NEQ6 Home Position

[Freddie]

Hi, hope someone can help.

I start my mount from the home position and tell the hand set that is where it is starting from. At the end of the session, I stop tracking and tell it to park to the home position. When it has parked, the RA is spot on perfect, but the DEC is about 7-8 deg out. Any ideas why and what I should do? It did the same last time I used it, so just let off the clutch and manually moved the DEC before turning off and putting it away. Maybe that wasn't the right thing to do?

Thanks

Freddie

[ncjunk]

Freddie,

Is the setting circle slipping at all? One of mine has a tendancy to move a little bit during usage which means it is out of alignment when I park it again.(the setting circle is out, not the telescope)

Do you get any accuracy problems during usage of does it find the targets ok?

[MickD]

I agree with Neil, the dec setting circle on my NEQ6 slips when in use. Unless you have lost power during a session then I would believe the scope has parked correctly and move the setting circle – not the other way around…

Mick

[Skylook123]

One way to check the Home position is to load the mount fully ready for operation and level (important!). This includes, if possible, exactly setting the latitude to your latitude; I use an inclinometer in the dovetail slot after leveling the tripod and installing the mount head, prior to installing the OTA. With everything fully ready to operate but without power, loosen the clutch in RA and roll the mount head until the CW shaft is horizontal. There will be some shaft bias, so use a bull's-eye bubble level on the mount head side surface that is now level to get the horizontal position exactly. Set the RA setting circle to something easy to remember, like 0 or 6 and be sure to lock the RA clutch. With the mount now level in horizontal, leave it in that position and loosen the DEC clutch and roll it until the OTA is perfectly horizontal, again using a bull's-eye bubble level. Now set the DEC setting circle to your latitude, using the scale that will allow it to read zero when parked. With the RA and DEC setting circles now ready, loosen the clutches and manually return the mount to the home/parked position. If you set the RA setting circle to 6, now both of the setting circles should read 0. This is the perfect home position, other than any azimuth offset due to compass error in setthing the tripod.

Now do your polar alignment using only the mount mechanical adjustments, leaving the clutches locked. Then do the stellar alignment. When you Park afterward, the setting circles should return to 0.

Good luck!

[Freddie]

Thanks guys. Had another go last night and changed nothing other than I did a 3 star rather than 2 star align and everything worked perfectly. Will experiment a bit more to see if 3 Vs 2 really was the reason, but everything looks to be sorted now.

Thanks

Freddie