Tried it out in anger last night (17/12/15) – yes I actually got a clear night!
After installing the drivers and running the software it found the camera first time and pulled up an image. Quite faint at first but fiddling with the exposure and gain soon got enough stars.
The software takes you through a sequential series of steps leading you to very accurate polar alignment. Basically it works by presenting you with a template of some of the brighter stars near Polaris. You overlay this on top of the camera image until they line up. You are then invited to rotate the scope a little a couple of times and from this the software calculates the true centre of rotation of your mount. A few more simple steps and you’re presented with two dots showing where your mount is pointing and where the true celestial pole is. All you have to do now is physically move your mount so the two dots line up. It doesn’t matter if the mount isn’t level and I managed to get away with using the adjustable feet on the tripod rather than loosening the azimuth and altitude bolts. The software is very clever!
So with all that done I chose Capella as my first alignment start and it dropped it straight in the field of view of my 26mm eyepiece. I have never had that happen before. Subsequent GOTOs were a joy and a little bit of syncing soon got objects dropping straight in the centre. (I think my setup has a bit of cone error which I haven’t wrung out yet).
The software is robust and well thought out, I reckon that next time it will only take about 5 minutes to do a good polar align and no cricked back or wet knees!
I’m very impressed with this piece of kit. Once you understand how it works it’s elegantly simple and saves an awful lot of setup time. Thanks QHY for dreaming up a new radical way of doing polar alignment and making my life a lot easier.
Rated 5 out of 5
Paul Scammell (verified owner)–
WOW….
Got polar aligned in about 4 mins on my second try more accurately than I have ever managed before and I didn’t get on my knees once.
English Translation need’s a little TLC which I have requested on the QHY Forum but the procedure is so simple, as Tony has pointed out in his review.
Get Polaris in the centre of view using ALT/AZ bolts, double click Polaris on screen, Template comes up for surrounding stars, move using a slider on screen to line the template dots with surrounding stars around Polaris which is smack on. Rotate RA a bit (I rotated about 30-40deg), Click Confirm, Rotate RA one more time and confirm again. Software then calculates NCP position and shows it on screen, A few simple steps later brings you close to polar alignment and lastly, a final step to get a precise alignment simply by adjusting your Altitude and Azimuth bolts to bring a green and red circle together in a magnified window and your done. Using PHD2’s Guiding Assistant reported a Polar alignment error of 0.3 arc/min.
Very Impressed and worth every penny…..Get One Now !
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A desiccant tube for cooled QHY cameras with M5 tapping. Use with our Orange desiccant beads so you can tell when the desiccant needs to be regenerated. One tube is supplied.
Connects the Auto Guide port of your mount to the ST4 port of your guide camera.
When used with suitable software this prevent trailing of the object during long-exposures.
All Sky Lens for QHY5L-II Cameras1 × £79.00
Tony Doubtfire –
Tried it out in anger last night (17/12/15) – yes I actually got a clear night!
After installing the drivers and running the software it found the camera first time and pulled up an image. Quite faint at first but fiddling with the exposure and gain soon got enough stars.
The software takes you through a sequential series of steps leading you to very accurate polar alignment. Basically it works by presenting you with a template of some of the brighter stars near Polaris. You overlay this on top of the camera image until they line up. You are then invited to rotate the scope a little a couple of times and from this the software calculates the true centre of rotation of your mount. A few more simple steps and you’re presented with two dots showing where your mount is pointing and where the true celestial pole is. All you have to do now is physically move your mount so the two dots line up. It doesn’t matter if the mount isn’t level and I managed to get away with using the adjustable feet on the tripod rather than loosening the azimuth and altitude bolts. The software is very clever!
So with all that done I chose Capella as my first alignment start and it dropped it straight in the field of view of my 26mm eyepiece. I have never had that happen before. Subsequent GOTOs were a joy and a little bit of syncing soon got objects dropping straight in the centre. (I think my setup has a bit of cone error which I haven’t wrung out yet).
The software is robust and well thought out, I reckon that next time it will only take about 5 minutes to do a good polar align and no cricked back or wet knees!
I’m very impressed with this piece of kit. Once you understand how it works it’s elegantly simple and saves an awful lot of setup time. Thanks QHY for dreaming up a new radical way of doing polar alignment and making my life a lot easier.
Paul Scammell (verified owner) –
WOW….
Got polar aligned in about 4 mins on my second try more accurately than I have ever managed before and I didn’t get on my knees once.
English Translation need’s a little TLC which I have requested on the QHY Forum but the procedure is so simple, as Tony has pointed out in his review.
Get Polaris in the centre of view using ALT/AZ bolts, double click Polaris on screen, Template comes up for surrounding stars, move using a slider on screen to line the template dots with surrounding stars around Polaris which is smack on. Rotate RA a bit (I rotated about 30-40deg), Click Confirm, Rotate RA one more time and confirm again. Software then calculates NCP position and shows it on screen, A few simple steps later brings you close to polar alignment and lastly, a final step to get a precise alignment simply by adjusting your Altitude and Azimuth bolts to bring a green and red circle together in a magnified window and your done. Using PHD2’s Guiding Assistant reported a Polar alignment error of 0.3 arc/min.
Very Impressed and worth every penny…..Get One Now !