Celestron nexstar - help

[Kimbo1]

Hi. We have just bought my Dad a Celestron Nexstar 130 - I guess we are doing something fundamentally wrong as the view is not much better than with the naked eye

[astrofox]

Start off in daytime looking at something a way off such as a chimney. If you can get that sharp then you can thing about getting the goto to work. No need for cold nights messing about.

[Joe_L]

Welcome to the group.

It does take a bit of practice I'm afraid. Stick with it a keep asking questions - there are so many things to get the hang of.  Everyone here is very helpful.

Sometimes the sky isn't as clear as you think it is ("Seeing"), but you should see nice sharp points of light when aimed at stars. Perhaps the focus is not right, try focussing on a distant object during the day, or a distant streetlight at night.

I got my Nexstar 6Se a year ago and I had to re-read the manual carefully and practice in daylight (***NEVER*** POINT IT AT THE SUN!).  Initial alignment takes a bit of practice before you get it right.

You might find these sites useful:

http://www.nexstarsite.com/index.html

http://www.cloudynights.com/ubbthreads/showflat.php/Cat/0/Number/5372796/page/8/view/collapsed/sb/5/o/all/fpart/1   (especially the method described by Tel).

Joe

[Joe_L]

Oh and make sure your tripod is properly level before you start

[Charic]

Kimbo1..........Hi, confirm that your talking about the celestron Nexstar 130 SLT. If so see if the link here is of any use?

https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=VRjLlp5KCHE

[baggywrinkle]

+1 for the advice above.

For the goto function you need to enter things like time zone and time (allowing for any DST), location using latitude and longitude, careful how you enter these. Get you location by googling where you live or use Google Earth.

[astrofox]

I had a nextstar a few years back. One thing that caught me out was Celestron insist on the date being in American format Year  Day  Month.

[Ramsay]

I had a nextstar a few years back. One thing that caught me out was Celestron insist on the date being in American format Year  Day  Month.

My Nexstar is MM/DD/YY which is also a pain, maybe its because mine is newer and just out the box.

[Sobel]

My Nexstar is MM/DD/YY which is also a pain, maybe its because mine is newer and just out the box.

Same, I aligned yesterday and the GOTO was way off, went back and yep, just as I suspected, put 11/12/13 instead of 12/11/13.