Meade Tripod LX600-ACF 14 inch User Manual - Page 43

Advanced AutoStar II Features Polar Drift Alignment (Northern Hemisphere) The LX600 with StarLock is specially equipped to perform an Automatic Drift Alignment. In the Autostar Setup menu, select "Drift Align" and the LX600 will guide you through a quick Automatic drift alignment procedure. This method is substantially quicker than the manual drift alignment method. During the Automatic Drift Alignment Procedure, LX600 will slew to a Southern star and Starlock will begin monitoring the stars' drift on its CCD chip. Autostar will then let the user know how many turns of the mounts' Azimuth Adjustment knob to make to improve the mounts' polar alignment. Next, the LX600 will slew to an Eastern star and StarLock will monitor its drift on its CCD chip. Again, the StarLock will suggest to the user the appropriate number of turns, this time using the mounts Latitude Adjustment knob, to achieve the optimal polar alignment. However, if you prefer to drift align the mount using the manual drift alignment procedure, see Appendix H. StarLock Automatic Rate Calibration (ARC) Obtaining best performance from StarLocked telescopes requires that the guiding aggressiveness be optimally set for current viewing/imaging conditions. This is an essential procedure to obtain peak tracking accuracy Please refer to Appendix C, page 54 for details. Periodic Error Correction (PEC Training) Training the mount using AutoStar's built-in Periodic Error Correction is necessary to achieve peak performance of the LX600 Telescope System. This is especially true when you are taking long exposure photography. Periodic Error Correction should be done after you have fully assembled your mount, balanced with all the auxiliary equipment you plan on using and you have successfully aligned the telescope. It is also important that this performed under reasonably dark skies with good seeing conditions. If atmospheric conditions are poor you will not obtain accurate error correction. See page below for directions on how to perform the Periodic Error Correction routine. Starlock Assisted PEC Training Periodic Error Correction (PEC) helps to remove the slight perturbations in tracking that occur due to the mechanical nature of a telescope. Follow the steps below to perform this procedure using StarLock: 1. Point the telescope's OTA at a moderately bright star near 0 declination (celestial equator). 2. Wait for the StarLock indicator lamp to stop blinking and become solid red, which indicates that it has located and locked onto the guide star. 3. Using your AutoStar handbox, navigate to the "Setup: Telescope" menu. Press ENTER. 4. Scroll through the options until "Telescope: RA PEC" displays. Press ENTER. 5. Scroll through the options until "RA PEC: Train" displays. Press ENTER. Training begins. 6. Scroll through the options until "RA PEC: Update" displays. Press ENTER. Update training begins. 7. Repeat step 6 one more time to improve the PEC training. Update Menu Option Use the Update option to further refine your training; it is recommended that you update your original training two or three times when first using your telescope. Update does not overwrite the data, but updates the training using information gathered from both the last and the current training sessions. Press the MODE key to exit from this option. If you wish to further refine your training, select this menu again and repeat the procedure. Erase Menu Option Select this option to erase all PEC training data. On and Off Menu Options Select "On" when you want the telescope to use the training information. Select "Off" when you do not want for the telescope to use the training information. Select "On" to enable the Smart Drive. 43