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Sonny,

I already posted to do a factory reset a few weeks ago.?

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Chip Louie Chief Daydreamer Imagination Hardware?

? ?Astropheric Weather Forecast - South Pasadena, CA?

Hi Mike,

When you cleaned the worm did you actually disassemble the aluminum clutch discs with the translucent plastic clutch disc sandwiched in between? The plastic clutch discs and both aluminum clutch discs must be totally free of grease or you get sticky movement even with the clutch knobs loose AND you cannot get the clutches to lock well no matter how tight you make them.?

Other problems I've seen on people's mounts are the aluminum clutch disc on the axles are not perpendicular to the axles which causes a slip, grab slip grab with the clutch knobs free. The ever popular damaged or contaminated bearings, the slightest dirt can cause havoc, misaligned or not fully seated bearing caps and bent axles.?

I would suggest inspecting the bearing caps to see that they are seated, you can check them by using a feeler gauge and confirming that the gap between the main mount body and the bearing caps is perfectly even all around the mount. If not you will need to reseat them to square the bearings on the axle.?

You can verify the axle is not wobbly by using a couple V-blocks and a dial indicator. Support the axle on the ends and place the indicator in the center, zero and rotate the axle. Swap the indicator with one of the V-blocks and check again, if it is out of true this is one issue you can check off. There may be more than one problem and in my experience it pays to check all potential issues before reassembly.

Just a few more things that are easy and quick to check out.?

Keep us posted.?
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Chip Louie Chief Daydreamer Imagination Hardware?

? ?Astropheric Weather Forecast - South Pasadena, CA?

I’m just freely spinning the saddle with my hand. If the ring gear spins with the saddle, I.e the worm gear is removed, everything spins freely. If I replace the worm gear, and have the clutch loose, the ring gear can not spin anymore bc it is engaged with the worm. How’re when I try to spin the saddle freely it sticks in a couple spots. ?So that is why I suspect the clutch

hopefully that makes it more clear. ?I noticed it was sticky trying to balance my telescope and I have been messing with it trying to figure it out. I don’t think it’s the bears as it spins nice when the worm is out.?

the other thing I note is if the clutch knob is really loose, it is almost like the RA shaft wants to unscrew itself out of the. Oh that’s, like the bottom threads are engages in the bearing. Maybe it has something to do with it?

mike

Going back to bone simple...
Have you tried a Factory Reset?
(I'm assuming your G11 has a Gemini II. Because I am ignorant if this is available with a Gemini I.)
Just thought I would through that in there. (Not that I'm ignorant. That maybe a Factory Reset could help flush any turds out of the controller.)

One other thing I've made a habit of is to use the Quick Start. It gives me a review of my settings, then drops me at a cold start.
But with the assurance my settings are hunky-dory, before I start. ;^)
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SonnyE


(I suggest viewed in full screen)

Possibly a bit of a tight spot in one of the needle bearings. You can rince them with WD40, then turp, dry thoroughly and regrease lightly. Sliding the RA axis in the other way (knob side) can help re-aligning them as well, if you have three. Or maybe your end plate is not square to the axis anymore (sag) or the shaft is slightly bent, although I doubt it.

Hi Mike

I"m not sure at what point of re-assembly you found the RA is a bit sticky. did you put your telescope back on??

>>>When I put the worm back in the RA assembly would have that stickiness again

this sounds to me like it could be a worm gear meshing too tight. i'm not sure what else you saw the leads you to the clutch

Brian

I did just this in the afternoon. I cleaned everything pretty well. But I found when I removed the worm the entire assembly of ring gear and everything spun freely. When I put the worm back in the RA assembly would have that stickiness again. It seems to be the clutch, even fully loosened it’s a bit sticky. Make it harder to balance in RA. Dec spins freely, just assumed the RA axis would as well.

Mike

Hi Doug

one more thing regarding the polar scope, and your comment "The app I have on my phone to match the reticle never seems to be in the same position when looking through the reticle of the polar scope...."

just to confirm, you rotate the polar scope so the position of polaris would line up with the app on your phone


Brian

Hi Doug

"?I verified the coordinates and UTC time."

just confirming, the time you should be entering into Gemini should be local time, and the timezone should offset that to UTC. you should not enter UTC time

"Using the buttons I could manually slew to where I wanted, but the tracking was off.? "

if tracking is off (I assume you can visually see it not tracking correctly), Chip mentioned some of these before, but recapping the possible causes:

- incorrect mount type selected
- incorrect gearing for the mount (check the gearing page for G11, the first two should be RA Worm Gear 360 and DEC Worm Gear 360)
- not on sidereal tracking (lunar, solar, custom, etc.)
- motor cables plugged in to the wrong port (RA/DEC cables reversed)

Some of the above could also contribute to or cause inaccurate gotos

Brian

I'm hoping to get back out one night this week and try in my backyard. ?I'll post back with my results.

I don't know if the GPS has the firmware fix for GPS rollover. ?But I did verify everything. ?Using the buttons I could manually slew to where I wanted, but the tracking was off. ?The polar alignment was good, but then it would overshoot everything in the GOTO, including trying to use stars to verify alignment.

Yep, all the wires were connected properly. ?I always check and double check before powering on.

Thanks, Michael!

The gears definitely were not slipping, I did check all of that. ?I always cold start, so I don't think that was the issue. ?I thought the Cold Start always deleted previous data.
As for the others, everything was tight, so the tracking was not off because of that.
And the GPS is brand new. ?I bought it from OPTCorp website the week before. ?I verified the coordinates and UTC time.
The tracking mode was sidereal, I haven't changed that at all.

I haven't had a chance to set the mount up again to try, but I'm hoping to one night this week. ?

Doug

I was using the GPS, so it pulled data from there automatically. ?I did verify it was correct.

Mike- I recently purchased a second hand G11 and found the RA axis very difficult to move with the gears removed. I removed the RA head, removed, cleaned and regreased the bearings and it solved it completely. I carefully inspected all of the bearings and if any looked anything other than perfect I was prepared to order replacements. In my case, they all looked good and cleaning and grease was all that was needed. If you're at all mechanically inclined I'd recommend going one level deeper into your mount and see what you find.

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Thanks guys. Jupiter and Saturn pass at the zenith every evening now. Here's a quick animation of Jupiter and two of its moons in the field over a period of ~1h.

Hi Mike

is your worm gear engaged? If you are comfortable with disassembly you might try disengaging your worm gear and rotating the RA shaft to isolate if it's the shaft itself or something related to the gearing

Hi Mike,
I don't have an answer for you, there I know there are members here who do.
So hang on until the cavalry arrives.
--
SonnyE


(I suggest viewed in full screen)