Townsville Astronomy Group

Hi Vin,

Thanks for the great tutorial mate. We were using a lump of wood with a fluorescent line up the middle that we could light up with a UV torch, same with the compass. Just a quick hit with the UV torch and away we went. The other refinements however, are very well received and will be implimented forthwith.

We are just about growing gills here (Townsville) at present but should get a chance at a wee bit of viewing soon.

Thanks again mate!

Lex, Barb & Sue.

Yeah no worries

Its a little game I've played at a lot of star parties: see who can polar align the quickest, then check the accuracy maybe half an hour or an hour later. I haven't lost one yet....some set up quicker but are hopelessly inadequate. Many are still tinkering with PA half an hour after I have finished. It really does only take about 3 or 4 minutes with the right technique.

Man it is pelting rain here at Latitude 23.5°, about 100mm in the last 24 hours. Haven't had a scope out since December 15th. Been raining or clouded solid since then.

I have a lot of archived material here that I need to sort through/edit/update for my own site, and plenty of time on my hands, so anything else that looks potentially useful will be forwarded on to you blokes

Vin

If you’re like most new amateur astronomers, the first thing you probably do when you get your new telescope properly assembled is put in an eyepiece and point it up to look at the moon. Just the excitement of seeing the lunar landscape up close is enough to keep you entertained for days. But eventually, as you progress to finding more difficult objects, such as planets and faint deep-sky objects, you will want to utilize all the features of your equatorial mount, such as the setting circles or perhaps even a motor drive. A mount is said to be "equatorial" if one of its two axes can be made parallel with the Earth’s axis of rotation. Aligning the telescope to the Earth's axis can be a simple or rather involved procedure depending on the level of precision needed for what you want to do. For casual observing, only a rough polar alignment is needed. Better alignment is needed for tracking objects across the sky (either manually or with a motor drive) at high magnifications. Still greater precision is needed in order to use setting circles to locate those hard-to-find objects. Finally, astrophotography will require the most accurate polar alignment of all.