Got my scope a few days ago, but tonight was the first I got to look thru
it. WOW- what a difference! Going from an 8" LX50 to this- I just am not
used to using the slew for everything. I'm so used to unlocking the dec and
ra locks and manually moving the scope to wherever I wanted to go. I was
also a little at a loss when I did the polar alignment. First off, it tells
you to set the scope at 90 deg and 0.0, which I did. Then it slews to where
it thinks polaris should be, and tells you to center it. - at this point,
do I slew with the controls, or should I be centering the star with the
wedge latitude adjustments, and azimuth controls? If I start messing with
the slew, moving left-right doesn't do much at all (obviously), but if it is
centered, when it goes to the second star, which most of the time I can't
find, it's WAY off, and I have to use the setting circles on the scope to
actually find the star using the coordinates in the book.

I did a manual drift alignment, so I know I'm good with my alignment (wow,
the superwedge makes such a difference!), but the scope's alignment routine
is always off.

After doing this, if I punch in M57, it will slew to somewhere around M57,
then I center it, hold down enter, and it updates. Then when I enter M27,
it goes to it, but the nebula is not centered in a 42mm plossl. So, I
center it, and hold enter to update. Then I enter M31, and it doesn't even
make it into the eyepiece, so I slew to it, hold down enter, it updates.
Then I go back to M57, and it's there ok, but go somewhere else, and it's
off. Weird. Is this how it's supposed to be? I thought this thing has the
precision to be able to center an object on a CCD chip.

Unfortunately, I've had rain for the past few days, including today- heavy
rain, but the sky cleared up this evening. But with all the humidity, the
sky is a bit hazy. I'm lucky to have had this good a sky, considering what
the weather has been like. I can't wait for a crystal clear sky!

Now my next challenge train PEC, then hook up the ST4 and Lumicon GEG! Once
I get that worked out, I can start snapping pictures.

Well, it's now 1:52am, and I have to get some sleep before work in a few
hours.

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