ABSTRACT
The latest trend in mount design is to add modern electronic and software components into the system to deliver precise pointing and tracking abilities to accommodate all manner of mechanical limitations and atmospheric effects. A telescope mount on its own is a dumb pair of motors, that is, until it is connected to a computer that models the mechanical, astronomical and optical properties of its environment. A “model” in this instance refers to a complex multi-variable equation that correlates the mechanical properties of the mount and telescope with an aligned star database and the optical characteristics of the Earth’s atmosphere. There are two types; a pointing model and a tracking model.
