Digital Level Inclinometer

[Guest peepshow]

Not sure if this is the correct forum section for this but...........

 

In hunting around for info and useful items I might use I came upon digital level inclinometers

on good ol' Ebay.

 

These have long arms, ( about 18 inches),  and the cheaper makes can measure any angle within an accuracy  of 6 minutes.  The more  expensive ones are accurate to within 1/2 minute  !

 

 

They have spirit levels built in so one could set the angle of the celestial pole and the long arm of the level would point to the pole, or any other point in the sky.

 

Even in the Southern hemisphere one could site the southern pole within this  accuracy.

 

I wondered if any one has used these digital inclinometers for astro work in any way and are they what is claimed of them.

Edited July 19, 2013 by peepshow

[Guest Kheldar]

Most people looking at a solution like this buy a Wixey

 

I can't comment on the effectiveness of either though - sorry!

[Daz Type-R]

I use a wixey when polar aligning my dob (don't ask.....   ) and searching for hard to see dso's.

 

I have a cheap spirit level and then reset the wixey to zero, using astro software to get the alt/az co-ordinates of DSO's etc, I have found my wixey to be 0.4 degrees off, which is a fair bit, but now I know to compensate for it, it is not an issue and I can find objects within a minute or so, mainly less.

[Brantuk]

+1 for the Wixey angle guage - calibrate it on a surface you know to be 100% level at home before you go to a session and it works fine (for me at least). They're dead cheap, magnetic - stick to any convenient part of your scope, and very effective when you know the co-ordinates.

[Daz Type-R]

Just a note in case any body was wondering, the Wixey only gives you ALT degrees not AZ, in the case of a dob you need a setting circle to give you AZ (Azimuth).

 

(best to point out the obvious for any newbies)

[Guest peepshow]

OK everyone on all that.

"Wixey" is a new word for me, whiskey isn't

 

I was thinking of trying to make a very accurate template for the celestial pole angle

to help set up my tracker, although I am also knocking up a small scope with

cross hairs and a marker to show the Polaris offset.

 

But I see you guys use the Wixey to pin point other stella objects so

that will be the road I might go when I have finished my tracker.

.......now a little bit further up the many  learning curves for me

[Tweedledee]

 

"Wixey" is a new word for me, whiskey isn't

 

I also find it very useful, might even try a wixey one day

[BAZ]

This is the one I bought, purely for the fact it has a built in spirit level. This is accurate to 1/10th of a degree, and is bang on for calibrating the digital gauge.

 

http://www.amazon.co.uk/Digital-Protractor-Inclinometer-Leather-Batteries/dp/B004UBDHDM/ref=sr_1_4/278-5775507-1481302?ie=UTF8&qid=1374313279&sr=8-4&keywords=wixey+digital+angle+gauge

 

Don't forget that any spirit level needs to be checked for accuracy, they are not all level when bought from the shop. The cheap and cheerful ones are set in plaster, or some other medium which goes off slowly to allow them to set the bubble. If they are off, they are always out.

Get a clear glass jar or jug, and fill with water, put your spirit level above this and compare, the water level is accurate.

[Daz Type-R]

Cracking idea Martyn, will give that a try on mine, I thought a spirit level was accurate no matter what the price but what you said makes sense.

[Guest peepshow]

Thanks for that Martyn. 

 

It occurs to me that one of these could be used for dec angles and another one

 for RA.  One could have a set of conversion tables from arc degrees to RA time as

1 minute of arc is 4 minutes of time in RA.

 

On my barn door tracker it would be easy to do this.  As my interest is DSO then finding the

little blighters will be quite hard without some form of pre alignment of my camera.

 

I found a  site where there are plans to build one's own digital setting circles

using rotary encoders, but quite a lot of work required. Here's a link for anyone who

maybe interested.............

http://eksfiles.net/digital-setting-circles/

[BAZ]

Richard,if you download and use Stellarium, it gives you co-ordinates in alt/az, so it's dead easy to use.

 

Have a look at Daz's mods (click the link in his signature) he has fitted a printed azimuth scale. Again this is easy to do. 

I had a rotary encoder on my Dob when I bought it. However, I found that it picked up and amplified errors, ending up over 4 degrees out. That got removed and a printed AZ circle fitted.

Have a word with Perkil8r, he sorted out the printing for me, and it's a lot cheaper than the electronic jobby.

[BAZ]

This is similar to the one I took off. Mine may have a fault with it, and that's why I get problems, the accuracy of the one shown is very acceptable though.

It might also be a cost effective way of doing it, but I prefer the printed/ stick on one.

 

http://www.machine-dro.co.uk/angle-measurement/rotary-angle-encoder-and-remote-display-with-a-6mm-diameter-shaft.html

[Guest peepshow]

This is similar to the one I took off. Mine may have a fault with it, and that's why I get problems, the accuracy of the one shown is very acceptable though.

It might also be a cost effective way of doing it, but I prefer the printed/ stick on one.

 

http://www.machine-dro.co.uk/angle-measurement/rotary-angle-encoder-and-remote-display-with-a-6mm-diameter-shaft.html

 

Now this one has a shaft.  If one used a 4/1 step down spur gears then each degree on the rotary encoder would

equal 1 minute in RA. 

That might be useful providing gear backlash was removed. (small rotary torque spring)

 

One might have two mounted side by side to see Dec and RA together.

 

Yes, thanks Martyn,  I have downloaded Stellarium.  Great piece of kit.

 

 Also downloaded Registax (5 and 6 !), Astro video, Astro snap, Sharpcap,

Deepskystacker, and quite a few others.............

 

...........and the kitchen sink too    (very useful for washing camera lenses in !!! )

 

I downloaded all these just to see what I might be able to do eventually.   So I have much of the software

but no telescope or camera yet.

 

Thanks again to all for useful suggestions and ideas.