NexStar 5se alignment problems

[polarispete]

I have had my celestron for a while now but not much chance to use it.  Now fully retired and living in rural France I hope to spend more time using it.

My main problem is trying to align it. Having followed the three star procedure using degrees and minutes for my co-ordinates and entering the time and date,

correctly (I hope, including BST)  the controller says alignment failed.  Tried two or three more times and still failed.  Very frustrating, especially as Saturn is in such a good position for viewing.  HEEEEELP Anybody.

[Coastliner]

I have the 4SE, so may be able to help. First of all, make sure you are entering the date in mmddyy format, not ddmmyy. This is a very common tripwire.

Second, if the scope runs off internal batteries, throw them away and get a 12v power supply, typically a car jumpstarter with a cigarette lighter output. After doing this many people have said that the motors sound different, everything runs a lot better.

[ronin]

If you are in France then I guess you mean DST, not BST ?

I suspect time could a problem, you are likely on/in the GMT geographical band (Normandy) but not using GMT at all, even with the 1 hours DST option.

Looking at the SE manual it is not overly clear where it expects France to be, UTC or UTC+1. The UTC/UTC+1 line just sort of disappears in the assoerted country boraders. I would expect you to have a timezone of UTC+1.

One option is that you set your location, Long+Lat, set the timezone to UTC and then determine the UTC time (think 2 hours different to what your watch presently says). It is this 2 hour difference which may be the problem. Unfortunately the scopes are set up for geographic timezones not political ones.

One other thing is do not use 3 star alignment, it sort of fails more often then not.

The 3rd star is to determine cone angle (I think) and usually it fails. I have the impression that the calculated error is worked out but that the set tolerance is somewhat tight, as in too tight. So 3 star alignment will fail more often then not. I think they improved the pass rate quite simply by opening up the tolerance. Do the 2 star.

[Coastliner]

The other thing to try, given that 3 star align is a bit flakey, and given that it is Saturn that you are interested in at the moment, is to go for a Solar System align, and align it on Saturn. The tracking is not quite as good as 3 star, but is more than adequate for observing/videoing the planet.

[Herbig]

Probably obvious but are you getting your tripod perfectly level and the tube pointing due North before you start?

[polarispete]

Thanks to all those who replied to my post. Just one point Herbig, I wasn't aware that the tube had to point North before starting. Tha manual says nothing about that any where, but will add that to the procedure and see if a helps.

[MarkJ44]

Hi Polarispete, already responded to your other thread, but will add that i agree with the comments above re 2 v 3 star alignment. I dont bother with 3 star anymore, bit hit and miss as said already, although goto is a bit more accurate when it you get it in my view. I only do 2 star and i pick a couple of stars in the part of the sky i intend to be doing my viewing, giving them reasonable separation. Always get good results. If i decide to look alsewhere i just replace one of my alignment stars with another close to where i want to view, works fine but can be finetuned by replacing both if necessary.

The technical advice i recieved is that you dont need to start pointing north, but i think plenty of people do start in that position, i'm sure plenty will disagree with the tech advice!!

[impactcrater]

this youtube link explains alignment very well...your scope does not have to face north as it is not 'equatorial' , rather 'alt-az'...