SYNSCAN Alignment star list

[gary1968]

Yup, EQMod is the way to go. I have only aligned my HEQ5 twice with the hand set and never had an issue, must have been lucky I guess. EQMod allows point and click from the lappy screen, soooo much easier.

But as I intend to use the hand set when I go to the dark sky site I use locally I will be watching this thread with interest.

Cheers,

Gary

[Deneb]

I just use the Handset, never had a problem with it, your just limited upto a 3 star alignment.

Nadeem.

[Psychobilly]

If I get a chance I'll start on producing PDF star charts later today...

Depends what comes up really...

Peter...

[Mr Spock]

I have a problem with three star alignment because of the house and a neighbour's tree. The handset doesn't give me enough choices; I find at least one of the lists is completely unavailable. It takes a while to juggle the first star choice to get three targets.

atm, Capella is behind the tree, Arcturus, Vega and Deneb are behind the house. Procyon is too low. Regulus and Spica are there, but not much else...

It would be much easier if I could give it my own selection.

[Deneb]

Some people are really busy aren't they

Nadeem.

[Deneb]

I have a problem with three star alignment because of the house and a neighbour's tree. The handset doesn't give me enough choices; I find at least one of the lists is completely unavailable. It takes a while to juggle the first star choice to get three targets.

atm, Capella is behind the tree, Arcturus, Vega and Deneb are behind the house. Procyon is too low. Regulus and Spica are there, but not much else...

It would be much easier if I could give it my own selection.

Maybe a eqmod might be better for you then, as you can select your own alignment stars.

Nadeem..

[Psychobilly]

Some people are really busy aren't they

Nadeem.

Waiting for "components" to arrive to finish next months build so ahead of the game and I might as well do something constructive

Peter...

[NickH]

.... unless you are in the field with no laptop (or equiv.)

Netbook costs less than the synscan handbox (laptops direct), and will run for up to 10 hours on the larger battery packs, but yes, I agree the point

[Psychobilly]

Would Polar North and South and Equatorial charts from 0,90,180 and -90 be ok for starters?

Peter...

[Psychobilly]

A Work in Progress

Lists...

http://www.graigolaobservatory.org.uk/Synscan%20Charts/Synscan%20Alignment%20Stars%20-%20by%20Common%20Name.pdf

http://www.graigolaobservatory.org.uk/Synscan%20Charts/Synscan%20Alignment%20Stars%20-%20by%20Constellation.pdf

Constellation Charts

http://www.graigolaobservatory.org.uk/Synscan%20Charts/Synscan%20Alignment%20Startcharts%20A-C.pdf

http://www.graigolaobservatory.org.uk/Synscan%20Charts/Synscan%20Alignment%20Startcharts%20D-L.pdf

http://www.graigolaobservatory.org.uk/Synscan%20Charts/Synscan%20Alignment%20Startcharts%20M-Z.pdf

Quite a bit more to do yet...

Peter...

[michaelmorris]

Hi Peter

Thanks Peter, these are brilliant.

However, the link to the D-L maps seems to be broken.

Regards

[philming]

Hi all !

I'm digging up the thread. 

These long exhaustive lists dont come near what I got as alignment stars suggested when i do a 1 or 3 stars alignment procedure. These are the lists existing in the catalog, but not the one that are suggested to make the alignment ? Or is there a way to unlock those as alignment stars ?

i.e. I am doing a simple one star alignment when shooting an abject. I choose as alignment star a star sually as close as possible to the shot object.

So i.e. if I want to shoot M20, I would tend to choose Kause borealis as an alignment star. But it's just not available... So how do I do ?

[ronin]

I think that somewhere about 4 years ago this post got mixed up and changed from alignment stars to the list of named stars.

Say this as an alignment star shoud really be significant and somewhat isolated, so that it is the one very obvious one in the field of view. This is ones like Arcturus, Albebaren, Sirius, Deneb would be anothers.

Stars like those listed in Ursa Minor would be too insignificant for alignment.

You might find that the alignment stars are in the named list but the data entry could have an "A" as part of the data field or they could simply be the first 20 in the named list. So if the offset from the address of the list is >20 then it is not an alignment star.

You seemed to be assuming an Alignment Star List and a seperate Named Star List. To save space they will most likely combine the 2 lists somehow.

OK, I may be wrong, found this: SynScan Alignment

What this one does is list the stars by a couple of naming conventions but also gives the best month to use it, I suppose that being told Rigel in June is a bit pointless as it is below the horizon, and Deneb (one I mentioned earlier) disappears later in the year. So there would seem to be a need for a good number as the time of year is relevant.

Open the pdf up to about 150% and it is a good sky chart.

Will still say I find it odd tht so many are considered Alignment Stars.

Alphard in Hydra is really dim, the ones in Draco are also notoriously dim and difficult to see.

Very puzzled owing to this.

Edited July 21, 2014 by ronin

[Coastliner]

I haven't tried alignment yet, but am I right in thinking that for, say, a two-star alignment the handset chooses the pair? If so, would it be useful to have a list of pairings as well as lists of the stars? That way we could do some preparation and see what pairs are likely to be visible before we venture out.

Many thanks for all the work guys, I now have many pages of laminations!

Neil.

[HollyhockLambda]

I prefer to use Celestron's GOTO mount manual. It includes star charts of alignment stars.

The chart is very simple and mapped like a planisphere which is easy to recognize star positions.

I downloaded the manual, then captured images were cropped, negative-inverted, and sent to cell-phone. useful.

(https://www.celestron.com/pages/manuals  , ex. CGEM mout maual has the carts)

[Dave2001]

Thank you, thank you, thank you to all the above who provided lists and charts. These are helping me tremendously in getting to grips with the regular alignment my new EQ8 setup.  

[teleskopjo]

Can these files in the post above be reuploaded please?