TELESCOPE HOW-TO

DRIFT ALIGNMENT METHODS

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Method#1

Again, I have updated and published this tutorial here in response to a

request.
I am referring throughout to the use of a German Equatorial Mount (GEM).
Also I will refer to South being 180 grid, but Northerners can use the
same technique, just substitute North 0.
You will need a magnetic compass, one that you can read down to 1
increments, a device for measuring angles, and a little basic handyman
skill but well get to that as we work through the technique.
Also you will need to determine the Latitude and Magnetic Declination of
your location. These can be found
here http://www.pangolin.co.nz/almanac/magvar.php, or also Latitude is
commonly shown on most road maps, and in Atlases.
Overview:
The term Polar Alignment refers to the alignment of the Right Ascension
axis of a mount so that it is parallel to Earths axis. This then enables the
mount to track stars by offsetting Earths rotation. For many in the
Northern Hemisphere this is usually achieved by aligning to the star
Polaris (with date and time offset) but in the Southern Hemisphere we
cant see Polaris, and the equivalent is the constellation Octans.
Unfortunately Octans is not easy to see and likely impossible from the
Light Polluted skies of our major cities, but you can still accurately Polar
Align without any stars at all. Heres one way.
Step 1
Find South by compass and lay the tripod so that the forward leg (usually
labeled N) is facing South. At this stage just standing back with the
compass and getting the tripod roughly in line is sufficient. Now level the
tripod head. Here I am using an old carpenters level that I cut down so
that it fits in my accessory case. Check level over three points.
Step 2
Heres the part where you need to make up a simple tool (or get someone
to make it for you). Here I have an aluminium bar screwed to the centre
of the tripod head, and centred over the Azimuth adjustment lug. Note it
has a scribed centre line and is about 600mm or 2ft long.
You dont need to be as fancy as this. A nice piece of timber or even a
two or three foot wooden ruler held in place with a weight will do the
trick. Just make sure that you dont use any ferrous metal, and the bar is
centralised to both the tripod head centre bolt and the Azimuth adjusting
lug.
Now you need to put a bit of good old boy scout skill to practice. Earths
magnetic field is variable and the compass does not indicate the true line
of North/South. Now you need to apply the Magnetic Declination for your
location that you looked up earlier. Mag Declination will be described as a
number of degrees either East or West. If it is East you need to subtract
that number from 180, if its West, add it to 180.
For example the magnetic Dec at my current location is 11 East and
therefore I set my compass to 169 which will therefore point me to true
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South. Simply move the tripod a little left or right until the compass is so
aligned.
Step 3
Fit the mount head ensuring that the azimuth adjusting screws as
indicated by the red arrow are centralised, and youre halfway there. The
mount is now reasonably parallel to Earths axis in one plane.
Step 4
All that remains is to either elevate or depress the mount head to your
Latitude. Note that there is likely a Latitude scale on the mount head for
this purpose but I am advising you to forget it. Very rarely have I seen a
mount that actually has an accurate latitude scale, in fact my EQ3 is out
by 3 and my EQ6 by 4
Following are three different was that you can easily set Latitude
accurately. The first is with a protractor and plumb line. I have fitted a
string that is too thick to be practical simply so that it shows up in the
photo. A 180 protractor is probably a better idea than the 360 version
shown.
The second is using and engineers protractor, which has a spirit level in it.
And the third is using a digital inclinometer. Note that it doesnt make any
difference whether you align from the mount head saddle or the
counterweight shaft.
Summary
Now your mount is polar aligned accurately enough for all night visual
observing sessions, although you may need to make a minor adjustment
in Dec occasionally. If you are using go to then now is the time to go
ahead and complete a three star alignment.
With a little practice youll find that you can align this way in only a few
minutes. If you always observe from the same place then all you need to
do to set up subsequently is mark the positions of the tripod legs on the
ground.
However if your goal is long exposure photography your initial Polar align
will not be accurate enough and you will need to proceed from here to
Drift Alignment.
Here are two excellent Drift Alignment tutorials.
http://wcs.ruthner.at/index-en.php
http://www.andysshotglass.com/DriftAlignment.html
http://nightskyinfocus.com/diyprojects/diy-autoguider-part-4-autoguidingand-polar-alignment/
http://wcs.ruthner.at/index-en.php

Method#2
Drift aligning an equatorial mount
Using Recticle Feature

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Polar aligning an equatorial mount for astrophotography purposes is not as

easy as just pointing the mount to Polaris and commencing an imaging
session. For astrophotography purposes good polar alignment is absolutely
necessary! The effects of bad polar alignment are field rotation and
images that seem to drift right out of the field of view of your cameras.
Both are very frustrating and very easy to experience if one hasn't spent
the time performing an adequate job of aligning the mount.
There are different ways of going about the alignment process, but my
favorite is the drift alignment method. I have found that after one gets the
hang of it, this method is extremely accurate and one can actually see
how well the mount is aligned in real time. Any and all errors are clearly
visible right on your computer screen. I perform drift alignment with my
CCD camera in prime focus, and use K3CCDTools3 and its reticule feature
for monitoring the drift of the mount.
I learned how to drift align my mount from a post by Charlie Hein in
the cloudynights forum. I could try to regurgitate what I read there, but I
rather quote his post in it's entirety as his explanation of drift alignment is
so spot on. Here it is:
Lawrie, drift alignment really isn't anywhere near as hard as it sounds
(although it does sound pretty daunting) - I avoided learning how to do it
for way too long myself for that very reason.
Understanding what you're trying to do is key. Hopefully, I can explain it in
a simple to understand way. In fact, I may over simplify for you just
because I don't have any idea what your experience level may be.
Because of this, please don't think I'm talking down to you if my
explanations seem too simplistic. I just want to make sure that I present
this in an easy to understand way. On the other hand, please feel free to
point out any portion of the following that you don't pick up on, and I will
do my very best to clarify it for you.
That said, let's get started. I'm not sure what kind of mount that you have,
but I'm going to step out and make a guess that you do not have a fork
mount on an equatorial wedge, but rather you have a GEM (like a CG5,
SkyViewPro, LXD-55 or 75, or a similar mount). If this isn't the case then
let me know, although it really does not change things too much.
It's important to note that while it's not exactly essential to do a rough
polar alignment on your mount, it will save you a *lot* of time in the
process, because the closer you are to being right on, the less you have to
move your mount around to get it right on. Just guessing about where
North is and how high Polaris is may put you farther out of alignment than
the mechanics of your mount can compensate for, which would force you
to physically move the mount in order to get it "in the zone".
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This would be very painful to discover 15 minutes or even longer into the
process, so I would *strongly* recommend that you at least level your
mount and sight Polaris through the polar scope (or the hole where one
would go) before getting started. It will save you a *lot* of time from here
on out!
Alignment Controls

If you can't see Polaris, then point the mount due North, and set your
latitude as closely as you can. This is far from being an accurate way to do
it, but it's better than just guessing. Also, try to make sure at this point
that your East - West (right-left) adjustment bolts (on either side of the
mount as opposed to the front and back of the mount, which adjust up and
down) are set so that there's plenty of travel in both directions - it would
be very painful to find out that you couldn't move the mount more in a
direction because you started out too far to one side or the other! I say
this because the farther you are out of perfect alignment, the more travel
you may need to get there, so it really pays to keep this in mind.
While we're talking about how you're setting up, let's also touch on where
you're setting up - you need to have a clear view straight over your head
and to the south (behind the mount), and you also need to have a view
either to the East or West that is as low to the horizon as you can get it for
the drift alignment to work.
Now, set up your camera in the telescope and get it focused. Start up
whatever program you have (you mentioned K3CCDtools so I will proceed
from the assumption that you have it), and bring up your preview window.
Find a star. Any star will do to get the camera focused, but at this point
you may as well choose the first star you will need for your drift alignment
- this is a time saver. Here's an easy way to figure out where in the sky this
star is.
First, move your mount so that the counterweights are parallel to the
ground, and your scope is facing straight up. This will put your scope on
the meridian (an imaginary line running from north to south straight over
your head).
Now, looking at the body of your mount, move the scope in DEC toward
the south (the rear of the mount) so that your scope and the mount look
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something like a "T" laying on its side (if you look at the scope and mount
from the side). This points your scope roughly at the celestial equator.
Take a look at this area of the sky and pick a star that is somewhere in this
general vicinity - it does not have to be exactly there, just in the
neighborhood. The important parts to consider is that you don't stray too
far from here, and that the star is easily visible on your preview screen.
Use this star to focus your camera - it doesn't necessarily have to be a
critical focus, but the sharper it is the better.
Now we need to line up the camera and figure out which direction the
image is oriented. Bring up the recticle display in K3. Now slew the
telescope so that the star moves in a left-right (or right-left) direction, and
note how well the star tracks the horizontal line of the recticle. You need to
rotate the camera in your focuser so that the star follows the horizontal
line of the recticle as closely as you can possibly get it. Be prepared to
spend some time learning how to do this step, but once you figure it out,
it'll take less and less time to accomplish.
Once the star tracks exactly with the horizontal line of the recticle then
your camera's orientation is set. Now you need to figure out which way
North, South, East and West are in your view. This is easy to do. To find
North-South, just lightly push on the South side of your scope (on the end
that the light is coming in) towards the North while watching the display.
Push just enough to be able to see the star move in your display. Your star
will appear to move to the South. Now you know the North-South axis. You
can use a similar routine for East-West - lightly pushing on the West side of
your scope towards the East makes the star appear to move West.
Whew! All that to get to here! Now we're ready to actually look at the EastWest drift of the mount. As counter-intuitive as this sounds, we look for
this East-West misalignment by watching for a North-South drift of the star
in our display. Slew the scope so that the star you've just used to focus
and orient your camera with is placed exactly on the line of the recticle
that runs East-West. Try to place it as exactly on the line as you can. We
want to bisect the star with this line (cut the star in half).
Now we watch for the star to drift off the East-West line in one direction or
the other, and we move the mount using the East-West (side to side)
adjustments to correct this drift. The rules for this are pretty simple at this
point:
Step 1 - Correcting East-West misalignment
If the star drifts South, the polar axis is pointing too far East.
If the star drifts North, the polar axis is pointing too far West.
Depending on how far out of perfect alignment you are, the star may start
to drift immediately. You can make adjustments as soon as you can
positively detect the direction it's drifting in, using the above rules. At first,
you will probably want to make a fairly large correction. Watch that you do
not lose your driftng star off the edge of the screen while making your
adjustments - if it looks like that is going to happen then center the star
and then continue to move the mount if you need to. As you get closer to
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nailing the alignment, make smaller and smaller moves. I find that
sometimes it's advisable to adjust past where you think the perfect point
is so that you get a sense of what you are accomplishing by moving the
scope. The bottom line here is that you are aiming for having the star stay
perfectly bisected by the East-West line of your recticle for a longer period
of time than you would want to expose for without guiding - a good time
frame is five minutes with no drift - the longer it can stay right on the line
the better your alignment is. I've had the star stay perfectly bisected for
over a half hour (I lose track of time chatting with folks while it drifts),
which is a very good alignment.
Now that you have drifted out the East West misalignment, you need to do
the same for the North-South axis. Leaving your DEC axis exactly where it
is, unlock your RA axis and move it either to the East or West, whichever
direction gets you closest to the horizon. Find a star in the general vicinity,
just like you did earlier. Your camera should still be focused and correctly
oriented, so all you need to do at this point is figure out where North-South
and East-West are again, using the same trick you used earlier. Once that's
settled, you're ready to go.
Once again, bisect the star on the East-West line of the recticle, and watch
for drift in the North-South direction. However, this time we're checking to
see if the mount is too high or too low, and we use the adjustments at the
front and rear of the mount to move the mount up or down. An added
wrinkle here is that the rules are different depending on if you are looking
at the Eastern horizon or the Western horizon:
Step 2a - Correcting North-South misalignment (using Eastern horizon)
If the star drifts South, the polar axis is pointing too low.
If the star drifts North, the polar axis is pointing too high.
Step 2b - Correcting North-South misalignment (using Western horizon)
If the star drifts South, the polar axis is pointing too high.
If the star drifts North, the polar axis is pointing too low.
As before, we're looking to keep the star bisected on the East-West line for
as long as we can stand to watch it - at least five minutes is a good rule of
thumb, longer is always better. Once you have this down, you might want
to go back to check the East-West just in case you accidentally messed
something up along the line - that's your call.
And that's that!
No question about it - this procedure takes time - time to learn (repetition
and familiarity make it faster), and time to perform (repetition and
familiarity make it faster). It taxes your patience, but it is definitely worth
the trouble!
Charlie
Effects of Bad Alignment

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I had no clue on how to properly align my equatorial mount until I read the
above explanation by Charlie. I now keep a print out of the directions on
me every time I go out to image.
The picture to the right is a perfect example of how an image will look like
if your equatorial mount is poorly aligned. The night I took this image I was
in a hurry to align the mount so I could get going imaging M51. Can you
blame me? You will probably have to click on the picture to enlarge it, but
in it you will see streaks that go from top right to bottom left as well as
stars that look elongated. These streaks are actually hot pixels which
decided to make there presence felt between my regular dark frame
acquisition sessions which I do between light imaging session. Actually,
this image was one of the reasons why I decided to Peltier cool my DSI
Pro!
At any rate, the downward direction of the streaks shows that my mount
was poorly aligned.
I hope that the information here will help some out there as much as it has
helped me. Drift alignment of your equatorial mount is an important
concept to master as an astrophotographer. Good luck and clear skies.

Method#3
There seems to be a lot of confusion lately, as to what 'drift alignment' is all
about. What is it? How does it work? How does a person make use of it? With a
little luck, I may be able to explain how it works, fairly painlessly. Once that's
understood, using it from then on should be a breeze. In the following discussion,
I'll be emphasizing Drift Alignment as applies to a wedge mounted LX-200 or
other SCT, but the principle for drift alignment is actually the same for all scopes.
I'll just be using the LX-200 as a reference for where the user is looking,
compared to the scope orientation, and what will be seen from that perspective.
Let me first say that Drift Alignment, like ALL polar alignment techniques, is used
to get the polar axis of your telescope parallel with the polar axis of the Earth.
Nothing more; nothing less. It's just that it's done by watching selected stars
'drift' in Declination while viewing them. From the type of Declination drift, we
determine in which way our scope is mis-aligned, and we can correct it
accordingly. Thus, the name of 'drift align'.
There are really only two directions that your scope can be off. You can be either
'left' or 'right' of the Celestial pole in question, or you can be 'above' or 'below' it.
Of course, you can be any combination of the two at one time, and it's very likely
that, in fact, you are when you start. We'll see how the 'drift' method is used to
close in on both of these directions, one at a time.
I can also define polar alignment a slightly different way and it will still mean the
same thing. Polar alignment is the act of setting up your telescope in such a way
that the North end of its polar axis points toward the North Celestial Pole and its
South polar axis points toward the South Celestial Pole. That seems as if I'm just

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saying the same thing but a little differently.... which I am... but if you keep that
particular definition in mind as we progress, I think you'll find that it will make
following discussion even easier.
Unfortunately, before we can look at the idea of 'drift alignment', we had best get
a couple of terms WELL understood! This part can get especially confusing if a
person is looking directly through the eyepiece one time, then perhaps through a
diagonal the next time. This isn't truly complicated, but if you're not careful, you
could easily get confused, so we're going to elaborate on it.

This drawing is a view of our scope as seen from its West side, when it's aimed
approximately at the Celestial Equator and fairly near the meridian, as seen from
a mid-latitude in the Northern Hemisphere.
Notice that the polar axis of the telescope runs right down through the center of
the scope mount, more or less parallel with the forks. TheSOUTHERN pole of the
scopes axis aims down through the ground and at the Southern Celestial Pole,
while the NORTHERN pole aims toward the Northern Celestial Pole.
What's even more important, is to notice that the direction of 'North' is toward the
physical TOP of our scope tube. The 'top' side being that side where our finder
scope is also mounted, more or less.
The direction of 'South' is obviously in the opposite direction, and is toward the
wedge, or down toward the forks.
I guess that it can be accepted that when I talk about aiming your scope 'North' or
'up', it means that the FRONT of the scope is going to be rotated in the direction
of what we just defined as the 'North' direction, or toward the TOP side of the
scope tube! Likewise, aiming the scope 'South' or down, means it will be moved
in the direction of the WEDGE, or the BOTTOM of the scope tube!. Fair enough?

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The tricky part is seen in this view. It also is a view of the scope as seen from its
West side, but the scope is aimed EAST this time. It's still aimed near the
Celestial Equator, but it's been rotated rather toward the EAST horizon! Things
look a lot more different now, but the fact is, our rules are still in place. If the
front of the scope is moved 'up' or 'North', the front of the scope will still be
moved toward the TOP of the scope (where the guide scope is still located, more
or less). Aiming the scope 'South' or 'down', will still mean pointing the front of
the scope more toward the 'bottom' of the scope, or toward the forks or wedge.
This isn't so bad, is it?

So long as viewers, when looking through the eyepiece, rotate their heads and
align themselves as in the first image, things might seem okay. "Up' is still toward
the top of their heads, even if it's not in the direction away from gravity. At least,
it's 'up' to these people.
But what about the viewers in the next picture? These people have simply
stepped over to the eyepiece without any contortions. They are perhaps relatively
short, or just don't want to rotate their heads at an angle. If the scope is to be
moved 'up', will these viewers see it move 'up'? That is, will 'up' still be toward
the top of the viewers heads? NO! According to what we have just stated, 'up' is
defined as being toward that same part of the telescope as before, and 'down' is
toward the wedge! If the viewers were to see star movement in the eyepiece that
was supposed to be 'North' or 'up', the viewers would see the star moving toward
the 'left' and 'up', on a diagonal! That's because the viewers don't really
understand what 'up' and "North' is, as is used in astronomy.
It can get even worse. If a person is using a diagonal, then the appearance of the
directions change, and movement of the scope and/or any object being viewed,
can get even MORE confusing!
With all of this in mind, the point here is, be SURE of what you're seeing when you
are looking for directional movement. Don't assume that just because an object is
moving toward the sky over your head, that it represents 'Up", "Down", "South",
or "North". PROVE it ahead of time! You can do this by very gently pushing up
on the front of the optical tube when you're aimed very nearly at your meridian.
The scope will move 'up', or 'North' ('South', if you're in the Southern
Hemisphere) and the star being viewed WILL move the OPPOSITE direction, no
matter what you see! This observation, and ONLY this observation, is the one that
can be trusted for determining what direction the observed star is 'moving'.
Okay. The painful part is over. Let's get started.

Alignment for the Northern Hemisphere.

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The above drawing is my feeble attempt at showing what the Celestial Equator
would look like to an observer at Northern mid-latitudes, when facing SOUTH. It is
a non-panoramic, two dimensional representation of a panoramic, three
dimensional object. The result is the sinusoidal shape you see here.
You see that the South Celestial Pole is significantly below the horizon. Naturally,
the North Celestial Pole is in the opposite direction, behind the viewer and
somewhere roughly half way between the horizon and overhead.

Here, we have a star that's following along the Celestial Equator as the evening
passes. It rises in the East, passes our meridian, then sets in the West.
I believe it's safe to say at this point, that the star always stays the same
'distance' from the South Celestial Pole throughout the night. This simply means
that it stays at the same Declination! I realize that these terms are basic to
amateur astronomers, but bear with me. The reason for terms as I re-define
them, should soon become apparent.
Now it's time to set up the scope. You've got it as close to Polar aligned as you
think it needs to be, so just aim it South and get ready to look through the
eyepiece at our 'star'. This, of course, means that you, also, are facing South.
(Never fear; for the folks in the Southern Hemisphere, we'll soon see things from
your point of view. But follow along anyway. There are fewer images from your
point of view.)

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Ooops! From the looks of things, we aren't properly polar aligned, and we didn't
even know it! It seems that the South axis of our telescope is aimed
somewhat RIGHT (West) of the South Celestial Pole! Although we haven't tested
it yet, we can see in the drawing that the 'arc' for our telescope as it rotates on its
axis, is going to follow an arc that's off to the WEST of the Celestial Equator!
Naturally, if our SOUTH axis is WEST of the SOUTH Celestial Pole, then
the NORTH axis is EAST of the NORTH Celestial Pole! Think about that for a
moment and make sure you fully agree with it. It's crucial.

What this rather messy picture is showing, is that, like the star that always stays
the same distance from it's Celestial axis, the telescope is going to also remain
the same distance from it's own axis, improperly aligned or not. In this case, the
scope was set to point at zero degrees in Declination. However, no matter what
the declination had been set to, the scope would still rotate around it's axis in the
same manner.

NOTE!: This also is a good image to use to re-emphasize what was said
earlier about what is meant by 'Up/Down', 'North/South' as relates to
the view in the telescope.
Since the scope tube rotates around it's Polar axis as it moves from the East to the
West, the 'Up', or 'North' part of the telescope is that part which is directly AWAY
FROM the Polar axis of the scope (toward the 'top' of the scope) , and the 'Down',
or 'South' refer to that part of the tube which points directly TOWARD the Polar
axis of the scope (toward the wedge)! Therefore, a 'drift' of a star that seems to
'drift' down', will apparently drift TOWARD the Polar Axis. Don't confuse these
directions as referring to the 'up/down' of this page!
The beginnings of seeing some 'drift' in the star is becoming apparent, but in
reality we'd be a bit more refined that this. When we wish to check and adjust our

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telescope for being out of alignment in an East/West direction, we would actually

select a star that is within 10 degrees or so in Declination from the Celestial
Equator and perhaps within 20 or so minutes in Right Ascension of our meridian.
That's where this particular error will be most apparent, especially when we use a
high powered eyepiece and the error is only slight.

This is a more realistic view of the section of sky that you'd be watching, to check
for Polar mis-alignment in an East/West direction. As you can see, as the scope
follows the star in Right Ascension, the star slowly 'drifts' toward the Southern
Celestial Pole... or 'Down' in our eyepiece, regardless on whether we're somewhat
on the East or West side of the meridian.

This gives us rule number one for drift alignment: If a star near the meridian
drifts SOUTH (down) in the eyepiece of the telescope, the SOUTHERN direction
on our telescope axis is too far WEST of the SOUTH Celestial Pole, and
the NORTHERN direction on our telescope axis is too far EAST of
the NORTH Celestial Pole!

Here we have the same section of the sky selected, and we're watching the same
star, but in this case the Southern Pole of the scope is EAST of the Southern
Celestial Pole. The star, as it progresses West, drifts NORTH (Up) in the field of
view, AWAY from the Southern Celestial Pole.

This gives us rule number two for drift alignment: If a star near the meridian
drifts NORTH (up) in the eyepiece of the telescope, the SOUTHERN direction on
our telescope axis is too far EAST of the SOUTH Celestial Pole, and
the NORTHERN direction on our telescope axis is too far WEST of
the NORTH Celestial Pole!

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NOTE! : Be very careful, because many manuals and instructions will be

talking about the NORTHERN pole mis-alignment, and you may well be
thinking SOUTHERN alignment because that's the direction you're
looking!!
More important than the rules to be memorized, I hope that the reason the rules
apply, makes sense to you!
NOTE # 2! : You can easily get confused about which way the star is
drifting, simply because your setup may or may not cause an inverted
image. To be sure, once you see a direction drift, just gently nudge the
bottom of the optical tube UP a little, and see if that makes the star
move 'South' according to your interpretation. It had better, because
you just nudged the tube NORTH!
NOTE # 3! When you set about adjusting the East/West adjustment on
your wedge, be certain as to which way to turn the knob! It's all too
easy to be thinking backward and turn it in the wrong direction. Think
about it for a bit, before you make the adjustment!

The First Two Rules for the Southern Hemisphere.

Here we see a similar drawing as the previous one, except a person in the
Southern Hemisphere would be looking NORTH to see the Celestial Equator, and
it's the NORTH Celestial Pole and the NORTH polar axis of his scope that's in
front of him and below the horizon. The SOUTH Celestial Pole, of course, is
behind him and up. Also, the alignment star, which is rising from the East, will be
moving from the observers RIGHT (East) to his LEFT (West).
In this example, the Polar axis is EAST (Right) of the North Celestial Pole. The
star, as it is watched, will drift UPWARD (South) in the eyepiece.

Southern Hemisphere rules #1 & #2

Rule number ONE for drift alignment in the Southern Hemisphere: If a star near
the meridian drifts UPWARD (South) in the eyepiece of the telescope,
the NORTHERNdirection on our telescope axis is too far EAST (Right) of
the NORTH Celestial Pole, and the SOUTHERN direction on our telescope axis is
too far WEST (Left) of theSOUTHERN Celestial Pole!

Rule number TWO for drift alignment in the Southern Hemisphere: If a star near
the meridian drifts DOWNWARD (North) in the eyepiece of the telescope,

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the NORTHERNdirection on our telescope axis is too far WEST (Left) of

the NORTH Celestial Pole, and the SOUTHERN direction on our telescope axis is
too far EAST (Right) of theSOUTH Celestial Pole!

Back to the Northern Hemisphere.

Once again we're back at our scope. And once again, unknown to us, it isn't really
properly polar aligned as we had hoped. Instead, we have the following condition:

What we're faced with this time is a condition in which, as we face South, the
Southern pole on our scope is BELOW the Southern Celestial Pole.... or put
another way, our Northern pole of the scope is ABOVE the Northern Celestial Pole.

If we look a star as it moves across our meridian, notice that there is VERY little
Declination drift of the star. That's fine, because we've already reserved that area
of the sky for determining any left/right alignment error. Instead, we can select a
star that is fairly near the Eastern or Western horizon, and again, near the
Celestial Equator.
If we watch for 'drift' of a star that is rising in the East, we can see that there's
going to be a significant drift AWAY from the Southern Celestial Pole, or
a NORTHERN(Upward) drift. If instead, we use a star that's setting in the West,
the star seems to drift TOWARD the Southern Pole, or a SOUTHERN (Downward)
drift.
Either direction, near the East or West horizon, can be used for checking our
up/down error. It depends strictly on your choice, which is usually determined by
which one will give you the best view. Your East horizon may be blocked by
houses or trees. If so, just use the Western section of the sky, but always try to be
fairly near the Celestial Equator. You simply must remember which direction of
star drift goes with which horizon.

This gives us rule number THREE for drift alignment: If a star near
the EAST horizon drifts UPWARD (North) in the eyepiece of the telescope,
the SOUTHERN direction on our telescope axis is too far SOUTH of
the SOUTH Celestial Pole, and the NORTHERN direction on our telescope axis is
too far NORTH of the NORTH Celestial Pole!

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Why is it recommended that all of your drift checks be made near the Celestial
Equator? Won't some other area of the sky also show the error drift? The answer
is, yes it will. The reason the Celestial Equator is chosen, is because that area of
the sky will show the error much more quickly. Zero degrees in Declination ... the
Celestial Equator ... has the biggest 'diameter' of all of the Declination circles, so
the drift error can be detected more quickly or more accurately.

It should come as no surprise to find out that when the South pole on the
telescope is ABOVE the Southern Celestial pole, exactly the opposite conditions
exist, so we have exactly the opposite directions of drift near the Eastern or
Western horizon. The trick is, to be able to remember or figure out which is which.

This gives us rule number FOUR for drift alignment: If a star near
the EAST horizon drifts DOWN (South) in the eyepiece of the telescope,
the SOUTHERN direction on our telescope axis is too far NORTH of
the SOUTH Celestial Pole, and the NORTHERN direction on our telescope axis is
too far SOUTH of the NORTH Celestial Pole!

Note: In reality, it's best to select a star that's perhaps twenty degrees or so
above the horizon for your testing. Your image is less likely to be distorted by
heat waves from the Earth, or just plain poor 'seeing' in general.

A Quick trip back to the Southern Hemisphere.

Once again, we are looking North toward a star near the Celestial Equator, and we
again are looking for the star to be fairly near either the Eastern or Western
Horizon. In this example, we see that the Polar axis of the scope

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is ABOVE the NORTHERN Celestial Pole, or BELOW the SOUTHERN Celestial

Pole, which is behind us. In this case, if the star we use is near the EAST horizon,
the star will drift DOWN (North) in the eyepiece. If we are using the star that's
near the WEST horizon, it will drift UP(South) in the eyepiece.
From what we've already covered about the actions in the Northern Hemisphere,
added to the above information, we can state the next two rules for drift
alignment in the Southern Hemisphere:

The Second Two Rules for Drift Alignment in the Southern

Hemisphere.

Rule number THREE for drift alignment: If a star near the EAST horizon
drifts DOWN (North) in the eyepiece of the telescope, the NORTHERN direction
on our telescope axis is too far ABOVE the NORTH Celestial Pole, and
the SOUTHERN direction on our telescope axis is too
far BELOW the SOUTHERN Celestial Pole!

Rule number FOUR for drift alignment: If a star near the EAST horizon
drifts UP (South) in the eyepiece of the telescope, the NORTHERN direction on
our telescope axis is too far BELOW of the NORTHERN Celestial Pole, and
the SOUTHERN direction on our telescope axis is too
far ABOVE the SOUTHERN Celestial Pole!

Tying it all together

You've seen how to detect and correct the various 'drifts' of a star for drift
alignment. There are a few real world facts that should also be pointed out.
First, the best way for you to detect drift is to be using an illuminated crosshair
eyepiece. Have the crosshairs aligned such that one set is parallel to the
East/West movement of the telescope. Do this by centering the alignment star,
then running the scope back and forth in Right Ascension to be sure the star stays
close to parallel to the crosshair. That way, a relatively small movement in
Declination can easily be detected.
Another method that's often used if you don't have the illuminated eyepiece, is to
position the scope so that the star you're observing is positioned at either the
Northern or Southern edge of the field of view in a conventional eyepiece. That
way, you can detect the North/South drift, seeing the small drift effects on the
star.
Second, do not... NOT... worry about 'drift' in Right Ascension. That has nothing
whatsoever to do with Polar alignment, but simply has to do with the drive
characteristics of your R.A. motor. In fact, what you may well want to do is to
'guide' on the alignment star in R.A., and hold it near the center of the
crosshairs... or the edge of the field of view.... depending on the method used.
Third, once you've been through the two alignments, left/right, up/down, go right
back to the beginning and repeat the procedure. Unless you have your wedge
PERFECTLY level.... not likely ... there will be interaction between the two
adjustments. That is, when you go back to the left/right adjustment, even though

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you thought you had it perfect the first time, it in all likelihood will need a small
amount of re-adjustment. Likewise after you've made this small adjustment. It
probably will have effected the up/down adjustment that you've just done. Don't
be surprised about it, and don't let it irritate you. It's the nature of the beast.
Now, because of the fact that you'll most likely be going back and forth between
the two adjustments, getting closer each time, it's easier on your nerves if you
don't spend a lot of time on one particular directional adjustment before going to
the other one. You'll be ping-ponging between these two adjustments, if you're
trying to get the drift down to as close to zero as you can. If you keep going back
to, say, the adjustment for left/right alignment of the pole that you're using as a
reference, and finally get it to ideal, you may want to pull your hair out when you
find that you have to go back and 'tweak' this adjustment again! It's probably
better, as you near the 'ideal' settings, to make a very small correction, watch it
once to make sure you improved it some, then go to the other check and do the
same. That way, both adjustments will slowly get closer and closer to ideal, at the
same time. (This is strictly a personal opinion, based on my own experiences, and
you may not agree with it at all.)
Finally, there is a matter of 'how good must the adjustments be?' That's really a
subjective matter. Naturally, in the ideal world, the answer would be that
anything less than perfect isn't good enough. But, at least where I
do MY imaging, it's far from the ideal world!
If a person is doing strictly viewing, then Polar alignment isn't critical at all, so
long as your 'go to' feature, if you have one, functions adequately. For
astrophotography or CCD imaging, it's quite another matter. In my personal
opinion, if a person has a permanent mount, then it's worthwhile to spend an
evening every few months, to get the drift down to the minimum they can get, no
matter what the scope application might be. Under these conditions, a star
viewed with high power would show no visible drift after 15 minutes or so.
On the other hand, if you are moving the telescope between viewing sessions, the
limiting factor is all too often, the time it takes to get the drift minimized. One
doesn't want to spend most of the evening making Polar adjustments, only to
have a short part of the evening left for imaging or photographing.
Even then, the amount of tolerable drift is going to vary with the type of imaging
you do. If you take a lot of relatively short, unguided images, then the accuracy
of the adjustments would probably be determined by the field rotation one gets,
while taking a full series of images of the same object.
If, on the other hand, you self guide or auto guide, the factors to consider are
going to be not only potential field rotation, but the extra work of guiding in both
R.A. and Dec. For a camera with self guide, your images will certainly turn out
better if you don't require Dec corrections in your longest shot. Otherwise, you're
potentially faced with camera over-correction, which can lead to trailed star
images.
As you can see, on this subject, I leave it mostly up to the user. That's the person
that has to consider all factors, and by experience with time, will determine for
themselves what the accuracy needed will be. As for me, I have a permanent
mount for my telescope, and I try to make sure that when doing CCD imaging, my
self-guiding camera NEVER has to make Dec corrections. Instead of using an
eyepiece for determining the drift of a star, I simply select the star, begin to 'self
guide'; with the Dec corrections turned off, and assure myself that after 15
minutes or so, there has been no more than approximately 1.5 arc seconds of drift
in Dec. That's usually good enough......... for me.

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I hope this discussion helps someone to get a better handle on how to make best
use of the 'drift alignment' technique for their scope.

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