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page 41
Using Setting Circles
The setting circles of the Polar aligned equatorial mount can be used to locate faint
celestial objects not easily found by direct visual observation. To use the setting cir-
cles, follow this procedure:
• Use a star chart or star atlas, and look up the celestial coordinates, Right
Ascension and Declination (R.A. and Dec), of an easy-to-find bright star that is
within the general vicinity of the faint object you wish to locate.
• Center the determined bright star in the telescope’s field of view.
• Manually turn the R.A. setting circle (15, Fig. 2a) to read the R.A. of the object now
in the telescope’s eyepiece.
• The setting circles are now calibrated (the Dec setting circle (9, Fig. 2a) is factory
calibrated). To locate a nearby faint object using the setting circles, determine the
faint object’s celestial coordinates from a star chart and move the telescope in
R.A. and Dec until the setting circles read the R.A. and Dec of the object you are
attempting to locate. If the above procedure has been carefully performed, the
faint object will now be in the field of a low power eyepiece.
• The R.A. setting circle must be manually re-calibrated on the current R. A. of a star
every time the telescope is set up, and reset to the centered object’s R.A.
coordinate before moving to a new R.A. coordinate setting. The R.A. setting circle
has two sets of numbers. The inner set is for Southern hemisphere use while the
outer set (the set closest to the R.A. gear) is for use by observers located North
of the Earth’s equator (e.g., in North America and Europe).
Two-Star Polar Alignment
Besides One-Star Polar Alignment which was covered earlier in this manual (see
"ALIGNING YOUR TELESCOPE USING STARFINDER," page 20), another type of
alignment, Two-Star Polar Alignment, is also available.
Two-Star Polar Alignment requires some knowledge of the night sky. Starfinder pro-
vides a database of bright stars and two stars from this database are chosen by the
observer for alignment. The rest of the alignment procedure is identical to One-Star
Polar Alignment.
1. Perform steps 1 through 4 as described in the "ALIGN YOUR TELESCOPE
USING STARFINDER," page 20.
2 . Starfinder displays a database of stars for the observer to choose from. Use the
Scroll keys to scroll to a star that you wish to align upon. Select a star that you can
easily locate in the night sky.
3. Press ENTER. The telescope slews to the star for alignment. Use the Arrow keys
to move the telescope until the star is visible and centered in the eyepiece.
4. Press ENTER. Repeat the procedure for the second alignment star. The telescope
is aligned and you are now ready to use Starfinder's GO TO capabilities for a night
of observing.