Az Goto Solar Problem..Please Help!!

[cthorpey]

Hi Folks,

I have just spent a really frustrating few hours trying to set up my az goto to follow the sun and failed miserably.

here is what i did...

put the solar filter on, taped it in place and taped the finder cover in place.

Levelled the mount.

levelled the scope and got it pointing north.

reset the power

I am on me happy holidays in holyhead so I set the long/lat to 53" 16.7' N 4" 6.2' set the date mm dd yyyy and the time and told it about daylight savings

checked to see that it was all set to 00.00.00 and it was.

Slewed to the sun and centered it.

went into setup menu, tracking and selected solar and then it all got a bit weird.

3 seconds after i hit enter on solar the scope started slewing down, all the way down until it hit the mount and I had to pull the plug.

so I did it again and triple checked everything and it did the same.

I did a factory reset on the thing, looked up on here to see if i was doing it right and I don't think i have missed anything but I can't get the damn thing to align.

The most frustrating bit is that it worked at home the other evening and tracked it in a 25mm eyepiece for 20 mins no bother.

Grrr

Thanks in advance for all your help

Chris

[spaceboy]

You have to go in to the options and enable solar tracking. By default it will not allow you to view the sun for obvious reasons.

[dtr42]

isn't the solar setting for the planets? is it looking for the first on the solar list ? have found to track sun i just focus the sun in eyepiece then press and hold enter on my goto control till it bleeps [comes up ENTER to sync ,i then use the arrows till it's centred and hit enter again ] the scope then tracks the sun for at least 15-20 minutes

[The Sailor]

When I start up to do a solar shoot I set it to solar tracking and then in Stellarium I click on the sun and away it goes, have left it on it's own for 3 to 4 hours at a time ans all has been well, spot on all the time. The only time I have had to take action was to use Stellarium to flip the mount and let it start afresh.

Jim

[sanmatt]

You have to go in to the options and enable solar tracking. By default it will not allow you to view the sun for obvious reasons.

Yeah the options are solar, lunar and sidereal I think? Sidereal being the one we want to astro stuff, solar and lunar are obvious.

This is what I was wondering yesterday, I found the option for solar tracking and it seem to work ok.

[skankanan]

when i used mine i pointed it roughly north slewed to the sun selected solar tracking then went to auto tracking scrolled down to the alt az dislplay and held the enter button briefly and it follows the sun lovely.check ure long and lat mine has to have east entered first then north. mines a skymax 127 az goto

[cthorpey]

Thanks. Didn't know about holding enter. Will try stellarium too tomorrow

Cheers

C.

[cthorpey]

Okey dokey.

Tried again just now. Repeated all the steps and it did the same. Then I reset it all and levelled etc. set the tracking to solar and connected to stellarium. I can slew to any object I want to from stellarium but as soon as I go near the sun the scope nosedives.

I can stop the nosedive if I press any of the direction keys but after 3 seconds it continues to nosedive. I can also stop the nosedive if I turn off tracking.

This is so annoying. I know it will be something so simple but I am getting really cheesed off now. The sky is so clear and there are some lovely spots to look at currently..

Any more ideas folks before I chuck it into the harbour?

[dtr42]

right date on the goto?/ or right time ?? is it set for AM or PM [24 hour clock]had similar experience with the moon [i had forgot to change the date:eek:]

[ronin]

I set the long/lat to 53" 16.7' N 4" 6.2'

Those numbers are Lat and Long not Long and Lat.

Also is 4" 6.2' correct.

Either it should have a "W" behind it or it should be -4" 6.2' as all West longitudes are -ve.

[cthorpey]

Definitely got the date and time right cos it worked fine last night

Just checked lat and long on net

53°16'28"N and 4°37'02"W

the group of objects: the latitude 53 degrees 16 minutes and 28 seconds north and the longitude 4 degrees 37 minutes and 2 seconds west

Even though I was out on the longitude a bit would it account for the nosedive even if the goto worked last night?

Thanks

[LeoLion]

Probably not related but there was a problem with the Merlin Alt Az mount due to sunlight leaking in to the encoder/s .That was an unwanted azimuth slew .Here is a video by Dr Steve Wainwright on that problem and its cure

.Hope you find the answer .

[cthorpey]

Leo, it's worth a try. Thank you. Will report back this afternoon.

[cthorpey]

Leo you were spot on. Although the synscan az does not have a bubble built in there is still a seam where the metal meets the plastic and there is a light leak causing the problem..

It is still under warranty so I am not going to be messing around with it and while I am away I am taping a tea towel to the mount. Proper high tech!

Thank you all for your help.

Another problem solved and another happy stargazer.

C.

[dtr42]

excellent mate glad your back in the sunshine

[spaceboy]

It's reasons like this why I joined SGL. Who would have thought it ??? Great find Leo!! I want to know Dr Steve Wainwright figured that one out in the first place.

[Black Knight]

It's reasons like this why I joined SGL. Who would have thought it ??? Great find Leo!!

That is a great solution, a bit obscure as well - well at least I'd never heard of it!

Sent from my mobile using Tapatalk, so please excuse the speeling and granma!