Heq5 pro woes

[lifeonmars]

Hi everyone

Having problems auto aligning heq5 pro mount ,entered my long and lat,time as per gmt, no daylight saving time selected,done polar alignment carefully but when it slews to the first star it must be a good ten to fifteen degrees out,it then prompts you to centre the star using the direction keys,but the speed it moves i would be there all night can I alter the rate whilst its in auto align mode to speed things up ,or should the first target star be nearer than that maybe in the finders fov,any ideas?Any help would be greatly a[ppreciated thanks folks!!

[Marc1980]

With regards to speeding up the slew rate, if you press 2 (rate).I usually then press 4 or 8 then enter. That will spped up you slew rate. Hope this helps.

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[steppenwolf]

Assuming for now that you have entered your details correctly and have an accurate Polar alignment then it is vital that your start position is correct. The start position for your mount is with the counterbalance bar pointing very accurately downwards and the telescope pointing accurately upwards.

[kirkster501]

The first slew after polar alignment is from the "home" position. No one has an home position (scope up weights down) that is dead on pointing at the NCP, there is always some error. As such, your first slew, to something like Kochab or Dubhe will always be out (I must say though that your 15 degrees is pushing it a bit).

Being 15 degrees out says to me you are using BST still...... ????

[lifeonmars]

Thanks for your help on this no I inputting gmt and daylight saving time is zero,the 15 degrees is just a guess but its that far away from the star that if I just press the direction keys as instructed the slew rate is so slow it almost moving at sidereal rate,so will it allow you to alter the slew rate during yje alignment process to something a bit quicker to speed it up,because at the rate its going i could have had my take out while waiting for it to arrive at the first alignment star!

[Marc1980]

Yes you can adjust the rate whilst aligning. Press 2/rate button then pick your speed. I usually use 4x then press enter and off you go.

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[lifeonmars]

Thanks for that info Marc will give that a try! cheers

[StuW]

I've found the same problem with bad initial star alignment since updating to the latest firmware (the one with the moved the polar align feature that also doesn't work). I've moved to full ascom mode now though, so not a problem.

[cotterless45]

I always GOTO the first alignment star, then disengage both clutches and centre manually. This is one reason for accurate balancing.

Further alignment is by handset rate x4. Try and be clean with direction, it gets upset with loads of minor alignment twiddling,

Nick.

[SnakeyJ]

Only time mine was this badly out was with a slipping clutch (not properly tightened) - if you're out of balance or very loaded this will be more pronounced.

I'm still on the version 2 handset, so not aware or read up on the current firmware issues (StuW). May be a bug/issue, but this is an huge margin of error.

Cheers to Mark on the changing slew rate while aligning - It can be panifull at x1

[lifeonmars]

Thanks everyone for your help,being playing around with it and cannot seem to adjust slew rate,I press the rate button then press a number say 9 i assume the display should change to 9 but it doesn`t do this i then press enter but nothing happens .The slew doesnt seem to want to change from 2 which is set any ideas

[Astro_Baby]

What version software are you running ? One of the older versions could lock out the slew rate controls.

Hes an idea, DONT align, just skip all of the set up menus by pressing enter until it asks if you want to star alignment, enter no.

The mount is now in manual mode. Press the rate button, press the 8 button and now press one of the direction controls, does the mount slew quickly....if it does chamces are its a software hiccup so upgrade to version 3.27.

if it doesnt youmay have a hardware bug or not, might be user error, might be a hundred different things but ai cant guess any of that.

Do the test above and let us know.

[lifeonmars]

Hello Astrobaby thanks for the above information I will try that and see what happens,the handset is 3.01 and it will do it no harm to update it,just need to get the right cables.For some strange reason and i dont think i am doing anything different it seems to have just started working, seems very odd but there you go.I have switched it off and I will give it another try. Many Thanks for your help!!

[Jiggy 67]

When changing the slew rate you have to be pretty quick, press rate, number and enter in quick time. If your not reasonably quick the handset will return to its previous setting

[lifeonmars]

Thanks for that jiggy,just tried it again and it seems ok now,but like you say you have to be quick maybe thats what I was doing wrong I don`t know .I can also alter the rate whilst mount is in manual as suggested by astrobaby,so thanks everyone.I think maybe my Dinosaur tendencies don`t help much !! Thank god for this Forum!!

[Astro_Baby]

Twherss your problem, ancient software release. There was a known bug in older versions where the slew would stick after certain operations. I saw this in version 3.25 I think. Sometimes the slew rate would have no effect and sometimes a slew would run wild...ie youd press a button to slew and the s ope would lock up and just slew at macimum rate until it was powered off.

Update your handset with later software and my bet is the problem will go away for good. 3.27 is stable.

You will need a PC with a serial port or a USBto serial convertor plus the cable tha came with the muont for upgrades.

[lifeonmars]

Thanks Astrobaby for that info,i will get myself the necessary adapter and update my handset.I must have tried for a couple of hours with no luck and suddenly you could alter the rate no messing and I couldn`t figure out what I was doing wrong!

[lifeonmars]

Just tried to update firmware on Skywatcher Heq5 pro Synscan Handset current version is 3.01,when out and bought a usb serial bus converter ,which attaches to the Skywatcher supplied lead.

I have installed the usb serial bus converter drivers no problem to my windows vista computer no problem,connect the cable to my powered up hand controller and the other end into my usb socket.I then bring up the downloader tool onto my laptop and cant get past the first box when i click on the hc version button it doesn`t regognize the handset the handset just reads on the led No Link to MC Start alone mode.I am a bit stuck now and seriously dont know what to do next Help!!!

[Astro_Baby]

Ah well I cant help with that, I do know some USB convertors dont work so well. i have a pc with a serial port so never have that problem. Somoene else wil have to help on the usb convertor front.

[JG777]

Are you holding down the 8 and 0 buttons onto the handset before you plug the power cable into it? This puts the handset into update mode.

[lifeonmars]

Hi JG777 Yes thanks for that Yes I was holding them down but as soon as I let go it went into standalone mode,I discovered that if I held the buttons down for longer and started the firmware update process

it then accepted it so problem is now solved.Must admit I was a bit surprised how long you had to hold the 0 and8 down for but thanks for your input much appreciated.