Heq5 pro not tracking. please help!

[Fred71]

Dear all,

This is my first post. I'm quite new at astrophotography, although I've used a startravel mount together with a camera for a couple of years. I recently decided to upgrade to a skywatcher heq5 pro mount which I intend to use with a Ed-80 refractor, also from skywatcher.

I've been spending countless hours trying to solve my problem and I am now to the point where I think my équipement is faulty and needs to be returned to be checked. Before I do, I wanted to ask you guys for advice because I can not exclude the possibility that I'm just doing things wrong. Here is my problem :

The mount does not track even though I've done the polar alignment and hooked on the synscan handset. I initially believed I would not need the handset for simple tracking and that after polar alignment, the mount would automatically start tracking. Clearly it did not, as the mount did not move and was completely silent. I then hooked on the handset, entered all the info for initialisation, checked the sidareal tracking was checked, but still no tracking, even though the mount did make some noise at that point. I did try to align one or two stars, but the telescope would just be way off the targeted star. I mean totally way off, sometimes pointing the opposite direction. I gave up star alignment, so just skipped the alignment part, thinking I could still use the mount to track without star alignment. However, when pointing to a star, I would see it drift after a few seconds, so clearly no tracking.

Can somebody help me out?

Questions: is it possible to use the mount to track without any star alignment, or without using the synscan handset? Is there an on/off button somewhere I have missed to start tracking?

Any idea why the star alignment is so incredibly off target? I doubled check all the gps, elevation, date info and the polar aligment is accurate as I checked it after a couple of hours and polaris was exactly where it should be according to my Find polaris app.

I'm quite desperate now, so any advice is more then welcome!

Thanks.

fred

 

 

 

[Jiggy 67]

Hi Fred, welcome to the forum.

 I have never used a “tracking only “ mode but a quick look at the manual (V4 Synscan) shows the below. Have you got a Synscan manual??....It appears that you can skip star alignment and track after finding an object USING THE HANDSET manually with the directional keys.

If I was you though I would study the manual and start from scratch with star alignment to get it right. There could be a number of reasons why this is happening, difficult to ascertain with the information provided. Once you’ve got that right and using the GoTo to find objects, the mount will track automatically 
 

 

Easy Tracking Mode:
The flow chart of the “Easy Tracking” operation is shown below:
    Initialization
Start Tracking
Locate a celestial
object manually
In Easy Tracking mode, the hand control also needs to be connected to a Sky-Watcher telescope mount. The mount must be setup at a proper “Home Position” (refer to Section 2.1 for details) before turning on the power. After turning on the power to the mount, the hand control must complete an “Initialization” routine. Then the user can choose to skip the “Alignment” routine and start the tracking function directly (refer to Section 6.1 “Choosing Tracking Speed”). Users will need to locate a celestial object in the sky, and then use the hand control to manually point the telescope to the target. The object locating function may still be used but it will only give a rough result.
The Easy Tracking mode is suitable for quick setup for visual observing of brighter celestial objects, such as planets, the moon, or the sun. If the user does not turn on the tracking function, the Easy Tracking mode can also be used for observing terrestrial objects

Edited July 20, 2020 by Jiggy 67

[Astrosharkey]

After you switch it on does the handset come on and after a few seconds using the arrow buttons can you move the mount??

[Jiggy 67]

Yes, once the handset has initialized you can slew the mount using the directional keys on the handset 

[Astrosharkey]

Sorry jiggy that was a question to Fred to see if we can work out if its a minor (set up) or major issue (blown board or power supply) or various other issues that can arise as i am sure you know

[Tenor Viol]

When you do the 3 star alignment, the first one will almost certainly be 'off' by a significant amount....

However, there are several things you have to be careful with as I think the HEQ5 handset is confusing...

You have to start from 'home' position. 

• You need to put in your latitude and longitude and these need to be accurate to the nearest minute of arc. If you don't know them, there are apps you can download to your phone, including the ones that help with polar alignment, that will do it
• You need to select the correct time zone. For UK that is +0.00
• You need to input the correct time use 24 hour clock - it will then confirm it back to you e.g. 22.30 = 10.30pm
• And at present you have to reply 'yes' to the daylight saving time question

If this is not done correctly, the mount will not point to the correct place at all.  

Edited July 20, 2020 by Tenor Viol

[FMA]

Im in the same platform than you "Skywatcher the troublemaker".

At the moment I haven't aligned the mount any time, and im sure where polaris is.......im on holidays soon, so ill take it with time....( look for a post with my name " im giving up", there are good advice there...)

I can track the moon/sun, for a few minutes, after goes out the eyepiece..... if I don't use the track option, it disappear from the eyepiece sooner, much sooner....so, it works, but nor for hours as I was expecting...

 

with all the mounts sold, I think they should do a masterclass for us....

[Erling G-P]

I don't think you can use the mount without the handset or alternatively a computer for control.

You can use it for tracking without doing a star alignment though - I did that last summer while looking at Jupiter & Saturn. Had to do that from a location in my garden where I couldn't see Polaris, so could only do a rough alignment towards north, and skipped the star alignment entirely.  As soon as I turn on my mount, there's a whirring noise from it. I thought it was tracking, but seems not to be the case - manually located objects would drift out of view very quickly.  Going into the menus and selecting 'Sidereal tracking' changed the noise, and then the mount clearly tracked.  Kept the planets in view for minutes, only requiring vertical adjustments in the view.

Why your star alignments are so far off is hard to say.  Do remember to enter the date in US format - MM/DD/YYYY.  A few times my mount has suddenly misbehaved, pointing into the ground, or maybe 90º off the suggested alignment star.  In those cases, I've solved it by turning off the power for 30+ secs and then starting over - this seems to reset the mount and clear old alignment data.  However, if yours has never worked, it probably isn't a solution, as I assume it must have been turned off for hours or days between sessions ?

[Hendrik - Nordic Light]

Hi Fred,  were you able to solve your issue?  I am having the same issue.  Can't find out why this happening.  Coordinates, time, date etc. are correct.  Tracking on Sidereal speed. All looks fine...but no tracking. 

[Cosmic Geoff]

This could be a silly question, but has the RA clutch been tightened? If it is slack, the mount will probably not track.

[Tomatobro]

The easy way to check RA tracking is to set the mount up in a room or garage. Put a laser pointer in the mount (improvise with tape etc to hold it in position).

Turn on the mount and laser and measure the distance from the centre of the mount to where the laser dot is on the wall. set the mount up and start sidereal tracking.

Some maths is now required. Say the distance to the wall is 3000 mm. 3000 x 3.142 = 9426 mm 9462 / 24 = 393 mm

Mark the wall and let the mount run for exactly 1 hour. If the dot has moved 393 mm (or pretty near) then the RA tracking is good.

Edited February 25, 2021 by Tomatobro
update

[Hendrik - Nordic Light]

Thanks guys,  I will have a look at the suggestions. Friday seems to be clear again! Full Moon...but hey you still can test a few things! 

 

[Hendrik - Nordic Light]

OK.  I did two tests so far.  One with tracking the Andromeda Galaxy for an hour and one with the distance method.  Let's start with the distance method.  Centre from the mount to the wall 3200mm.  I marked the start and the finish.  Distance travelled on the wall 65mm 

Andromeda test.  Started with 98°57 5' and 64° 22 5'   Finished with 118° 43 6' and 73° 21 1'    

So the question is...what could be the problem.  it seems in case of the Andromeda test that the mount tracks too fast?

 

 

Edited February 25, 2021 by Hendrik - Nordic Light
update

[Hendrik - Nordic Light]

OK.  I did two tests so far.  One with tracking the Andromeda Galaxy for an hour and one with the distance method.  Let's start with the distance method.  Centre from the mount to the wall 3200mm.  I marked the start and the finish.  Distance travelled on the wall 65mm 

Andromeda test.  Started with 98°57 5' and 64° 22 5'   Finished with 118° 43 6' and 73° 21 1'    

So the question is...what could be the problem.  it seems in case of the Andromeda test that the mount tracks too fast?

 

[michael8554]

Not sure I agree with the 3000mm = 393mm on the wall.

The mount should move 15 degrees in 1 hour.

The distance on the wall would be roughly 3000 x Tan 15 = 3000 x 0.2679 = 803 mm  ?

At 3200mm it would be 857mm ?

Michael

[malc-c]

When you were tracking Andromeda for that hour how far out was the tracking visually.  Did it drift completely out of the field of view of the camera or wide field eyepiece ?  I use EQMOD so can't really comment on the handset, but if it's really fast could it be that the tracking rate is set to luna if it's faster than sidereal ?

I've never tried centering a star in the field of view and then let it track without guiding to see how well it performs on a PA mount, but given  the mass production, and pricing point, I wouldn't have thought that the mount wouldn't drift over an hour even if the mount was belt driven to remove some of the backlash.

Rather than use a large target such as Andromeda, re-do the experiment using a bright star such as Rigel or Betelgeuse.  Center it, set it tracking in sidereal rate  and set the stopwatch running.  It should be a simple matter of establishing the field of view the camera or eyepiece has, and then time it to see how long it takes for the star to drift out of the field of view.  This might help establish if there is a real issue, or if it's just the tolerances of the mount in question.  

[Hendrik - Nordic Light]

Hey Malcom, White Dwarf, Thank you for the answers. The Andromeda test was inside the house to see whether the mount was tracking. It seemed it tracked  🙂 Last night I performed another test on M42 and NGC2264.  I got good polar alignment.  ( I checked it again after I returned home the mount after around 3 hours of shooting and Polaris was on the spot where it should be at that time. So that is all ok. I balanced the mount for the home position etc. All levelled.   I did a two star alignment. Sirius and Mirfak. When mount slew to Sirius, Sirius was a bit out of the middle.  I centred it. Then the mount slew to Mirfak.  Mirfak was spot on in the middle of the eyepiece.  I selected M42 as the first test. (Olympus EM1 Mark II and WO Redcat 51) -  60s are ok.  90s gets blurry images - 120 / 150 / 180 not worth considering (I get 3min with my Skywatcher star adventurer) -  I moved the to the Christmas Tree cluster. From the 40 images I took at 120s - Only 40% of the images are usable.  There was no wind.

I have no idea why I can't get longer exposures on this mount. 

Tomorrow it seems to be clear again. I will do the bright star test to see whether it drifts out of the centre. 

 

 

 

[malc-c]

To be honest, anything over 60 seconds and I use guiding. 

From a review website 

Quote

Without guiding, the HEQ5’s tracking errors will result in blurred subframes with anything longer than 30-45 seconds of exposure with most scopes. However, with autoguiding I can get accuracy as good as 0.9 arc seconds

https://telescopicwatch.com/sky-watcher-heq5-pro-review/

Quote

The HEQ5 mount typically runs at 20-30 arcsecs from new unguided in independent tests

I can't comment on the other mount, but if you want long exposures with the stock HEQ5 then you will need to implement guiding, or hypertune the mount (replace bearings etc). https://www.darkframeoptics.com/product/heq5-hypertune-mount-tune - £400 gets you a mount that will give you 5-7 minutes with an ED80, or 3 minutes with a 200P, with 0.6 arc sec guided.  £550 adds more refinement and a claimed up to 10 minutes unguided with a ED80.

Personally I think you are expecting too much form a mount that is really at the bottom of the imaging mounts

[michael8554]

So the mount is tracking at sidereal rate ?

What did you change to make it work ?

Michael

[Hendrik - Nordic Light]

Thank you White Dwarf and Main Sequence.   I did a few tests with the HEQ5 PRO tracker.  I have let it run on different tracking speeds like Lunar, Solar.... and back to sidereal speed.  Checked whether there was a backlash.  Rechecked all parameters.  Nothing else.

Last night I got tracked exposures of 210s without too many problems.  20% of the images were rubbish or not really useable.  This all in unguided.  Tonight I will try to track 4 5 minutes exposures and see how it goes. 

 

 

[malc-c]

If you are getting 3 minutes 30 sec unguided exposures that are useable from an HEQ5 that hasn't been tuned then I think that is acceptable... I think your expectations of 5 minutes unguided with this mount is pushing it to be honest

[Hendrik - Nordic Light]

Thanks Main Sequence.  Tuned...you mean Rowan Belt Mod?  I am testing to see how far I can push this mount.  Once I know its limits I know the boundaries of which I can operate in.  I want to make sure I do not solely rely on technology and software 🙂 it is always good to be able to understand the basics, so all there after will be bonus! 

[barrie greenwood]

On 27/02/2021 at 16:43, malc-c said:

To be honest, anything over 60 seconds and I use guiding. 

From a review website 

https://telescopicwatch.com/sky-watcher-heq5-pro-review/

I can't comment on the other mount, but if you want long exposures with the stock HEQ5 then you will need to implement guiding, or hypertune the mount (replace bearings etc). https://www.darkframeoptics.com/product/heq5-hypertune-mount-tune - £400 gets you a mount that will give you 5-7 minutes with an ED80, or 3 minutes with a 200P, with 0.6 arc sec guided.  £550 adds more refinement and a claimed up to 10 minutes unguided with a ED80.

Personally I think you are expecting too much form a mount that is really at the bottom of the imaging mounts

Hi thsts simply not true I own a eq5pro and use it unguided for the last 3 years to start with you must marl with a felt tip the home position to get the home position perfect park the scope and use a small spirt level on the Dec axis to get it perfectly level once level tighten up the Dec thumb lock an mark the top of the Dec axis mount in a line into the mount itself so when the Dec moves it separates the line then do the same on the RA axis. 

Now you have your home marked and always a reference point when starting up the mount .

Then make sure the mount leg with n on it is north  and use an app called synscan init to get the data and the position of polaris and set into the polar scope. 

Then set your alignment when it skews to the first star don't use the keys to center it but loosen the Dec and set the star center on the Dec axis then the ra axis by loosening the ra screw .

Second star use the keypad third star use the key pad  to center .

It will now be aligned .

Each time you are using the keypad to center the alignment star always finish the the up button and then rhe right button.

The lines you mark on the mount will always allow you to set from exactly the same point .

Regards 

[malc-c]

25 minutes ago, Hendrik - Nordic Light said:

Thanks Main Sequence.  Tuned...you mean Rowan Belt Mod?  I am testing to see how far I can push this mount.  Once I know its limits I know the boundaries of which I can operate in.  I want to make sure I do not solely rely on technology and software 🙂 it is always good to be able to understand the basics, so all there after will be bonus! 

 

LOL - our usernames are shown in the grey bar - the main sequence / vacuum etc are just member status based on post count  - my user name is malc-c 

No tuning isn't just adding the rowan belt mod.  If you click that link I provided it takes you to a website where the strip and replace bearings, fit the rowan belt mod and then tune the tolerances so fine the backlash is as minimal as you'll get.  The belt mod does indeed help as it removes one component of the backlash harmonic.

You could spend £500 having the mount tuned, or a £200 for a guidescope to get decent / perfect tracking...

[malc-c]

4 minutes ago, barrie greenwood said:

Hi thsts simply not true I own a eq5pro and use it unguided for the last 3 years

Are you imaging or visual observing??

The stock EQ5 has less resolution in its gearing and steppers than the HEQ5, so would have thought that for long exposure imaging tracking errors would be more noticeable.  But you are right in that precise polar alignment helps to reduce tracking errors as does resolving cone error