How to Polar Align Your EQ (Equatorial) Telescope Mount

[Music] hello i'm brian with mead instruments and we're going to show you how to polar align your german equatorial mount this is an essential part of the telescope setup and how to polar align your mount is one of the more common questions we get at mead i'm going to be demonstrating polar alignment on this lx85 mount but most of what i show you will also be applicable to just about any other german equatorial or we'll simply call eq mount for short please note this content is going to focus on use in the northern hemisphere polar lining in the southern hemisphere is a little trickier because there isn't an easy reference point to the celestial pole as we have in the northern hemisphere using the star polaris which i'll talk more about later instead the observer in the southern hemisphere would use a small group of stars located near the celestial pole and use that as their reference point when using a german equatorial mount in the northern hemisphere polar alignment is a necessary step to allow your mount to track accurately and if you're going to take astrophotos of deep sky objects then it's even more important that you achieve an accurate polar alignment for planetary solar or lunar photography and accurate polar alignment is not as critical although it will make processing your images a lot easier later so let's get started first please note that at least for the rough polar alignment this is a separate alignment from your computerized go to alignment and i know that can be a little confusing but to simplify this we're going to start with just having the mount switched off so we're not going to be using the electronics at all to get started first we want to locate true north the compass on your phone can get you started and most phones with their default settings it will account for the magnetic offset you can also use a standard compass just make sure that you do account for that magnetic offset and when using a compass you know steer clear of any large metal objects or electronics as it can throw off the reading it's generally pretty good to get you a good start and we can do this during the day and when you have identified north and where north is at least pretty close you're going to position the tripod of your mount so that the north tripod is pointing north now you can do this before you add the weight of your mount and telescope in this case i'm able to kind of get away with that because i'm not using a very large telescope but with like an lx85 here if i found north i'm just going to position the tripod so that i'm roughly pointing north now that we're roughly pointing at true north we want to set the latitude angle of the mount and we're going to be paying attention to this scale here that's shown from 0 to 90. to make the adjustments on the lx85 you have two bolts there's the front i'll call the front or north facing bolt loosen that it's not load bearing it's really just a retaining bolt but you want to loosen it to allow room for adjustment and your actual latitude angle is adjusted back here by turning it clockwise to elevate the mount or counterclockwise to lower them out now to find your latitude that's pretty easy too just using your phone most all phones have a good gps on them that'll be more than accurate enough you can also if you're near a major city you could just google the latitude for your city or nearby you don't have to make this an exact science just yet we want to be you know within about a degree of what our latitude is in this case i'm very close to 35 degrees north so i will make the adjustment so that our index mark is at 35. and we will lightly tighten the retaining bolt for now but we might need to loosen that later as we make fine adjustments now believe it or not you are roughly polar aligned at this point you are pointing close to true north we've set our latitude this is enough to do some quick observation of the moon the planets if you're just going to be observing for a few minutes but we do want to be a little bit more accurate than this especially if we're going to do some astrophotography so now we can wait for it to get dark and take our next step into getting an accurate polar alignment so now it's dark and we have a rough polar alignment from earlier today now we're ready to dial it in and get an accurate polar alignment under the night sky now even the most advanced telescope users will debate over which is the best method or which is the preferred method to accomplish a good polar alignment i'm going to show you three of the many ways that you can polar align your telescope i'm going to show you three easy straightforward ways to dial in your mount and be ready to start tracking for long periods of time or even track for taking long exposure astrophotos method one we're just going to use the telescope the finder scope and the eyepiece which all telescopes should be equipped with and of course the mount start by positioning the mount in the home position as i've done here we're doing this manually we still haven't turned the telescope on but home position counter weight shaft should be pointing downward the optical tube is pointing north this happens to be declination at 90 degrees but you don't really have to worry about that just set your optical tube so it's pointing forward and in line with the right ascension axis as i've done here this is your home position the lx85 has index marks to help you locate the home position but it's really to guide you so that you can be in this position before you begin your alignment we're going to use the most convenient reference point that we have in the northern hemisphere that is the north star also called polaris polaris happens to be less than a degree from the north celestial pole so it's a fantastic reference point for polar aligning your telescope so with my finder scope should be already aligned with my optical tube you know you should have your telescope set up as you normally would with your finder scope aligned and your eyepieces everything ready to go so if i'm looking at the sky right now i can see polaris if i look through the finder scope i should see polaris hopefully somewhere in the finder now if you don't see polaris in your finder scope that means your daytime alignment wasn't quite accurate enough to to be in the field of view and that's okay have a look at the sky identify polaris which is not the brightest star in the sky but it is the brightest star in ursa minor or the little dipper polaris is at the end of the handle of the little dipper and is the brightest star in that constellation and so identify polaris in the night sky the adjustments that we make are going to be moving the azimuth left and right and the altitude up and down to the mount we are not going to adjust the right ascension which i'm doing here to show you or the declination we do not want to move that from the home position so during this process you will keep ra and deck locked down i've only unlocked it just now to show you but keep ra and deck locked down any movement we make is either going to be by physically moving the whole tripod left and right for making gross adjustments or by making fine left right adjustments or azimuth adjustments with these knobs here or the altitude adjustments also the latitude which i showed you previously so we're only going to be moving these knobs these knobs or gross movements moving the whole tripod so i'm looking at the sky i'm looking for polaris and let's say i'm only off by a couple degrees i can see it it's not in my finder i'm going to make a little azimuth adjustment usually when we miss our daytime puller alignment it's usually our left right alignment usually the up down which is our latitude is correct because we just set it to our latitude and it should pretty much be pointing at the altitude of polaris in the sky so i can make azimuth adjustments with these knobs here and if i look through the finder get it centered left and right make a small adjustment to [Music] my altitude and center polaris in your finder at that point you would make the progression to center polaris in the eyepiece again you're not moving ra or deck your telescope's still off you're doing this offline this is a manual adjustment here center polaris in the eyepiece with polaris centered in the eyepiece we are now less than one degree from being perfectly polar aligned at this stage our polar alignment is good enough to proceed to do a go-to alignment with your audio star handbox you can track objects across the night sky for the duration of the night without having to make very many adjustments at all to keep those objects centered you can also start taking some astrophotos short exposure astrophotos lunar imaging planetary imaging even some short exposure deep sky objects can be accomplished at this level of polar alignment so depending on what your goals are this works in many cases especially if you're going to set up for a quick observing session you really don't need to be more polar line than this because you don't want to spend more time aligning your scope as than you would just simply making an observation but if you're going to take longer exposure astrophotos or you want to prevent your object from drifting out of the field of view over a prolonged period of time you do need to get a little bit more dialed in than this method two uses an optional accessory a polar axis finder i'm a big advocate of a polar axis finder because similar to method one even though it is an additional accessory it doesn't require anything else to to work for you you don't need any an app or a battery or it doesn't have it doesn't interact with your go-to system it's done entirely offline it's simply a low power optical finder that helps you cite polaris it threads into the threaded opening on your right ascension axis there is a polar axis finder scope available for the lx85 and even though it is just a little finder it has a transparency map in that finder scope that shows you where to position polaris in relation to the north celestial pole and it references the big dipper as i mentioned or some major it also shows the relative position of cassiopeia so if you can see either the big dipper ursa major or cassiopeia in the night sky you can adjust your telescope in relation to those constellations to offset polaris and that is actually quite accurate a well aligned polar axis finder can get you very nicely polar aligned and it is a method that i quite like because of the reasons mentioned not needing too much else to get you that that good result my lx85 and all equatorial mounted mead telescopes equipped with the audio star or the autostar 2 handbox can achieve a more precise polar alignment power on your telescope enter the date time and location information and align as you normally would using an easy one two or three star alignment method in this example we are using a one star line which uses the star polaris and this is the preferred method to get a good polar alignment adjust the mount's latitude and azimuth knobs to center polaris and the eyepiece when polaris is centered press enter and the telescope will move to an alignment star if the alignment star is not visible in your sky press the scroll down arrow key on your hand box to select another alignment star if alignment is not successful double check your alignment star and if necessary check your date time and location information and try again your telescope alignment is now complete your eq mount is polar aligned and you're ready to start your observing or photography session you

Channel: meadeinstruments

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Keywords: Meade, Meade Instruments, Meade Telescope, LX85 Telescope, Telescope Tutorial, Telescope How To, Celestron, Sky-Watcher, Orion, Astrophotography, Polar Align, William Optics, German Equatorial Mount, Telescope Photography, Astronomy, How To Polar Align, Telescope Mount

Id: _VSgnRoOgoQ

Length: 12min 54sec (774 seconds)

Published: Fri Jul 10 2020