The Control Panel provides the main controls for MaxPoint. It displays the current, corrected, and target coordinates, and includes controls for performing alignment runs.
Reports the name of the telescope driver and its current status as reported by the telescope driver software.
Note: if Scope Status is showing Not Connected, this is because you need to connect to MaxPoint from a telescope control application. This could be MaxIm DL or any other ASCOM-compliant telescope control program. To do this, go to your telescope control application and select Scope Setup. Select MaxPoint as the telescope (i.e. your program will link to MaxPoint, which will in turn connect to the telescope). Once this is done, connect the link to the telescope in your telescope control program. Note that you can connect multiple control programs to MaxPoint; it will act as a hub.
Checking this box forces the control panel to always be on top of other windows on the screen.
This displays the local sidereal time; i.e. the right ascension of the meridian. If this looks wrong, make sure you have correctly set the Windows clock and time zone, and under Scope Setup check the latitude and longitude.
Displays three sets of current coordinates, in both Right Ascension/Declination (RA/Dec) and Altitude/Azimuth (Alt/Az). The Scope position is the current position according to the telescope's electronics; i.e. the uncorrected position. The Corr. (corrected) position displays the telescope's current position as corrected by MaxPoint.
Target indicates the target object's position; i.e. the true sky position the telescope was last commanded to. The Lock Target control will freeze this position, allowing for an error measurement to be made (i.e. the difference between Target and Scope coordinates).
Brings up the Scope Setup dialog box.
Brings up the Calibration Observations dialog box.
Brings up the Telescope Pointing Errors dialog box.
Brings up the Calibration Sky Map.
This function is applicable only to German equatorial mounts.
When Pier Side is set to Auto, the pier side is determined automatically. If the ASCOM driver provides pier side information, then this information is used. If the driver does not provide pier side information, then the pier side is estimated based on the position of the telescope. Alternatively the user can determine the pier side manually, by selecting Normal or Inverted. (MaxPoint doesn't care about the pier side convention used, as long as it is selected consistently.)
The pier side information is displayed in the status field at the top of the window.
Applies MaxPoint corrections to telescope coordinates and forces automatic updating of the correction model whenever observations are added or removed.
This frame contains controls for setting up, starting, and stopping a calibration run. The status of the current calibration run is shown at the bottom of the frame.
The Start button starts a calibration run. Starting a new calibration will reset the error parameters to zero. Depending on the calibration mode, not all of the parameters will be reset. Since the values are reset, if you change your mind about recalibrating, you will have to reload previous observations.
The Stop button terminates a calibration session. Clicking this makes sure you cannot accidentally add more observations.
The Auto button brings up the Auto Calibration dialog box. You can use this command to automatically perform calibration measurements at a large number of points on the sky. It uses the PinPoint LE Engine (included) and MaxIm DL. You must select your calibration options, and hit Start before you can start auto calibration.
Add to current cal. is used when you would like to add more points to a previous calibration that you stopped. You can use this option if you accidentally stopped a run, or if you decide you would like to add more points. Please note that doing this is not recommended if you move the mount or power down the telescope. You can instead recalibrate your mount using Recal Permanent or Recal Portable (see below).
If you wish to calibrate a telescope for the first time, or do a complete calibration run, then you should use Full Calibration. You should also use this if you make any mechanical changes to the telescope, such as adjusting the collimation or change the weight distribution.
A minimum of six observations is required in order to generate a model. A minimum of 18 observations distributed across the sky are recommended. When using sighting stars, the usual procedure is to start in a small area of the sky, so that the star is in the field after the short slew. Once six points have been recorded, you can start moving larger distances, as the model begins to correct the errors. It is very important to record data points over a large area of the sky in order to assure an accurate model.
Once a full calibration has been performed, it should be consistent from session to session, unless you change the hardware configuration. If you shut down the telescope, you will need to resynchronize it with the sky upon power up. This is done by recalibration.
Recal Permanent is used to recalibrate a mount that is permanently set up. MaxPoint assumes that the mechanical parameters of the mount, including polar alignment, has not changed. It only recalculates the offset in Right Ascension and Declination. You can use just one observation; but averaging several observations of different stars may produce better results. Please see below for additional information.
Recal Portable is similar to Recal Permanent, except that it is assumed the polar alignment may have shifted as well. A minimum of two observations are required; for best results six observations are recommended. Please see below for additional information.
Tip: for best results, turn on the Anti-Backlash function on the Telescope Setup page.
MaxPoint can aid in polar alignment. Before using this feature, please read the Polar Alignment section.
The first step is to create a mount model using the Calibration features. You will need a number of measurement points distributed around the sky to ensure an accurate measurement.
Next, click the Polar Align button. The Adjust Polar Alignment wizard will appear.
The procedure is simple. First pick a convenient star; for best results, pick one high in the sky near the equator. Next center the star accurately, using a crosshair eyepiece or a camera and software such as MaxIm DL. If you are using MaxIm DL you will want to turn on the Crosshair feature (image right-click menu) and use the Auto Center capability.
Click the Next button. The telescope will be moved a short distance. Re-center the star using the polar alignment adjuster on the mount. Do not move the telescope axes.
Click Next again. To confirm the new alignment click OK. If you decided not to adjust the telescope click Cancel.
After adjusting the polar alignment, the alignment terms in the model will be reset. It is strongly recommended that you perform a Recal. Portable (to update the polar alignment terms) or a Full Calibration after adjusting the polar alignment.
This box contains a list of currently-visible bright stars, with accurate positions, which are suitable for calibration. The drop list shows approximate positions for each of the stars, along with the visual magnitude. (The software contains more accurate positions for the stars; they are displayed at lower resolution to save screen space.)
The star positions are corrected for precession, nutation, and proper motion. Only those stars above the user settable horizon are displayed. The default minimum horizon is 30 degrees, to keep observations above the zone of high atmospheric refraction. The list also does not include stars within 5ยบ of either pole.
The star list is in alphabetical order. An asterisk is shown to the right of the star name for stars that have been used in the current calibration. (Stars actually may be used more than once if you wish; for example, if you wait two hours all the stars will be in different positions on the sky and would be suitable for re-use.)
You can step through the list in order of distance from the current telescope position using the < > buttons. Note that the order of this list is constantly being recalculated as the telescope moves around. You can skip stars that have already been used in the current calibration by using the << >> buttons.
Once you have picked a star, use the Slew button to move the telescope to the target. Clicking Slew will automatically turn on Lock Target. If you need to abort the slew for any reason, click the STOP button.
Once the target position is locked, you can center the star using the Scope Nudge buttons, your telescope control application, or the hand paddle. The difference between the Scope position and the Target position is used to calculate the pointing errors.
Once you have a target star centered, click the + button, conveniently located in the center of the Nudge controls.
For a more convenient means of picking your alignment stars, please see the Map window.
The scope nudging allows you to move the star North, South, East, or West. The controls are arranged in a cross pattern. To make it easier to pick which button to press, align your camera so that north is at the top.
The distance moved for each nudge is selected using the Deg/Min/Sec selector and the associated Number field. Usually you will be nudging in the arc-minute range.
The Lock Target check box holds the current target position while you make your adjustments to center the star. It is automatically cleared when you click the + button to record the observation. If you use a separate program such as MaxIm DL to pick your alignment stars, then you will have to manually turn on Lock Target after picking each star.
Clicking the A button brings up the About box. The user registration information can be entered via the About box by clicking the Registration button.
Clicking the ? button brings up this help.
Several important displays are available in this frame.
Scope Setup is used to set up your ASCOM telescope driver, enter your local latitude/longitude, mount parameters, etc. It is also used to access the Horizon Editor.
Observations displays the list of all observations made during the most recent calibration run. You can also save observations and load up old observations. Loading old observations also loads the model for those observations, so this allows you to save and load calibrations.
Errors brings up a display of the mount errors and offsets as calculated by MaxPoint. This is also where you can view the polar alignment errors of your mount.
When you do a full calibration run, MaxPoint uses the observations you have made to calculate eight parameters that describe your mount errors. These are displayed when you click Errors. Combined with a set of mathematical equations, these eight Error parameters form the "model" of your mount's pointing errors. This model is used to correct your telescope pointing. The Error parameters are also stored in the Windows Registry, so they automatically reappear when you restart the software.
The Observations that were used to generate these parameters are not automatically saved, so it is recommended that you do so. When you reload an old observation file, the model parameters (Errors) are automatically recalculated. This means you can easily switch back and forth between two models, etc.
There are two scenarios where you might want to change only part of your model. The first instance is in a permanent observatory, when the telescope loses its pointing on the sky (due to power failure, hitting a hard limit, etc.). You can "sync" your telescope on the sky, but this may result in your pointing being slightly biased elsewhere in the sky. (Tip: If possible do your sync from the control software through MaxPoint, rather than on the telescope hand paddle. This will be more accurate because it takes the model into account.)
Simply doing a sync may be sufficient for your purposes. For the best pointing, you want to redo the model, but that could be very time consuming. Fortunately, that is not your only option. You've only lost your sync position on the sky; the polar alignment and mechanical properties of your telescope have not changed at all. You only need to fix up Hour Angle Bias and Declination Bias. It turns out that these two parameters don't require a lot of observations to measure accurately. Just half a dozen points spread around the sky is often sufficient. So what we want to do is "freeze" the other six Error parameters in the model, and then do a short calibration run just to fix up just the HA/Dec Bias errors. That is exactly what Recal Permanent does. It allows you to "repair" your model without a time-consuming long calibration run.
What about portable mounts? You can often reassemble your telescope exactly the same way as before, so the mechanical offsets and flexure characteristics are identical (caveat: this will not be the case if you change cameras, add a finderscope, significantly change the balance, etc.).
Now you have the same HA/Dec Bias problem as with the permanent mount, and you have also inevitably changed your polar alignment. Now you need to update the Bias error parameters as before, plus the Polar Azimuth and Polar Altitude error parameters. That is what Recal Portable is for; it locks the other four parameters and allows you to update just the four Bias and Polar parameters. Again, you can do this in fewer observations; perhaps 6-12 might be all that is required.
To summarize, using Recal Portable or Recal Permanent allows you to have the benefits of a previous long calibration run (e.g. 100 points) while needing only a relatively small number of additional observations. This can be a great time saver.