Please help. How to operate RA Drive and polar alignment on EQ3-2?

[roarke80]

Hi, after months of gathering equipment, I finally have a complete enough setup and am getting really good views of the Moon and Jupiter. However it's quite an effort to keep the objects in view as I can't figure out how to work the RA Drive.

The mount I bought comes with the drive installed, and when I plug it in and turn the power on I can see movement in the gears. But looking through the scope it doesn't really help me track anything, even when I set it to 8x, I can't detect any movement of the mount through the scope.

Also, can anyone help explain how do you do polar alignment when you're not able to see Polaris? Can I just use a compass to tell me where north is?

And finally, my mount looks diff from the EQ3-2 in the manual. I'm not able to attach the mount head to align directly with the 'N' on the tripod itself. Am I doing something wrong?

Thank you, any tips would be much appreciated!

[magic612]

First, watch this:

Okay, granted - you can't see Polaris. But using a compass to get you close to north will help a lot. You can also estimate where Polaris is if you can see The Big Dipper / Plough in the sky (use the "pointer" stars to find where Polaris should be).

It doesn't have to be perfectly aligned to track, so if you have latitude and other things set properly, then something else may be going on.

Is there a North / South switch? Is it set to "North"? That's the only thing I can think of offhand - try those to start and let us know what is happening from there.

[jimmyjamjoejoe]

The clutch needs to be engaged for the drive to work... Thats a common mistake people make.

As for alignment, magnetic north is close enough for visual stuff. If you're really fussy you can align to about 3 degrees east of magnetic north (i think).

[roarke80]

Thanks very much for that link to the video! Very informative and well made, will be watching it and trying it out tonight.

By having the clutch engaged, do you mean all the levers should be locked tightly? Sorry for being such a noob.

[valleyman]

Yes the knobs should be tight, but dont over tighten them