Getting Started with Voyager and SkyGazer

Controlling Your Telescope

Once the telescope is aligned, Voyager can now drive it across the sky. Click on an object in Voyager's sky chart window to select it. Your selected object is now the target object for the telescope. You can press the Go To button in Voyager's Info Panel or Telescope Panel to slew the telescope to the target. If your telescope does not support Go To commands, these buttons will be disabled, and you will have to move your telescope manually. But the bullseye will still indicate your telescope's field of view in Voyager's sky chart window.

You can "emergency stop" the telescope while it is slewing by clicking the Stop Slewing button. You may need to do this to prevent the telescope from bumping something or someone nearby.

Most telescopes don't have perfect pointing accuracy - the mount may be slightly mis-aligned, or its axes might be slightly non-perpendicular. Hence, you may need to "nudge" the telescope slightly to center the target object in its field of view. You can use your telescope's hand controller to do this; or you can use the arrow buttons in Voyager's Telescope Panel. To set the motion rate (i.e., how fast the telescope moves when you press the arrow buttons), use the slider to the left of the buttons.

Note that some telescopes don't support these commands, and if so the arrow buttons and slider in Voyager's telescope control panel will be disabled.

Once you have precisely centered your target object, press the Align button in Voyager's Telescope Panel to synchronize your telescope's position with the object's. This tells the telescope that it is now pointing directly at the object; once you've done this, slewing the telescope to other nearby objects should be much more accurate.

If you slew the telescope to faint target object in a very different part of the sky, you may want to align the telescope (using the procedure above) on a bright star near the faint target first. That should make it easier to find and center the target in the telescope's field of view.

Back: Setting Up Your Telescope
Next: Updating Your Software

Copyright February, 2011

Carina Software & Instruments, Inc