,  50 53 02 N, not the way you have entered them.

[Arlington1]

Thanks @Cosmic Geoff

Solar align does make sense, as I have no issues finding Jupiter!

One thing I would like answered for sure. How accurate does the location need to be? If I select Brighton, when I am in hastings (30 miles away) is that going to put things well out or make little difference?

[Arlington1]

11 minutes ago, Cornelius Varley said:

The coordinates should be 000 37 20 E,  50 53 02 N, not the way you have entered them.

AHHH!!!

That might help!

[stevend]

4 minutes ago, Arlington1 said:

Thanks @Cosmic Geoff

Solar align does make sense, as I have no issues finding Jupiter!

One thing I would like answered for sure. How accurate does the location need to be? If I select Brighton, when I am in hastings (30 miles away) is that going to put things well out or make little difference?

I used google earth to get the coordinates of my back garden. Otherwise; I use two star align for general viewing (2 stars at least 90 degrees apart) and solar system align if I am just looking at planets and the moon (eg like Jupiter and Saturn last night).

[Cosmic Geoff]

3 minutes ago, Arlington1 said:

One thing I would like answered for sure. How accurate does the location need to be? If I select Brighton, when I am in hastings (30 miles away) is that going to put things well out or make little difference?

My experience is that it's not critical and that picking any town within 30 miles will get it working.  Of course it's best to get it exactly right by entering the lat/long numbers.  (On the other hand, selecting the nearest town will avoid gross newbie data-entry errors that point to the wrong continent 😦.)   The lat/long format is indeed confusing, being quoted in various formats not necessarily matching the Nexstar format.

[Arlington1]

Thanks again everyone, great responses.

I have input my Long/lat in the correct way now and straight away I note polaris is listed in the star list, so that looks promising. As advised, I may not use this as an allingment start tonight but its good to see it there.

So for tonight, I am going to try the following, based on responses to the OP and my posts. I am now confident I have the right time zone and location.

I will work a little harder to getting my finder scope alligned. I have already done it on a distant telegraph pole this morning but will check against some stars tonight.

After this and eeing as I will start the night looking at my new freind Jupiter, I will start off with a solar allign.  After that, I think I will go back to the auto three star allign and remember to not sod around pressing enter and align, get it done quicker. I will base the rest of my evening on the success/failure of these two and up date you one way or the other tomorrow morning.

 

[stevend]

28 minutes ago, Arlington1 said:

I will work a little harder to getting my finder scope alligned. I have already done it on a distant telegraph pole this morning but will check against some stars tonight.

 

I checked my FS alignment last night by using Jupiter (before aligning the scope via the handset).

Edited July 22, 2020 by stevend

[Arlington1]

Hi again all,

Well pretty successful night!

Firstly, I was not expecting to see the moon when I stepped outside so had my first look at that. At first it was not good. It was so bad that I thought I had condensation on the lenses or something. Then I realised I was looking through the glass ballustrade at the end of my patio! It looked stunning when I figured it out but I did not want to spend too much time looking as I felt this was a great opportunity to do the solar alingn. I did this using the mmon and then asked the scope to go to Jupiter. It was directly in line with Jupiter but a bit high so I did it again, on Jupiter and told it to go to Saturn....and it was spot on. It was still a little out when I asked it to go back to the moon though.

Next, I cleared all that and did a 3 star align. Success on first attempt!

Very happy

I now have more questions about wobble, viabrations, been way to veiw, what to veiw etc but I will do some research first as I am sure I can already find answers to most my questions on what seems like a great forum

Thanks again everyone.

Edited July 23, 2020 by Arlington1

[happy-kat]

That's great

Observing is best on solid ground decking for example can create horrid vibrations

[Arlington1]

9 minutes ago, happy-kat said:

That's great

Observing is best on solid ground decking for example can create horrid vibrations

thanks.

It is a solid patio I use. It does settle down, its just the mearest touch like when I focus or touch the scope with my head etc. I am struggle to get the best out of veiwing without resting my eye socket against the eye piece.

[happy-kat]

You may find it more comfortable to sit to observe

[Arlington1]

Thanks agian for all responses.

I am successfuly aligning everytime now. Not 100% sure what was wrong and it may be a few but the maing thing seems to be that I was taking to long between aligning the scope and pressing align! The reason I feel it was this and not something else is, I just went through the alingment in my living room, just pretending to point at stars and niot even puttng the right time and location in and it successfully aligned. Obviously it would be alingned incorrectly but the fact is, I got through the whole process. I then tired its that night outside and bang, job done.

 

Had some good veiwing of the moon last night. WOW!!!