My first Magazine Sky & Telescope - 02.2019

S&T Test Report of bright stars, visible planets, and the Moon were given as alignment choices, including Jupiter, which was well-placed in the south. I selected the gas giant, and the scope slewed around to the bright planet dutifully, though I could tell just sighting down the tube of the scope that it was off quite a bit, prob- ably due to the compass app pointing to magnetic north rather than celestial north several degrees away. I then loos- ened the altitude and azimuth clamps and just moved the scope to where Jupi- ter was located. With most mounts, this would immediately ruin the alignment routine. But the AZ-GTi has internal encoders that detect the movement of the axes when you do this, and it knows how much you’ve moved the scope, as if it was done with the hand controller. I was using a 55-mm Tele Vue Plössl eyepiece, which produces an extremely wide ﬁ eld at 7.6×, essentially eliminat- ing the need for a ﬁ nder scope. With this combination, Jupiter really looked like a bright star, but I could tell what it was from the bright Galilean moons close by the planet. I centered Jupiter in the ﬁ eld with the slow-motion controls in the app and synced on it. I then popped in a 13-mm Tele Vue Type 5 Nagler, producing 32×. Jupiter u Sky-Watcher’s free SynScan app for An- droid and iOS devices is extremely easy to use. It includes several alignment routines, a basic catalog of named stars, several dozen double stars, and several deep-sky object catalogs. The mount can also be controlled with other plan- etarium apps, though they need to connect through the SynScan app. was a big blob that quickly snapped into focus using the Evo- star’s dual-speed 10:1 Crayford-style focuser. The gas giant’s ruddy Northern and Southern Equatorial Belts were easy to see, though not much else was as I cursed myself for not bringing one of my higher power eyepieces. As a veteran user of Go To mounts, I’d long ago learned not to expect much accuracy from a single-star alignment with an alt-azimuth mount, but just for fun I decided to slew to my favorite globular cluster M13 to see how far I was off. I knew when I looked in the eyepiece it would not be there, and I was right. Dreading the hunting game, before popping in the even wider eyepiece I decided to move just a little bit around, and on my ﬁ rst jog, in came the faint, fuzzy, round object that was unmistakably M13. In my light-polluted Florida skies with only a 72-mm optic, the scope didn’t resolve any stars in the cluster, but it was there, and it reminded me of the ﬁ rst time I’d ever found this object with my 60-mm department-store scope decades earlier. Notably, this was certainly much easier than that had been way back then. For my next evening out with the system, I set up in my own driveway with a wider range of eyepieces on hand to better gauge the Evostar’s opti- cal performance. A bright Moon was out, so that, along with several bright planets, was easy prey. Again, I pointed north and was on Jupiter in less than ﬁ ve minutes from the time I stepped out my front door (I'd previously put the scope outside to acclimate to the temperature). q Left: The 72-mm doublet objective includes an ED element for superior color correction. Middle: Sky-Watcher’s AZ-GTi Go To mount includes “Freedom Find” auxiliary encoders that precisely track movements on both axes regardless of whether you move the mount using the app controls or the optional SynScan hand controller, or you loosen the clutches (arrowed) and move the scope manually. Right: The AZ-GTi includes ports to connect an optional SynScan hand controller, an external DC power supply, and a SNAP port that connects directly to most DSLR and Mirrorless cameras. 60 FE B RUA RY 2 019 • SK Y & TELESCOPE

My first Magazine Sky & Telescope - 02.2019 | Page 62