The QHY PoleMaster
The QHY PoleMaster electronic polar scope was
designed to make your polar alignment routine easier, although I do have the
RAPAS scope by Astro-Physics, this scope is very versatile and can be use jointly with
any other polar alignment software like the SharpCap (which I will talk later) or PoleMaster . One point to
mention is no matter which camera tracker or telescope mount you’re using, when
it comes to astrophotography, accurate polar alignment is
critical.
If you have ever struggled to polar align your
telescope mount with the north or south celestial pole, the QHY PoleMaster or
SharpCap may just be your new best friends.
The QHY PoleMaster delivered exceptional results for me on my
first night out with it. The dedicated polar alignment software was easy to
use, and the camera produced a crystal clear image of the star field surrounding
the north celestial pole, you just have to be patient as you will need a dark sky
before starting.
Polar Alignment speed,
accuracy and experience improvements with the QHY PoleMaster:
I can polar align
faster, at dusk
I using the PM to improve the current method I
use with the RAPAS for alignment which was
fast, this one is faster.
I can monitor and confirm my polar alignment at
any time
No more 2 or 3-star alignment routines if
necessary but again is a personal choose
The spot-on accuracy of the PoleMaster means
that my AP mount 1100gto will only need to swell to a star at zero
declination (South sky) and once centered on the scope finder or PC do a Recal
(press bottom left hand corner button once and press 9).
.
QHY PoleMaster Alignment Camera Specifications:
Field of View: 11 degrees by 8 degrees
Interface: Mini USB 2.0
Resolution: Approximately 30 Arc seconds
Weight: 115 g (0.25 lb)
What’s included in the box
This PoleMaster was sent to me from High Point Scientific for review. The
team at High Point made sure to include the necessary adapter for my EQ
telescope mount. Here is a look at everything that comes with the PoleMaster:
PoleMaster camera body
Lens cap with a lanyard
Mini USB 2.0 cable
Mount adapter
Mount adaptor cap
M4 hardware for attaching the adaptor
Allen key for lens focus adjustment
Fastening the PoleMaster to your telescope
mount
The PoleMaster I am using is for my Astro-Physics
1100GTO EQ mount, and I have fastened it to the mount using the dedicated
QHY adapter for this model. The hardware was easy to install, and the materials
used and overall finish of this device is attractive.
The adapter for my mount came with a tiny Allen
key to adjust tension, so I could securely lock the PoleMaster into the front
of the polar axis scope of the mount.
The QHY PoleMaster adapter for the AP Mount
9000 & 1100
There are two parts to the mount adapter for
the PoleMaster, the camera base disc that attaches to the camera body, and the
camera mount ring that you need to secure to the mount. You secure the camera
base disc to the mounting ring using a thumb screw.
For the mount adapter I used, there were three
tiny grub screws to tighten using the supplied Allen key to lock the adapter
into place.
The device connects to my Hub via a Mini USB
2.0 cable, with miniature locking screws to avoid yanking the cable out by
accident. I wish more of my device connectors had this. The manual
instructs you to position the USB port of the PoleMaster to the left hand side
when looking at the device head on.
I ran the mini USB 2.0 cable from the PoleMaster
into my recently Pegasus powered USB hub, which consolidates the various
astrophotography devices I have running to a single USB cable into my laptop.
The adapter allows you to take the PoleMaster
off of the mount while not in use or in storage, but I think I’ll leave it
right where it is. The tiny camera adds no weight to my rig and maintains a low
profile.
I’ll just have to make sure I don’t bang
anything against the device by accident when setting up. The included lens cap
should stay on the PoleMaster when not in use to protect the lens.
Software and Downloads
All of the software and drivers needed to run the PoleMaster device
were found on the QHY website. The company has recently updated their site,
which lead me on a bit of a wild goose chase.
Rather then using the URL printed on the green
card that came with the camera, I simply “Googled “QHY PoleMaster Driver” to
find the appropriate section of the QHY website.
Here, I downloaded the latest stable driver for
the PoleMaster, along with the dedicated software needed to communicate with
the camera and control parameters such as gain and exposure length.
With the 2 downloads unpacked and installed, I
ran the PoleMaster software on my field laptop with the camera connected. The
QHY PoleMaster manual was to-the-point and helpful through this process, and
instructed me to click the “connect” button.
I heard the reassuring “new device connected”
chime on my Windows 10 OS after plugging in the PoleMaster, so I new the camera
was successfully recognized by my PC.
After hitting the “connect” button, the
PoleMaster delivered a live-view loop of the stars in the northern sky. My mount
was already partially polar aligned to my latitude at 36 degrees north, and pointed
towards Polaris from my observatory.
The PoleMaster camera lens has an 11 x 6 degree
of field of view. This means that the pole star should be visible if the mount
has been roughly polar aligned.
Even though it was not completely dark out yet,
I could see a formation of stars in the display screen right off the bat. After
zooming out to 75% view, the north star, Polaris was obvious.
Using the PoleMaster Software
The PoleMaster software user interface.
The first thing you’ll want to do is adjust the
gain and exposure settings so that it is easy to identify the pole star and a
number of adjacent stars in the field.
The software walks you through a simple process
of identifying and confirming the pole star. The process involves matching an
overlay of star positions with your current view of Polaris and surrounding
stars.
The rotate tool on the left hand sidebar lets
you rotate the star pattern overlay using your mouse or using the computer
arrows to move the sidebar level.
Then, you are asked to rotate the RA axis of
your telescope mount to determine the rotation of the mechanical axis. By
rotating your mounts right ascension axis by 15 degrees or more, the software
can confirm this value.
This can be confusing the arrow showing on your
screen shows an clockwise rotation, the star rotation must be moving
anti-clockwise, so when using the Hand_Control/HandPad move the stars
anti-clockwise. when the manual clearly states that this must done using the
hand controller or mount control software.
Fine tuning my the polar alignment accuracy of
my telescope mount using the QHY PoleMaster.
Next the on-screen prompts tell you to confirm
the center of rotation. Eventually, you will get to a point where the
application displays a small green circle. This is exactly where the pole star
needs to be. At this point, the ultra-fine adjustments you make to your polar
alignment are far beyond what’s possible with the naked eye.
Atmospheric Refraction
The PoleMaster has an option to enable a
feature called atmospheric refraction to further improve your polar
alignment accuracy. This feature asks you to input your coordinates,
temperature, and pressure. For atmospheric refraction to work correctly, the USB
connector on the PoleMaster must be facing east.
Owners of the PoleMaster have recommended to
start the polar alignment routine with your telescope to the west instead of
the home position. 2 moves or more than 30 degrees can be difficult from the
home position, so if the telescope starts in the west it is not an issue.
If you do not remove the PoleMaster from your
telescope mount between astrophotography sessions, you can reuse the centering
procedure from your previous polar alignment. However, if you are using the
atmospheric refraction feature, you’ll need to remember to adjust the
temperature and pressure settings for that night.
SharpCap
Some weeks back I began to hear about Sharpcap’s polar alignment tool. Sharpcap
is compatible with just about any camera out there as long as there is an ASCOM
driver for it. Best part? Sharpcap is free.
A visit to the Sharpcap website revealed I had
everything I needed to give this Polar Alignment Tool a try: a compatible
camera (guess what my QHY polemaster camera!!) and all I needed was one of those increasingly
rare clear nights to give it a try. I read over the instructions a time or two
in preparation, but, frankly, there isn't much to the procedure once the camera
is connected to Sharpcap. Press an onscreen button a few times, move the mount
once, and adjust the polar alignment with the mount’s altitude and azimuth
adjusters.
That nice night finally came, and saw me
setting up my AP-1100GTo mount. I put the telescope in normal “home” position,
that is, pointed north with the counterweight “down.” (NOT Tracking) the QHY polemaster
was already was inserted into the guide scope and connected to the Pegasus USB
hub/ computer.
First task was getting an image, a focused
image.
Once I was close to focus, the sensitive QHY
was producing more than enough stars to meet Sharpcap’s requirements in a mere
1 seconds of exposure. To work, the program needs 15 stars within 5-degrees of
the pole, and according to the information on the first polar alignment screen,
I was getting around 20.
Ready to go, I clicked Sharpcap’s Tools menu
and selected “Polar Align.” I was then presented with Screen 1, shown here.
Stars marked in yellow are the ones Sharpcap is using for plate solving the
star field (figuring out which star is which). I didn’t worry about that, just
let the program think for a little while as the frames rolled in. Shortly, the
“Next” button was enabled, meaning I was ready for step 2.
After pressing “Next,” screen 2 was presented and I was instructed to rotate the mount 90-degrees in right ascension. I did, so, moving the mount roughly 90-degrees to the east. (remember NOT TO USE the hand-control to rotate the scope).
Sharpcap then studied a few more frames in
order to determine where the Celestial Pole was and what I needed to do to aim
the mount there. Once it knew these things, the Next button was enabled again.
After pressing Next for a final time, a star
was highlighted in yellow and there was a yellow arrow connecting it to a
circle, my target . The task was to move the mount in altitude and azimuth so
as to position the star in the little circle, not unlike what you do with a
polar bore-scope (by the way, you don't need to return the mount to home
position before adjusting; leave it rotated 90-degrees). As you move in the
proper direction, the yellow arrow gets shorter and shorter and eventually
disappears. It is then replaced with a pair of brackets around the target to allow
fine tuning. As you center the star in the target circle, the brackets will
move closer and closer together.
How easy was this to do? Quite easy AFTER I
understood exactly how to do it. In the beginning, I was fairly far from the
pole, with the arrow extending off screen. I’d been told that at this stage it
was best to adjust while watching the error numbers Sharpcap displays instead
of worrying about the arrow.
These numbers (degrees, minutes, and seconds)
indicate how far you are from the pole. They aren’t labeled as altitude and
azimuth; instead they read “Up/Down” and “Left/ Right.” Sounded easy to me. I’d
adjust the mount’s altitude until the Up/Down number got smaller, and the
azimuth till the Left/Right went down. Alas, that didn’t work at all.
It turned out there was a catch, and until I
understood what it was, I was all at sea. Up/Down does NOT mean the mount’s
altitude, and Left/Right does NOT equal azimuth. Instead, these error numbers
relate to directions onscreen (that's what I thought, anyway; see the addendum
at the end of the article).
In just a minute or two, I had the program
indicating my distance from the pole as under a minute (it when from 55sec to
15 sec) showing as an 'excellent' Polar Alignment!!
The accuracy? I swell to a star at zero
declination south and just need to move the star with my hand-control a bit to the centre
of the screen to calibrate my AP 1100gto mount.
Advantage above Polemaster
Basically, SharpCap takes two pictures near the
pole and analyzes them to judge the accuracy of your Polar Alignment.
SharpCap uses plate solving to scan the
images and then tells you how much you need to move your mount to increase the
accuracy of your Polar Alignment. It connected to APCC automatically using it
plate solve and altitude position.