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Polar aligning and guiding


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Is it necessary to accurately polar align if guiding is used?

once the leaves are back on the trees I won't be able to see NP, it's hard enough as it is.

i intend to invest in guiding at some point anyway but can you get away with rough polar aligning?

thanks

mike

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The better your Polar-Alignment the less work the guider has to do in order to keep the mount on target , so the answer is no.

If you can't see the NCP soon I'd advise you to get as accurately polar-aligned/ drift-aligned now and then leave the mount/tripod set up , it can be a pain if you have limited space to store however.

The other thing is to mark the tripod foot position ( I drilled 3 small holes in the patio to ensure accurate replacement) so that everything goes back in the same place every time , eliminating the need to PA every session.

I just plonk the tripod in the holes and know that I'm ready to go.

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I see you both have ED80's which is what I'm getting.

do you both guide with your setups then and if so what length subs can you get without accurately polar aligning and guiding? Or am I missing the point and by roughly aligning you can get whatever length you want depending on system accuracies?

thanks for your help!

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I got mine before I had a computer as it's a standalone guider that plugs directly into the mount.

I stick with it rather than going down the PHD route because it just works.

I'm sure there'll be someone along in a minute to put the 'otherside' of things to you . . . :rolleyes:

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PA is essential, i´m roughly PA with the PA-Scope, and then fiddle around with PHD-PA (found somewhere the method here in the forms -> all hail to the SGL-search function :grin: )

i´m guiding with the 9x50 finder scope and an PS-eye...

...got very good results after having some troubles with the calibration and some parameters...

but now i can guide +30mins w/o problems (even in superzoom on small stars i can see rectangular 2x2 pixles as stars)

the only problem i have so far, if i´m aiming at some DSO´s where nearby no "brighter" stars to find (even after de-aligning the guiding scope to "look around") i´m unable to guide...

maybe i have to look for a 80/400 frac or so as a guiding scope maybe with a barlow :cool:

and there it comes again -> spending money for new toys :rolleyes:

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What about using Alignmaster in conjunction with guiding? Will that give me enough accuracy for multiple minute subs?

in this case, when aligned properly, there shouldn´t be any problem for longer subs...

...and just when you think everything is going well, either the wind kicks in or an Aircraft kills your 20min sub :mad:

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  • 1 month later...

Is it necessary to accurately polar align if guiding is used?

once the leaves are back on the trees I won't be able to see NP, it's hard enough as it is.

i intend to invest in guiding at some point anyway but can you get away with rough polar aligning?

thanks

mike

As far as I understand it if you don’t have good alignment and then guide you will get field rotation.

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With a webcam and a finder scope I can manage about 6 or so mins on the old (faithful) EQ3 2

Indeed, this is where I started and it worked for me on my EQ3-2 obviously the HEQ5 is a bit better >.<

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