[Quatermass]

For all of you that have a skywatcher 200p and the EQ5 mount and are considering guiding set ups I am putting this thread up so you can follow my progress.

Step 1. Ordered the parts I need first the EQ5 Dual axis kit from Rother Valley Optics they have just got a batch of them in today when I called them this morning. Cost of that is 95.89 total should be with me by Friday.



Step 2. Order the Guide port conversion kit for eq style mounts from Optic star total cost 12.60p
Heres the guide port kit


£108.49p for both the Dual Axis kit and Guide port conversion kit so far. Will update any further costs.

The Plan..
Add the dual axis motor kit then solder on the Guide port so I can then connect my LVI auto guider here is the pdf file (attached) for soldering on the Guide port kit easy to do and straight forward, I have that on good authority from Stan and others on the forum who have done this already.

If you dont have an auto guider you could use a webcam and laptop software as Stan had done with great success.I am using an auto guider because I dont want to use a laptop outside although others are very happy to do that.

For the guide scope I plan to convert my sky watcher 10x50 finder scope to use as the guide scope.

I will keep this thread updated as the parts arrive and let you all know how things work out, wish me luck
QM Going over to the darker side...

[austen4]

Looks good Quartermass. I will definitely be watching this thread as I need to get a guide scope and only yesterday I have seen this.

Hope it all goes well

[Quatermass]

This is the skywatcher 9x50 finder scope that I will be converting to a guiding scope. If any one else has already done this I would like to hear from them

[Daniel-K]

i did try but fail'd o was using a webcam but many people have good resluts with a finder guider.i think my issue was just a focus thing so i just went for the easy option with the st80 and qhy5. modern astrnomy do the adaptors to allow web cams and qhy5's to screw into the finders

[Quatermass]

I found this thread which looks well cool on the conversion..
http://stargazerslounge.com/diy-astr...onversion.html

[Dodge]

Watching this thread! I have the same scope and mount (albeit undriven at this point) and I saw your blog and some of your pics are outstanding, especially considering they are unguided.

Looking forward to reading your results.

[Quatermass]

I have a mate who is a cool metal sculpturer going to make the finder scope adapter for me
http://andy-jarrett-sculptor.com/

Sent from my GT-S5670 using Tapatalk

[Quatermass]

Ok Day 2 of the project.
Very impressed with Optic Star who delivered my Guide port conversion kit for the eq5 mount. I got it this morning having ordered it yesterday at lunch time. It arrived with a printed out instruction manual and was well packaged total cost for this item was 12.60p.
Here are some pictures of it for your reference.












Glad that came so quickly 10 out of 10 for Optic Stars delivery service now waiting for the Dual Axis kit from Rother Valley Optics and were on to the next stage. The ST4 port kit has a good printed manual which is basically the PDF file I have attached to this thread but nice to have all the same.

The ST4 conversion kit parts look bigger then you think quite chunky so here is my 10m sky-watcher eye piece next to it so you can judge the size better.

[Quatermass]

I expect this thread to get quite big so I will take all the info from it when its finished and condense it down to put it on my blog so others will all ways be able to find it if needed

[Quatermass]

Well my my things are going well, the post man just delivered my EQ5 dual axis kit at 1pm having ordered it yesterday at the same time! Well done to Rother Valley Optics for fast and efficient delivery and well packaged. Heres the pics.









All the parts looked in good condition and now its time to get out the soldering iron and solder on those wires. Pics and details to follow...

[Quatermass]

On to stage 3 putting in the ST4 port on the dual axis control pad and soldering it on. Well I am rubbish at this sort of thing and cant remember the last time I used my soldering iron so if your fearful of wires and soldring irons then take heart this was really easy to do.

Very simply just follow the instructions step by step and you will have no problems I found it a breeze to do just make sure you do it on a flat table in a well lit area so you can see what your doing.

First of all gently prize off the caps from the control pad with two small flat screw drivers they come off very easy just be gentle.



Next you undo the 4 screws that hold the plate down following the instructions and putting the screws in a safe place, I just laid them out on my desk in the order I took them off there's not a lot of them so dont worry.



Next you gently lift back the main panel as per the instructions.



Having done that I then pulled back the circuit board after undoing the screws and just got it out of the way so I could drill the hole with out going anywhere near the circuit board. I simply held the plastic case between my legs and drilled it with a hand drill, very easy.



Ok after that was done I undid the little nuts that hold the wires down in the clamp bit and gently pushed the ST4 port wires in place leaving about half an inch of the black part of the casing wire showing.



I then soldered on the wires with my rubbish soldering skills being non existent its a good idea to get someone else to help hold things steady for you here but it was easy to do. I really am rubbish at soldering so if I can do it you can to.



So that done put everthing back and your done here is the finished control pad with the st4 port hooked in,I left about 3 feet of wire from the kit on because I was too scared to cut it shorter but it will be useful if I need to step back away from my scope. The control pad is held by an old cutlery holder that I cut down and fastened to my telescope with cable ties it makes a great holder for the control pad



Ohh getting excited now so on to installing the dual axis kit.
This was easy peasy so just a few pics to show them in place a child could put them in just follow the instructions.

The RA drive in place


The DA drive in place


Tested that all out and all worked fine, Hooray..

Now for the clever bit.
We need to turn the skywatcher finder scope into a guide scope but I cant wait for my mate to make me a metal adapter so we need to put our thinking caps on..

This was my solution pure canny genuis I feel

Take the end of the finder scope. The get a piece of foam from the auto guider box that happens to have a hole that fits perfectly the size of my 2x Barlow lens.. Ah ha..

Now cut it to size..





Now place the foam inside the finder scope and insert the 2x Barlow lens.. then insert into the barlow lens your auto guider camera, oh yes baby



Its snug tight fit and you can easily adjust it for focusing..
Plus you can remove it all and have your finder scope back to normal easy as can be.

And for the finishing touch why not add a cut down led christmas light so you can illuminate your polar scope instead of your now dead christmas tree



And that my friends is the Quatermass exsperiment almost complete.
Its looking to be nice clear night so I can now take all this lot outside and see if all my hard work had paid off.

Hopefully it will all go according to plan and I can at long last start having a fully guided system. I will report back tomorrow wish me luck
QM

[bamus]

wow! this is briliant! its much easier than I thought it would be. wish I have seen this kind of instructions before I have spent £300 on GOTO upgrade kit. Love X-mas light!

[Quatermass]

Now going out side to try it all out for the first time lovely crescent moon and Venus out already.. how excited am I lol

[Rob L]

Good luck with it, hope it all goes smoothly.

[stan26]

Brilliant write up so far QM, good luck with you first guide attempt, hopefully that foam mod will hold the LVI secure enough not to give any diff flex...? that said on a 50mm finder it shouldn't be to noticeable if at all. I'll be keeping an eye on your progress, and I'm sure many others will to.

Stan

[Quatermass]

Hallelua! It works well almost.. I found out after piddling around for sometime with my finder scope that my LVI camera requires very precise focusing. First you have to find a bright star beetlejuice was my choice tonight. Then focus on the star then take the 25m wide angle lens out and with the start centred you have to use the little focuser supplyed with the LVI to get it very sharp. My poor little foam effort just is not going to work as I cant finely adjust with it. So I put the camera in the main telescope focuser and tryed again. Beetlejuice had drifted off target by then so it said no star found. Grrr by this time I was getting cold and grumpy. I refocused the star and tryed again.
Success! this time it found the guide star and I could calibrate it correctly. Then the moment of great joy arrived the LVI screen lit up with the following message.

So now I just need to refine my guide scope focusing and were good to go.
Phew what a relief!

[austen4]

Great! well done. I am glad it works as I am going to try it with my HEQ5. Would you say it would be worth buying a proper guide scope or is the finder scope good enough for the job?

Well done again!

[Quatermass]

Hi Austin
I think the Heq5 already has a guide port doesn't it?

[stan26]

Congrats QM!! That moment you have been waiting for....

I know the feeling when that message appears on the screen for the first time. You can't help but smile......and take a picture!

Stan

[stan26]

BTW with regards to the HEQ5, I may be completely wrong here but the I think the *standard* HEQ5 has NO guide port interface. It just has a basic Dual axis controller similar to the EQ5. The Syntrek version have the ST4 port (i stand to be corrected).....

Stan

[Quatermass]

Ah I see well in that case this would work. I did have some trouble though as when it was calibrating it said motor not working, if I skipped calibration the guide display should just one axis being altered. Took it back in and double checked my soldering sure enough on of the wires had come away so be sure to make good strong solder joints and that there all attached securely when you put it back together, that took me ages to suss out but all is well now.
I did smile when it said guiding Stan smiled and sighed a big big sigh of relieve as well!

[stan26]

I must admit I was genuinely nervous the first time I fired up PHD and hit the guide function. I hit the button and walked away saying to myself that it'll never work. A few moments later I went back into my garage where the laptop was and was gobsmacked to find bettlejuice perfectly centred in the cross hairs and that magical word "guiding" in the bottom left corner of the window

Now its just a matter of fine tuning everything and get that guide scope adapter made up. I found that when guiding the whole balance of everything makes life so much easier. Once you find the optimum balance point on the mount, keep it there! I have even put marks on the weight shaft etc.

Also QM, Precise polar alignment may not be an issue anymore. My PA was very very accurate tune over many nights on my pier so it always stayed put, but PHD couldn't handle it being this accurate. The star would move ever so slightly off in DEC over a long period of time but PHD wouldn't follow because the movement was so small! Doesn't make sense does it. So I have had to purposely move my PA off slightly in az. Many others have experienced this problem. I'm not sure if this will be the same with the LVI.......

Stan

[Quatermass]

Hi Stan
Well tonight's tentative go at guiding has come up with a few things that need sorting out first the finder scope come guide scope I dont think is going to work that well as the LVI is very fussy about focusing and with the guide camera in the main telescopes focuser tonight for a good testing, I can see that I will need a guide scope on the shopping list but that's ok I still have a bit left for that.

Second issue is that when it has found a star and shows you where it is centred if it is slightly off and you press calibrate it gets ready to move the motors to calibrate then says motor not moving. This is more due to the slow response of the motors that need a bit of fine tuning. If I ignore the calibration step and the star is reasonably in the centre of the cameras view and press load it then gets ready to guide I press start and it starts guiding with both x and y axis showing adjustments going on to each axis so it is guiding. One thing I have come away with tonight is that everything has to be fairly accurate which is not my usual style at all so that's going to be a challenge for me.

Like all new things its going to take some getting used to but I'm glad that it is working and I now am able to use my LVI guider. Until the clouds rolled in it was guiding for over half an hour so that was impressive enough for me.
Now all I have to do is get the guide scope sorted out properly and I should be ok.
It feels good to have done this took a bit of fiddling about but it was worth the effort.

[austen4]

Originally Posted by stan26

BTW with regards to the HEQ5, I may be completely wrong here but the I think the *standard* HEQ5 has NO guide port interface. It just has a basic Dual axis controller similar to the EQ5. The Syntrek version have the ST4 port (i stand to be corrected).....

Stan

This is correct and therefore I should be able to solder the wires on. I have a few questions that if you have time to answer would be great :

1. Do many Guide camera's have a st4 port?
2. You talked about being precise, what would this include?
3. I take it the guiding software will adapt to the motor gearing?

Thank you very much for trying the mod, great money saver.

[Stagman]

Interesting! .... just received my LVI 2 today and hopefully be able to try it out over the weekend

I was also considering using the 9 X 50 finder as a guidescope. What was the problem with focus?