Astrotortilla - Allign first?

[Stian]

Hi,

Quick question.

Do I have to align my mount prior to using Astrotortilla? Or does Astrotortilla actually take care of the tracking as well? (Using a combination of Stellarium / Astrotortilla / NextRemote / Nexstar 6SE

 

br

Stian

[russp]

You need to polar align it. Your scope will track whatever you point it at without any input (although for ultra accurate tracking you have to guide) - you just use astrotortilla OR stellarium(once you have star aligned it) to point the telescope - it then tracks all by itself. You probably don't need to star align for astrotortilla - that's kinda the point certainly don't when I use plate solving for targeting in SGPpro.

 

 

[Thalestris24]

Hi

You'd need a wedge to polar align an alt az mount... What did you intend doing with your setup + Astrotortilla?

Louise

[Stian]

Hi,

Thanks for the reply. Managed to test the setup on Sunday. So I had to do a 2 star align first to get the scope tracking. Turned out astrotortilla is a great tool for polar align (forgot to mention that I have a wedge).

 

[Thalestris24]

1 hour ago, Stian said:

Hi,

Thanks for the reply. Managed to test the setup on Sunday. So I had to do a 2 star align first to get the scope tracking. Turned out astrotortilla is a great tool for polar align (forgot to mention that I have a wedge).

 

Hi

I wouldn't recommend using AT to polar align with - it's unreliable! Much better to use drift aligning (the PHD2 tool is good if you set up guiding)

Louise

[Stian]

OK, Thanks. Picking up a QHY5L-ii tomorrow and plan to use it for guiding with my 9x50. Will be interesting to see if I can manage with it.