Moon @ 71.3% 1/11/22

This was not my intended target last night, I make it a point not to shoot the Moon greater than 50% however I thought I could image a DSO well below the Moon since it will be my only clear night sky for a while and then I must wait for the full Moon to come and go.

I had two equipment problems last night. First one of my two dew strips shorted out and burned up the controller. Not to worry, I thought I could still get my DSO however Sharp Cap could not plate solve the area around Polaris.

No polar alignment, no imaging the DSO.

There is a small probability that I was trying to align on the wrong star (0.001%) but Sharp Cap would solve the star map but then not be able to. I will test the ZWO 125mm guide scope today.

Question: Could the ZWO 125 mm guide scope become out of focus?

Any help on this is Greatly Appreciated.

So after an hour and a half of trying to align the mount I just fell back to: “When the Moon is out, shoot the Moon.” This image is greatly cropped if you can’t tell.