EQ6 Synscan Polar alignment

[cardconvict]

Hello does anyone use the synscan polar alignment for feature and is it very accurate or just a feature to get rough polar alignment

[Tinker1947]

It works if you level the mount, have a good PSU, and just one run its good 2 or 3 runs using different stars it will put any thing in the center of your EP/CCD every time....

[Owmuchonomy]

It's very accurate if you conduct the process correctly.  30" error is quite achievable.  I do fine tune it with drift alignment if I am imaging with 15 minute subs but its usually very close anyway.  Its not absolutely necessary but I find a reticle eyepiece or the magnified live view on the Canon capture software EOS Utilities (which has crosshairs) helps a lot.

[cardconvict]

I was thinking of buying align master software but to be honest I think I would be wasting my money if I have the feature already in the Synscan mount

[jambouk]

I put togeher a guide on how to do this routine in the thread:

 

 

 

James

[cardconvict]

Do you think it is very accurate to do astrophotography.

[jambouk]

I presume you are talking about deep sky astrophotography.

You can do astrophotography with very rough and ready polar polar alignment, but you would have to keep your exposures short and be accepting of limited results. This also depends on the focal length of your kit; the longer the focal length, the quicker any tracking errors will become apprent.

the more accurate your polar alignment becomes, the longer you can push your subs before tracking errors appear. But even then periodic errors will interfer.

if you want to reliably get subs longer than 60-120 seconds, and you don't have a paramount, you'll need to guide.

James

[cardconvict]

Yeah I want to do images of around ten minutes guided with a c9.25 with F/R but if the alignment is off you get field rotation in the image on the edges of the image

[jambouk]

The handset polar alignment will be more than sufficient in that case. 

How is your guide camera being set up? I suspect that will be a bigger limitation than your polar alignment. 

James

[zicklurky]

For 10 minutes at that focal length you'll need pretty good polar alignment, I'd recommend drift aligning, it's pretty easy with the PHD wizard.