Possibly a dumb question?

[terrym2002uk]

I was out this afternoon aligning my polar scope against a fixed point, ie so the centre rotated about the point.

Whilst I was doing this I thought with the fixed point centred in the polar scope and the mount in the home position I would align my scope so the same point was centred in a 4mm EP.

I thought this may help my with the accuracy of my first goto alignment point, but haven't tested this yet. Is there anything dumb i may have over looked in doing this?

Ta

[barkis]

There is no fixed point you can you during daylight to set your mounts Polar Axis to the North Celestial Pole.

At night, if its clear of course. the Equatorial mounts axis, is set parallel to the celestial pole, using the star Polaris.

The star is not actually bang on the NCP, but for visual purposes, it does a good job.

For long exposure imaging though, a more accurate method is to use the drift alignment method. There is a tutorial on the forum I think, but it is a simple enough procedure, but a little timr consuming.

Ron.

[terrym2002uk]

I think you misunderstood. I wasnt aligning the mount to polaris as such, rather I was calibrating the polarscope around a fixed point. ie so that the mount axis rotates in alignment. (ie basic mount calibration)

[brantuk]

You were aligning the polar scope to the axis of the mount I think. The scope will be automatically aligned to the mount when you fix it in place using the dovetail and rings. The only thing left to align is the finder with the scope. The 4mm eyepeice (if the seeing allows it to be used) will allow you to do a star alignment with more accuracy and finder alignment too

[terrym2002uk]

You were aligning the polar scope to the axis of the mount I think. The scope will be automatically aligned to the mount when you fix it in place using the dovetail and rings. The only thing left to align is the finder with the scope. The 4mm eyepeice (if the seeing allows it to be used) will allow you to do a star alignment with more accuracy and finder alignment too

Yes, you would have thought it would have been in alignment, automatically but it was a tad out in the vertical, so I adjusted the dovetail plate set screws so it was. Some guy in China may not have rolled my tube 100% accurately!

Indeed I did do the finder at the same time