The New Telescope - The Good, The Bad, and the Depressing

As my last post described, I had a few issues setting the scope up for the first time. I was excited, and rushed a few things, and so the results were less than "stellar" (har har). My second and third attempts were also disappointing, and the following details the trials of getting this scope back to tip-top shape.

Part 1: Nags Head Glitch
My family spent a week in Nags Head, NC over the week of July 4th. Being a fairly dark observing site, I brought the scope along to show my family - some of whom are also into astronomy - some of the sights. I had purchased a new battery pack for powering the scope, and was anxious to try that out as well. Luckily, it came charged from the factory - nice :)

I placed the scope on the concrete pool deck in the back of the house, and the sky was perfectly dark and clear. An amazing night to observe. I set about aligning the scope, and it was very easy this time around (read the manual, Todd, it helps). I slewed the scope to M4, a globular cluster in Scorpius. Gorgeous. So much more detail than the smaller reflector I had been using. My brother had trouble seeing it (I guess his eyes aren't that good?) so I decided to move to Jupiter, which had just risen in the south. And then it happened...the scope went NUTS. It began spinning freely on the alt axis, and the hand controller said "No Connection - Error 17". I tried restarting the scope, and then another alignment. This time, even that didn't work, and the scope went haywire again.

Thinking it was the battery, I decided to wait until the next clear night and drag a long extension cord out to the pool deck. I didn't get another chance for several days, due to clouds.

Part 2: Total Failure
Same setup as before, but the sky wasn't as nice. There was a bit of haze due to some swamp fires in the area, but it was still clear enough to try the scope again. I used the extension cord and the AC adapter, hoping for better results. No dice. In all attempts, the scope kept losing connection to the motor, and the error never went away. Thoroughly depressed, I packed the scope up for the remainder of the vacation and decided to hit the message boards for help. I also put in a trouble ticket with Celestron, hoping they could help.

Turns out this is a fairly common issue, but is usually caused by a bad connection between the hand controller and the mount. I read a LOT of helpful information on Cloudy Nights (thanks guys!) and was directed to view the Nexstar website (www.nexstarsite.com).

Part 3: MacGuyver at Work
After trying the hand control in the AUX port of the mount (rather than the typical hand controller port), I still had errors. I was not sure what the next steps would be, since I had done nearly everything recommended by the boards and the Nexstar site. I even updated the hand controller and motor control firmware (via an old Windows 98 laptop that I had in storage, gathering dust - come on, make a Mac version!!!). The only other thing to do, before sending it in to Celestron, was to take the entire mount apart. So I did :)

To be honest, there are not a lot of parts to this mount. I removed the OTA tube from the mount, then removed a few screws on the inside face. I then removed a few more under the battery door, pulled off all of the plastic casing, and the innards were exposed. Just a bunch of ribbon cables and 2 tiny circuit boards, stacked on top of one another. And then I saw it - a connector on the bottom board was slightly loose, and it felt wobbly when I tried to reseat it. I plugged the scope in, powered it up, and went through the actions of aligning it to the moon (totally fake, as this was indoors - I just wanted to give it a place to start from, to give it a realistic test). Trying to slew to M4 caused the error again, until I touched the loose connector, after which it worked perfectly. Voila! I tested this over and over, and this was definitely the issue. I reseated the connector and went about putting the plastic casing back on. It wasn't easy - nor was it easy to remove. I should have come right off, and gone right back on, but it was stuck. I then realized that the board assembly was crooked - and that this was the reason the connector was coming loose. I bent the boards forward a bit, and the cover went right on. I tested the scope again, and all went well. Finally :)

Part 4: An Actual Observing Night
With the scope back together, I marched it out to the driveway for a real test. It aligned perfectly using an auto 2-star method, and hit M13 dead on. Amazing!!! Everyone at my house was in bed, and I wanted to wake them up to see M13 - a true dazzler of a star cluster, and this view was nothing like my old scope. This was in my light polluted driveway as well! Then I slewed to M57, the Ring Nebula. Dead center in the eyepiece, and brighter than I had expected. I spent the next hour slewing all over the place - to asterisms like the mini coathanger, double stars in Lyra, more clusters like M3 - what a night. Dew prevented me from staying out past midnight (which was probably a good thing!), so I packed it in. I could barely get to sleep afterwards, as it had been SO nice to finally have the scope working.

The next star party at the Mingo observatory is July 25, with another on July 26. I can't wait to use the scope in darker skies with better views (my driveway is blocked by trees in many directions).

Thanks again to everyone that helped me with ideas, links, and good wishes!