Well I finally got a chance to take my scope out again except this time I went to my astronomy club's observing site which is way darker than my location!
Got to the site after an hour of driving about 20 minutes before sunset so I could see what I was doing. Balancing and leveling the scope went ok. Balancing the scope properly is VERY important! The motors are much quieter and goto is much more accurate. Polar alignment went ok. It's hard to see through a hole! Three star alignment is what I used to get the goto up and running. I have read this before and didn't listen, do not use Polaris for an alignment star. After redoing the goto setup I used Lyra, Capella and Altair. The first object was m45. Dead center at 32mm. My main purpose for going out that night was to practice piggyback astrophotography. I shot a roll of 400 ASA film with exposure times ranging from 5 mins to 15 mins at 17 to 200mm. I am new at astrophotography so I was very excited to see the flame nebula and a hint of the horsehead nebula in one of my photos of Orion! Goto stayed accurate from 6pm until 2:30am when the dew started forming
Oh well I had a blast and will back out tonight or tomorrow except this time I will be packing 800 ASA film!
I will try and get some photos online soon so I can share them with you.
