6 replies to this topic

[Andrey]

Greetings, dear Meade users!

 

  I am a happy newbie owner of Meade Polaris 90 with German equatorial mount. Recently I discovered some parts of the mount are not described in the Polaris Series Instruction Manual v3 (see below).

  What are A, B and C?

  How do I use these parts?

  What its proper location?

 

  Thank you for a detailed reply.

 

    

[MistrBadgr]

Hi Andrey,

 

Those parts have to do with attaching and using a drive unit that is not available.  The current drive attaches to the place where the manual control hooks on the other side of the mount.  A is the drive gear, which can be manually moved and serve as a manual control knob.  B is the leaver for the clutch mechanism in this unavaliable drive unit.  C, I think, is a shaft to hook the drive unit to the mount.

 

Hope this helps,

 

Bill Steen

[Andrey]

Hi Andrey,

 

Those parts have to do with attaching and using a drive unit that is not available.  The current drive attaches to the place where the manual control hooks on the other side of the mount.  A is the drive gear, which can be manually moved and serve as a manual control knob.  B is the leaver for the clutch mechanism in this unavaliable drive unit.  C, I think, is a shaft to hook the drive unit to the mount.

 

Hope this helps,

 

Bill Steen

 

Dear Bill,

 

  Thank you for sharing this information.

  Why the original drive unit is not available for the Polaris 90?

[MistrBadgr]

Hi Andrey,

 

I do not know, I only can guess.  What I do know is that the Polaris line of scopes that are now sold was put together shortly after Meade was bought by Sunny Optical.

 

I wish they did have a drive unit that fit with those items, rather than putting a drive on the other side.  It would be a whole lot better.

 

Bill

[Andrey]

Thank you.

 

Hi Andrey,

 

I do not know, I only can guess.  What I do know is that the Polaris line of scopes that are now sold was put together shortly after Meade was bought by Sunny Optical.

 

I wish they did have a drive unit that fit with those items, rather than putting a drive on the other side.  It would be a whole lot better.

 

Bill

Dear Bill,

 

  Thank you for commenting this.

  The question has been answered.

[Andrey]

Anyway I started learning about the Meade Polaris Motor Drive and found that the link to its User Guide is broken:

  https://www.meade.co...de-size-1-4-mb/

  https://www.meade.co...e_manua1021.pdf

 

Can you share this PDF file please?

Thank you.

[Ilyass]

Hi,
I’m beginner in astronomy and I had many troubles to set up the Polaris motor drive attached on my Polaris 130 EQ that I bought recently.
After many temptations I was finally able to set it up, and now it ‘s working just fine, I can truck stars as well as planets without moving the telescope,I use it with the moon, Mars and Saturn.., it was very nice.
I would like to share with you the steps I followed to operate the motor drive:
1- lining up with the celestial pole ( declination axis of the equatorial mount should be lined up with the latitude of observing location and the polar axis (RA) should be lined up with the star Polaris)
2- look for the celestial objects you want to truck by rotating the optical tube around declination and polar axis (to make it easy the viewfinder should be well aligned)
3-center the object in the MA26 mm.
4-turn on the motor drive.
5- if you are observing in northern hemisphere then switch N/S to ‘S’, if not you should set it to ‘N’ (as Mr Steen said Previously on his review)
6-put the motor speed to maximum.
After that, when we see the celestial object on the eyepiece it remains centered and static during all the observation time as the motor drive is compensating the earth’s rotation.we can change then the eyepiece to more magnifying one to observe more details.

Please if you have any comments on this steps or any other remarks, I will appreciate if you could share it.

[MistrBadgr]

Thanks, Ilyass! 

 

This is good information!  

 

Bill

[Andrey]

Eventually I decided to purchase the Meade Polaris Electric RA Motor Drive (SKU: 616000).

User manual for the unit appeared at https://www.meade.co...e-manua1021.pdf.

 

After many temptations I was finally able to set it up, and now it ‘s working just fine, I can truck stars as well as planets without moving the telescope,I use it with the moon, Mars and Saturn.., it was very nice.

Thank you very much for sharing this.

I will definitely follow your instructions and provide a feedback!

 

5- if you are observing in northern hemisphere then switch N/S to ‘S’, if not you should set it to ‘N’ (as Mr Steen said Previously on his review)

Seem like a quest (switch to rear gear to move car forward) 

Can you share a link to the review by Bill Steen please?

 

Thank you.

[MistrBadgr]

Andrey,

 

Somehow I missed your request for a download link to the polaris motor drive manual.  If it does not work from here, you might try it from the support section of www.meade.com.

 

https://www.meade.co...r-drive-manual/

 

Bill