First go at polar alignment with the HEQ5

[Sam]

Hi all,

With the stars out at the moment I thought it would be a good opportunity to try out the new mount. The polar alignment was pretty straight forward - a bit hard to judge where the middle of the scope was but the guess must have been pretty good as it all seems to work pretty good. The wind is a real pain though! To test it out I found Pleiades and put one of the prominent stars in the centre of the eyepiece - then I put the barlow on with a 6mm eyepiece. To my delight the star stayed in the eyepiece, and quite still as well! rather than rapidly departing out the side - what a relief! I am very happy with the mount - the next step is to look at my favourite sights, which should be a lot more fun now that I won't have to readjust all of the time. The next step is to attach the webcam and have a go at mars - later tonight if the weather stays clear - though the wind might make things difficult.

cheers

Sam

[supernova]

Good luck sam.

Bernie.

[Sam]

Well, true to form it's gone all cloudy again! oh well better luck tomorrow.

[Sam]

The weather around here is one big yoyo! What a great night! After bringing the scope back inside thinking it had clouded over for good I went back out just to check and it was very clear! So I dragged everything back outside again, well at least I got to practice polar alignment again. Two nights ago I had real trouble finding Crab Nebula but this time around with the mount having power it was quite easy to find using slow speed adjustments - very impressed - got my first picture of Mars too.