Not quite polar star more black hole !!!!

[Obi Wan]

I am slightly confused.....no comments at this stage please... As a "newbie" i am trying to follow all the instructions, which goes against 43 years of natural instincts. I / we ( Mrs Obi Wan ) have cooled it down ( no sarcastic comments ) and set it up in direction of polar star using a compass , house in way( Easier to use compass than move house)

Latitude has been set as ageed by google at 56 degrees.

Now the big question......as the telescope is nearly pointing vertically and Mrs Obi wan is not the tallest jedi, the viewfinder is now too high.......apart from using a large crate what am I / WE doing wrong !!!!

Also when we would like to look at jupiter which is at a much lower angle and 90 degrees to the left .....what do we need do to achieve this ???? Do you unlock the azimuth lock and swing telescope round and lower the altitude, but in doing this will it wipe out the polar alignment which the negates the whole point of polar alignment

At the moment this is all theoretical as the promised clear sky ( ref local weather report ) is cloudy.

Would appreciate any good advice or sensible offers for a not yet used telescope !!!!

[mallorcasaint]

It is the mount that is polar aligned not the scope. Once the mount is aligned you use the DEC and RA controls to move the scope to your target. This will preserve the polar alignment.

[Cornelius Varley]

If your mount is an equatorial go to this site Astronomy Boy Equatorial mount tutorial to understand how an equatorial mount works.

Peter

[LukeSkywatcher]

This is exactly why i gave up on EQ mounts. Never got to grips with using them properly. Now i prefer a dob or Alt-Az mount.