auto guiding with a CG5GT

[gary1968]

A quick question, for astro imaging with an unguided mount accurate polar alignment is required to achieve good long exposure images.

I intend to get a guider asap, possably a qhy5, and I got to wondering, if the mount is guided does that lessen the requirement for accurate polar alignment any or it alignment just as important when guiding?

Cheers,

Gary

[steve51450]

hi gary

good polar align is always a good thing even when auto-guiding, as it means your mount corrections will need to be much smaller so your error spikes in ra & dec will be smoother as the auto guider is not having to work so hard to correct periodic error as well as bad polar alignment

thats my take on it anyway............but i may be wrong

[steppenwolf]

Polar alignment remains just as important - although corrections in RA andDEC will keep an object centred in the FOV if the polar alignment is poor, the images will suffer from a certain amount of 'field rotation' which will manifest itself as trailing stars especially at the perimeter of the FOV.

[gary1968]

Thanks for that guys, note to memory......... 'I must Improve My Polar Alignment Routine' :-D

Is anyone here using the new v4.15 software on the CG5GT Mount? It is supposed to have a new / better polar alignment routine.

Gary

[Whippy]

Gary, have you thought about using WCS for your polar alignment? I've been using it for a while and it's not bad at all.

Tony..

[gary1968]

Hi Tony,

I do have WCS, never got round to trying it yet, mainly due to lazyness...... lol

Its the webcam version and I still have a neximage so should work with that.

Will give it a go next time,

Cheers,

Gary