Tracking with a Wedge and LX200

Well, I finally got a chance to try out using a wedge on my LX200 last night. I found that the tracking& goto are MUCH worse than when I use in Alt/Az mode. I know my polar alignment was probably not the best, but I would have thought that the computer could account for that with the plolar 2* align. Is this not the way it works?

This leads to some other questions.

*How necessary it it to get the scope into the polar home position 'exactly'. When I was rotating the scope in RA, I was getting some star shift, but not too horrible I thought.

* When in polar mode, does the computer not use the Dec drive to correct for possible errors in polar alignment?

I set up the scope with at 2* polar align using the same 2 stars I used in alt/az mode the other night. I had about the same accuracy (9mm eyepiece) on both nigths, only when I used the wedge both the goto and tracking were off much more.

Thanks for any help.

-Geoff

Thanks to everyone with thier responces. (Sorry for the late reply, work interfeared with my life :-)

To answer a couple of the questions, I have a newer LX200 GPS, not the classic. I guess i should have also separated what I meant by alignments. First I need to get the scope polar aligned. (Thanks for all the pointers,tips). Then there is the alignment for setting up the computer. (Calibrating the Goto...?) It was this computer align I am/was using the 2 star method on. (hoping that the computer could help correct for any errors in the polar align process)

When I go to align the computer (as opposed to the polar alignment), the controller offers easy, 1 star and 2 star aligns. I was using the 2 star hoping that it would be more accurate. It sounds like I should just be using the 1 star align? Is that right? It sounds like the erros in the goto are more the problem of the polar alignment than the computer setup.

As for the drift alignemnt, when observing from my backyard, I only have about a 60 deg field of view in the E-W direction. (big trees) I am not sure that a drift alignment would work with the E/W star choice at least 60 deg from the E/W horizon. Anyone know? What if I picked a star closer to polaris (dec) but in an eastern orientation? (RA)

Clear Skies!

-Geoff