Somewhere around here I have a home-made borescope for my old Jaegers equatorial, it works on the same principle as the Tuthill scope and I made it for about two dollars. I must agree with Patrick, a borescope is the fastest way to achieve precise polar alignment, but a true borescope does require that you can either remove your polar shaft (as in my Jaegers mount), or have a hollow polar shaft and on many modern designs. I think the Tuthil scope just used V-grooves for German equatorials, and mounted on the shaft housing, not sure how it worked on fork-mounted SCT's... Patrick wrote:
There is one other option that I've had good luck with, namely a nifty device called a Tuthill Precision Polar Alignment Scope.
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Chuck Hards wrote:
I think the Tuthil scope just used V-grooves for German equatorials, and mounted on the shaft housing, not sure how it worked on fork-mounted SCT's...
Nothing better to do tonight since it's clouded over AGAIN, so I set up my C-5 with the Tuthill polar finder and shot a couple of pictures to show how it's mounted on a fork mounted SCT. http://www.trilobyte.net/paw/temp/TEMP013.JPG The image on the left shows a dial on the back of the mounting plate. To use the finder you first consult a chart and, based on the current date and time, turn the polar finder until the indicator arrow points to the correct setting for that date and time. Then you adjust the wedge in altitude and azimuth until Polaris is centered on the cross hairs in the polar finder. The polar finder and its mounting plate are then either removed or left in place for the night. Quick, easy and accurate. Patrick
participants (2)
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Chuck Hards -
Patrick Wiggins