Auto Guiding Question

Thanks for reading.

I have a ST-2000XM and an LX200 GPS and would like to start using them both to take guided images. There is not much info in the manuals, so can you tell me if there is a website that can help?

Thanks for your time.

Joe.

There is more to guiding than meets the eye. It's not as simple as attach the guider, find a guide star, and go. To get good guiding, you'll need to:

* Test your mount to see how well it performs in tracking
* Tune your mount for best performance in guiding (backlash being the number one thing here).
* Test your mounts' ability to guide accurately
* Learn the ins and outs of calibrating your mount for guiding (what makes a good guide star; what kinds of error occur, what they mean, what to do about them, etc.)
* Spend some time guiding with your mount to learn about it's quirks and limitations.

Since you have an SBIG camera, you already own a good manual on guiding. I wrote the manual for CCDSoft, and the chapter on guiding goes well beyond the abilities of just CCDSoft, and gets into the subjects described above. For a more thorough treatment (as well as lots of other useful stuff), get yourself a copy of my book, "The New CCD Astronomy."

LX200 mounts vary considerably in their ability to guide effectively, so it's well worth spending some time to see just what your mount can do.

Ron Wodaski
http://www.newastro.com