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Celestron NexStar 8 SE


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Hello all,

Hope you are all doing great. Tonight is my first night on this website. It is also the first night that I attempted to use the Celestron NexStar 8 SE telecsope that I purchased yesterday. It was a total failure. After 3 attempts to allign the telescope it stated that it was aligned. I directed it to find Mars and it found something. It was something round that would not center. There was also something that looked like spiders moving around. I then directed the telescope to find Saturn and it pointed at my house. :embarrassed: I didn't know that I live on Saturn. I attempted to search for other objects but all I saw was a blank screen. Tomorrow night is another night and I will give it another shot. Hopefully things will get better tomorrow.

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Hi Bummedout, like you i am a bit of a novice and i dont have experience with the 8SE however i might be able to give some advice. The spiders that you are talking about sounds like you are not focussed on something, point it at something really bright or one of these spiders and adjust the focus until you get a sharp image. As for the 8SE pointing at your house, i suspect from where you were standing your house was roughly to your East? Saturn hit the horizon at roughly 4:15 your time (i picked Chicago as your location as it says Midwest on your profile) and depending on your surroundings it probably wasnt up in the sky until a fair bit after that, what time did you ask it to point to Saturn? To find out this info i used a program called Stellarium which might be worthwhile you downloading, it really helps you get a better understanding of whats up there and prior to going out i have started planning my nights with it.

As for the rest of your problems, it does just sound like it is not properly aligned and focussed (how did you align it if you cant see anything??). I know how frustrating it can be at first (I swore blind my scope was broken) but stick with it as it is so rewarding in the end.

I think someone a bit more technically minded and perhaps with 8se experience might be along to give you some more tips but welcome to the forum and good luck.

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If you do not havbe GPS on the 8SE then the standard reply is check all the data.

Think that the location is Longitude then Latitude.

Enter your timezone, expect -6 or -7.

When it gets round to asking it DST is On now.

Get the mount as level as you can and level the scope OTA as well and point it North. It is a good start position, if nothing else.

Tell it to align, supply the date and time - date in US format, but you should be OK with that. :grin: .

Suggest the 2 star align, no idea why but the 3 star align seems to have problems in that it appears to be successful but then never quite points at the right thing.

If there is a Polar initial starting point then I assume that you level mount and aim scope at Polaris then tell it to align. This if present may be better as the start position can be used to determine some of the errors that the scope need to compensate for. Makes you look even better - you know and can find Polaris, not kidding here people are impressed by this.

Terriable thing to say but usually the main problem of a goto is the operator. :eek: :eek: :eek:

I have 3 goto's. :BangHead: :BangHead: :BangHead:

They all hate me and are out to get revenge on me. :rolleyes: :rolleyes: :rolleyes:

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Hi and welcome. My only advice is to read the instructions again and carry them out to the letter. Celestron GOTOs are brilliant so I would imagine that it's something that you are not doing correctly. It takes practice but stick with it. Good luck.

Peter :smiley:

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My recommendations:

get stellarium as you need to able recognise specific stars for 2 star align (my preferred setup)

use google earth to get your co-ordinates accurate

enter all data correctly and allow for daylight time, if applicable

make sure you have a good power source, batteries alone will not cut it for very long

pick two stars ideally about 45 - 60 deg high and over 90 deg apart, it is best not to select stars that are very high in the sky

be aware that sometimes GOTO can be very accurate and then another night they seem to drift out of accuracy very quickly. Later on look up how to re ALIGN during your session.

Or, for a first session just use Solar System align on the moon, as it is nearing first quarter and you will good views along the terminator.

As Ronin states there is a lot of info, most (all?) Celestrons use the same software so look for setup posts for eg SE6, SLT 127 etc.

HTH

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Don't use the skyalign as it often doesn't work. Pick two star align and use two stars a far distance apart.

Also how are you powering the scope, as it will do all sorts of crazy things if run on batteries.

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Thanks to all that replied. I appreciate the help and the advice very much. My second night out with my new nexstar 8SE was probably less successful than the first. There is no doubt in my mind that it's the operators fault. Today the telescope had no problem alligning but when I looked through the lense all I saw was fuzzy whiteness. I received this fuzzy whiteness no matter what I asked the telescope to find. I am using batteries right now because my AC adaptor has not arrived yet from OpticsPlanet.com. This is also the site from where I bought the telescope. It could be my location. I live in a suburb of St. Paul, Minnesota. The weather has not been the best. Nevertheless I see many stars in the sky with my naked eye. I am near sited and I see more looking up in the sky with my glasses off than I do with my telescope. :shocked:

Eventually I may end up sending the telescope and the many accessories I purchased back to OpiticsPlanet.com but I will keep trying to make this work. It's pretty discouraging right now but like my dad always said, "success comes in cans". Yes pops can be a little annoying at times but he gives good advice. Good luck to all of you and if you like please keep the advice coming.

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Well keep at it, you have a week to sort yourself out before a total lunar eclipse visible in your part of the world. :Envy:

It might also be worth trying to view distant objects in the daytime just to get used to it. Note; (if it is like my 127) when you first switch on your can use the motor to move the scope around without inputting any data, ideal for 'testing'. Though watch those batteries, hopefully your AC power adaptor will arrive soon.

Stick with it and good luck.

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I'm sorry if this is teaching how to suck eggs, but it might be worth re-checking focus. My first scope was an 8SE, new out of the box, and I found I had to turn the focusser a lot, and I mean a lot, more than i expected before anything would come to focus. Something like 30 or 40 twists, if you see what I mean. For the first hour I was convinced it was broken, until I saw this advice online. Apologies if you've already done that, but it caught me out first time round :p .

Mine was rubbish with batteries - ok for about 10 mins with a set of fresh new ones, but after that its was all over the place.

Good luck and don't give up yet :)!

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Have you tried focusing when you see "fuzzy whiteness" - as Steve says you might just be well out of focus. The daylight focusing is a good idea if you can an object at least 1/2 mile away to focus on.

Peter

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I'm sorry if this is teaching how to suck eggs, but it might be worth re-checking focus. My first scope was an 8SE, new out of the box, and I found I had to turn the focusser a lot, and I mean a lot, more than i expected before anything would come to focus. Something like 30 or 40 twists, if you see what I mean. For the first hour I was convinced it was broken, until I saw this advice online. Apologies if you've already done that, but it caught me out first time round :p .

Mine was rubbish with batteries - ok for about 10 mins with a set of fresh new ones, but after that its was all over the place.

Good luck and don't give up yet :)!

This was exactly what happened with mine. You could try to focus on a distant object in the daylight, turn the focuser until the object is clear. Then when you use it next it should only need a small adjustment.

Again I stress using it on batteries made mine go crazy, wouldn't find anything. This is because as the scope moves the power drops so much it doesn't have enough power to remember where it was slewing to so just carries on.

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Again thanks to all of you. It's pretty cool that people are willing to help out. I worry about using the telescope during the day because of the sun but I will put a new set of batteries and try again. The AC adapter was sent today. OpticsPlanet.com was holding my order because the portable power unit was out of stock. I insisted that they send the other accessories that I purchased such as the AC adapter and they finally obliged. Now as far as the focus is concerned whenever the telescope finds an object I adjust the focus. I adjust the focus until it does not turn anymore in both directions. Nothing changed. I will not give up on the scope until I receive the AC adaptor and stay outside for hours attempting to locate something. Anything at all would be a victory right now.

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The bright light with "spiders" definitly sound like a focusing issue.  I used the "auto 2 star" alignment method for mine and used Polaris as the first star and it aligined very nicely.  I also used my cell's compass information and added Longitude and Latitude numbers instead of a nearby city while performing my alingment info input.

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During the day will be fine, just dont point it near the sun!

Not sure of the space available but maybe try your house or a lamppost. You are much more likely to recognise even something fuzzy in daylight.

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4th night out was very much like the first three. Tonight I did not use the GoTo function. I found the brightest object in the sky, centered the red dot from the finder's scope on that object. Nothing changed. All I saw was the same fuzzy white screen that always shows up. The focus knob was turned to the max both ways and nothing. As far as this telescope is concerned there is nothing in the sky. It's a pretty clear sky. The clearest sky of the 4 nights. Also I used a fresh batch of batteries. This will be my last night out until Friday night. Hopefully my AC adapter will have shown up by then. Really don't know how much it's going to help because there are no objects coming in through the telescope. I'm really at a loss right now.

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Unfortunately even the red dot will not be aligned to the telescope out if the box. Therefore what you pointed at last night is likely not to be in your telescope.

Again this is best do during the day or just as the light is fading. So honestly you are best finding a distant object and then try to adjust the focus. Once the object is in focus, centre it and then look through the red dot finder. You will most likely see it's way off. There are to knobs on the finder, adjust these until the dot is on the object.

The below is taken from the celestron help section online

 Why should I first use my scope in daylight?

 If you are unable to see anything clearly through your telescope at night, try using the scope in daylight first. It is much easier to familiarize yourself with focusing, aiming the telescope and aligning

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I must agree with Steve - try it all out during daylight but stay clear of the Sun. Find an object about 1/2 mile away if you can - not in the sky - and practice focusing. If you still cannot get focus I am at a loss unless the telescopes collimation is way way out and I would not have thought so.

Peter

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I must agree with Steve - try it all out during daylight but stay clear of the Sun. Find an object about 1/2 mile away if you can - not in the sky - and practice focusing.

Peter

In fact both the Steve's have recommended this so we must be right. :grin:

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