pilar alinging Heq5 Pro

[astroban]

Hi

I have just read Astro Baby's excellent tutorial on polar aligning the Heq5 (I would put in a link at this point but I am not sure how).

My question relates to the date circle, on my mount this scale appears to be very loose, there is a lot of play in it and it easily spins independently of anything else. Is this correct?

There is also play in the RA index scale when locked, which makes accurately setting the time and date hard, is this normal? :crybaby:

Having read Astro Babies guide I think I finally understand the process, :notworthy: :notworthy: (Thanks Astro Baby). I am just not sure about the scales.

If it ever stops raining I will give polar alignment another go tonight.

Many Thanks

James

[Reggie]

Hi James, the date circle scale is supposed to be loose and able to be spun, this is used to offset the mount to the correct position so that the reticule has its polaris position in the right place according to the actual position of polaris in the night sky

As for the play in the index scale, I noticed this too, the thing to do here is make sure that you choose a side for the looseness and make sure that you always use that side to align your mount by. So my RA scale is aligned to the index mark by turning the RA scale to the left with the RA scale setscrew locked, it's only about 1mm of play but that should help you maintain accuracy.

[astroban]

Thanks for the reply, just wanted to check before I spent a lot of time setting mount up.

James

[thing]

You don't need the scales unless you prefer doing it that way. The Synscan gives you Polaris clock position. Lets say it says 9 o'clock, just rotate in RA until the little circle is at 9 o clock. Stick polaris in the little circle and Bob's you auntie.

[ash]

Sorry to hijack astroban, :salute: Thing could you explain what the polaris clock position means please :oops: always wondered.

Thanks again

Andy

[thing]

When you have entered lat/long, time, date and all the rest of it, just before it asks you if you want to do a 3 star align you will see two bits of information, one is Polaris clock, it will give you a time, say 7.30. Look through the polar scope (having of course found Polaris and having it somewhere in the scope) and rotate the mount in RA until the little circle that is on the circumference of the big circle is pointing to 7.30 clock position, in other words down and to the left somewhere. You will also see the constellations of Cass and the Plough engraved in the polar scope, they are in mine anyway, as a double check make sure that these roughly align where the actual constellations are in the sky.

Then move the MOUNT, not the scope, in azimuth using the adjustment knobs at the front of the mount and move it in elevation using the elevation adjustment screws, the big things at the front and back of the mount. Centre Polaris in the little circle of the polar scope using those two adjustments and there you have it, polar alignment. Or at least as close as you are going to get it.

That took five minutes to type, it takes about 20 seconds to do.

What I've done is do an accurate polar align, mark where the tripod legs are, and then drilled three tiny holes in the patio where i put the scope when I get it out. All I have to do when I get the scope out is put the tripod legs over the holes which means Polaris is always immediately there in the Polar scope and there will be a very minor adjustment to make. Bear in mind that I don't strip the mount and tripod down, I leave it fully assembled and keep it in my garden shed.

[Keagle]

When you have entered lat/long, time, date and all the rest of it, just before it asks you if you want to do a 3 star align you will see two bits of information, one is Polaris clock, it will give you a time, say 7.30. Look through the polar scope (having of course found Polaris and having it somewhere in the scope) and rotate the mount in RA until the little circle that is on the circumference of the big circle is pointing to 7.30 clock position, in other words down and to the left somewhere. You will also see the constellations of Cass and the Plough engraved in the polar scope, they are in mine anyway, as a double check make sure that these roughly align where the actual constellations are in the sky.

Then move the MOUNT, not the scope, in azimuth using the adjustment knobs at the front of the mount and move it in elevation using the elevation adjustment screws, the big things at the front and back of the mount. Centre Polaris in the little circle of the polar scope using those two adjustments and there you have it, polar alignment. Or at least as close as you are going to get it.

That took five minutes to type, it takes about 20 seconds to do.

Thanks for that Dave! Never knew that. Printed it out to try out tonight...

I've always just centered Polaris where the recticle was and then wondering why the GoTo alignment never pointed anywhere near anything.

Kurt

[thing]

Have you marked the null position on your mount? Do a good alignment, then use the 'Park Scope' command to park it up. Put some little strips of masking tape on the dec and RA bits and then when you do your polar align next time, rotate the dec and RA so that the lines match up. You then have it in the right place to start your alignment. Also the first star is usually a bit off, rather than use the hand controller to centre the star, loosen the clutches and move the mount manually to centre it, you don't have to move it much! Align the other two stars as normal. Some pics here http://stargazerslounge.com/index.php/topic,32829.msg335364.html#msg335364, look down the thread they will be there somewhere.

I can easily get 150 second trail free images, I had a go at a 4 minute unguided one the other night, it was just starting to show signs of trailing. http://stargazerslounge.com/index.php/topic,33514.0.html I will add that I'm a complete novice when it comes to imaging, so if I can get 4 minutes, anybody can. It's a very accurate mount for the price IMO.

Edit: the other thing is to manually pick your alignment stars. You want one close to the southern meridian, one high or low in the West, and one high or low in the East, but if your West one is low make the East one high and vice versa. At the moment if you are out aligning at around 6pm Altair is a good one for the meridian, Caph is highish to the East and Arcturus is very low to the West. You can of course look at a planisphere or something like Stellarium and pick your own.

[ash]

Thanks Dave appreciate the info :) i too was wondering why it didn't 'goto'

will try next clear night

Andy

[Keagle]

Have you marked the null position on your mount? Do a good alignment, then use the 'Park Scope' command to park it up. Put some little strips of masking tape on the dec and RA bits and then when you do your polar align next time, rotate the dec and RA so that the lines match up. You then have it in the right place to start your alignment.

Not quite understanding this bit! So I polar align, GoTo align, then park and put tape on the scales and the mount? Then next time I do a polar alignment I just match the tape on the scales up with the tape on the mount?

I've done the manually move to the first star, unfortunately it misses on the second two too! I'm going to try one star align, manually move it, park, and then align again. Heard that does something IIRC.

Thanks Dave!

Kurt

[thing]

Have you marked the null position on your mount? Do a good alignment, then use the 'Park Scope' command to park it up. Put some little strips of masking tape on the dec and RA bits and then when you do your polar align next time, rotate the dec and RA so that the lines match up. You then have it in the right place to start your alignment.

Not quite understanding this bit! So I polar align, GoTo align, then park and put tape on the scales and the mount? Then next time I do a polar alignment I just match the tape on the scales up with the tape on the mount?

I've done the manually move to the first star, unfortunately it misses on the second two too! I'm going to try one star align, manually move it, park, and then align again. Heard that does something IIRC.

Thanks Dave!

Kurt

Do the full three star alignment Kurt. Then park the scope using the park function in Utilities. Switch the mount off. Mark the heads like in the photo. It only takes a minute. You still have to do a polar align when you use the scope again.

If you think about it, when you polar align the mount you are moving the mount in RA to get the circle in the polar scope in the right 'clock' position. Then you're putting the mount back in what you might think is the 'neutral' position, it could be a fair bit off. When you park the mount, it's gone to where it thinks is the null position, so if you can put it where it thinks is the null position every time you align it you're onto a winner. Just to clarify, you only have to mark the mount once! Not every time you use it.

When you say it misses the second two stars, is it out of the viewfinder/spotting scope completely or is it just say a widefield eyepiece amount off?

[Keagle]

As in it's completely out of the viewfinder/spotting scope. I'm assuming it's just my error. Thank you very much for your help though Dave, going to be trying out all of this tonight I think.

In the photo?

Kurt

[thing]

The photo of the marked up mount, on here somewhere. http://stargazerslounge.com/index.php/topic,32829.msg335364.html#msg335364,

[Keagle]

The photo of the marked up mount, on here somewhere. http://stargazerslounge.com/index.php/topic,32829.msg335364.html#msg335364,

Thank youuu! Will do tonight. Supposed to sleet at some point, but I want to get this sussed.

Kurt