Safety and Security of Equipment

For your safety and to avoid damaging the AstroLab telescopes, CCDs, etc, the following points are crucial:

Do not open any dome when the Sun is above the horizon unless authorised by the AstroLab supervisor. Looking at the Sun, even for the shortest fraction of a second, will cause instant and irreversible eye damage.
The AstroLab telescopes are limited to looking at objects with declination (Dec) less than +65° because of the attachment of the flip-box and CCD. Don't attempt to observe any object north of Dec +65° or serious damage may result if the CCD hits the fork mount. If the 'co-ordinate matched' (Sync) procedure has been wrongly carried out, e.g. the telescope pointed at Vega but the handset matched on Altair, then there is a serious risk of a collision.
Never adjust the RA or Dec manual knobs when the LX200 power is on. Serious damage to the drive motors could result. These knobs are only used for aligning on terrestrial targets, i.e. street lights, when the telescope power is off.
When sending the telescope on a large slew always check that the cables are not snagging the telescope as it moves. Note the abort procedure and always know which way the telescope is expected to move.
Do not touch any optical surface of the telescope.
When you finish observing, if not working remotely, check that the telescope power is off. If the power is left on, the telescope will continue to track and serious damage will occur.
Leave the dome PC on at all times. If the PC is switched off it can become cold and damp and stop working.

jrl

2013-Dec-22 23:33:29 UTC