malc-c

It certainly wasn't one of  the scopes listed in the UK when I was the Product Manager for Tasco in the early 1980's.  We didn't cater for the serious astronomer  back then, with the 4.5" 11TR being the largest model imported.  

Rob, 

The other thing is that all of us assumed the simplest thing of having the wires crossed wouldn't be the case, afterall that is normally the first thing to check.  Maybe from now on if anyone reports power type issues I and others won't make that assumption and suggest checking the polarity of the supply, even if it prompts an "Of course... what do you take me for, I'm not a wally !" type reply 

At least it shows that Skywatcher's protection built into their new boards works !! 

Glad you're all sorted 

7 hours ago, Rob B said:

Can anyone tell me if the AZ-EQ6 mount will switch on without the syscan hand controller being connected?

My AZEQ6 will not switch on with or without the synscan.

When I disconnect the synscan from the mount and connect it to a standalone power supply the synscan does power up but is erratic and keeps resetting itself.

For clarity, in normal operation the synscan handset gets its 12v power from the mount.  It is possible to power just the handset via USB (on the later versions of handsets) or via the barrel jack.  Its always difficult to diagnose faults that are intermittent.  They can be power supply issues, or a component that is failing but not completely failed. 

If you have access to a test meter, its worth checking the voltage at the mount when the supply is under load.  I don't know about the AZ-EQ6, but HEQ5 and EQ6 mounts work better at 13.8v rather than 12v.

If you are sure the issue is in the board power / buck convertor circuitry then I'm willing to have a look as per our PMs.  But I thought you were going to contact the retailer as the board is around 3 years old ?

Oh and forgot to add that the first PSU is used in my observatory came from maplin, and one night it went pop and took my mount out with it....

Quote

Hi Malcolm,

Thank you for the support! 
I have tested the steps above and I got these results...

"rule out the motors, remove them from the mount and see if the same issue occurs.":
I did and it gave pretty much same results as before; 
DEC motor - same, runs 5-15 sec then stops. It runs a bit longer in one direction and in the direction where it runs shorter it makes more noise but I'm not sure that has any significance.
RA motor - same, runs as long as you press the arrow buttons.

"swap the motors over at the point where they connect to the motor board.: 
Only one at the time was connected (see photo), i e I did not swap and connect DEC to RA board and vice versa at the same time (it caused the motors to "hack" after a second or so). 
The results were telling:
DEC motor connected to RA board - DEC motor runs as long as you hold the button!
RA motor on DEC board (see photo) - motor stops after 5-8 sec.

I have checked the board and the wires but I can't see anything that looks loose or bad soldering (see photos)
It's of course possible that there is a bad connection in the cable that connects the boards but I can't see that.

So, I guess we are talking about having to change the PCB?

Kind regards,
Magnus

So if I follow this right.

• Dec motor connected to the DEC connection the result is a 5-15 second run and then stops
• RA motor connected to the RA connection the motor runs fine 
• Dec motor connected to the RA connection the motor runs without issue
• RA motor connected to the DEC connection and it runs for 5-15 seconds

This does indeed suggest that the motors are fine and points the finger at the DEC board as being the cause.  

Its not clear form the pictures as to how they connect... Are the RJ ports used for inter board connections or are they used to connect the steppers to each board ?  If they are  interlink connections and you have access to a multi-meter (DVM) then you could check continuity of the cables (if you do this by touching the solder joints of the RJ connector with the cable in place then it also confirms the connection of the RJ plug and RJ socket as well).  If the fault remains the same regardless which cable is used between boards then that rules the cables out.  

The part that I'm struggling with is what's causing it to run fine and then cut out in that 5-15 seconds.  I'm not familiar with the system myself, but is there an option to update the firmware via a PC application.  If so you could see if that works.  If the firmware flashing is performed without any errors and the fault still occurs then it could possibly be the driver side of the board.  Do any of the chips on the DEC board get hot when the motor runs ?

You mention that the DEC motor seems to buzz when it stops.  Can you confirm that the motors used are steppers and not DC servo motors (I can see what looks like an encoder disk and the letters "enc" are visible on the silk screen of the PCB).  It may be irrelevant as the driver chips look to form an H bridge and if one side has failed then it might explain the buzzing from the motor.

Chances are that a replacement board isn't available as a single litem and so a complete package has t be purchased.   

Depending on the age of the mount you may have a case under consumer law to have the board replaced.  The fact that it might be out of warranty is irrelevant as its the fact that you would normally expect something to last for a reasonable length of time.  The only caveat  is that it would be clear that the mount has been opened up and "messed with" .  If getting the retailer involved is not an option then before you look at getting a complete new goto kit let me have details of the chips involved and I would be willing to have a go at repairing the board.  I can't promise I will be able to fix it, and there would be some costs involved such as postage and parts but it's an option.  But you then have the weigh up the costs against that of a new complete kit.   Drop me a PM if you want me to take a look at the board and we can go form there.  I can make out that the microcontrollers used are PIC 16F chips, but can't make out the actual part numbers.  Same goes for the smaller chips. If you could let me know what they are I could at least confirm that I can still get them.  If the drivers have been discontinued / or impossible to source then that would scupper the repair before we started 

Thanks Stu for the recommendation.  Rob has dropped me a PM.

To rule out the motors, remove them from the mount and see if the same issue occurs.  If it does then this suggests that the issue is electronic related rather than a mechanical issue such as a stuck bearing, thick grease restricting movement or bent shafts etc.   The next thing to try is to swap the motors over at the point where they connect to the motor board.  If the issue moves with the motor then this would suggest the issue is a faulty motor which will need replacing.  If the issue doesn't follow the motor, and remains on the same output then both motors are fine and the issue is with the control board or handset.  I've not read through the linked thread, but commercially there are two options available, a basic hand set or a goto handset. If its the goto handset then the fact the motor responds to the initial command to slew to a target suggests the handset would not be the cause.

My gut feeling is that it's either a connectivity issue (the mount seems to be very similar to a Skywatcher EQ5 which used DIN plugs and leads between the two motors), so its worth checking that the motor wires are soldered nicely to the back of the DIN terminals, or that there is continuity between pins at either end of the cables. There was a thread where someone else has a fault on one axis and it was down to one wire on the back of a DIN socket that was just hanging on by one strand which would disconnect through movement).   

If after checking that and no bad solder joints are found, and all connections and cables check out OK then this just leaves the motor board as the cause.  If it all points to the board as being the culprit then it's likely to be one of the H bridge driver chips.  However replacing one is not something that someone with limited soldering experience could do.  99% of the Skywatcher boards I've repaired have been down to damage to the main processors, but I have replaced one H bridge chip on one board as it had no output whatsoever. 

Are you able to take a nice photo of the motor PCB and post it so I can see what components are used ?  I can then advise further.

13 hours ago, ddm4313 said:

I think I was using 19v at that time, it's not a laptop power source but a mini pc power source.

Doesn't matter if it was a laptop or mini-PC,  19v is still an over voltage for the control board, and is more than likely the cause of the original board failing.  If your damaged EQ5 synscan box is lacking the USB port then there is a high probability it can be repaired.  However if the damaged synscan unit looks identical to the one in the link provided then regretfully I lack the equipment to replace the main processor.  

All the control functionality is handled by the synscan unit.  The motors should be able to handle 19v so its unlikely that they have been damaged.  

The options are (depending on board version) a repair of the existing synscan unit or purchase a new replacement that has the option of USB connectivity and will come with a full warranty.  Either way a new 12v power source is needed to prevent  repetition of the issue

34 minutes ago, Dr_Ju_ju said:

What controller is being used to drive the motors ??  but my initial thought is that the power supply isn't up to the job....

Or something is binding, as the motors are reported to be "buzzing" 

From Stevenage, Hertfordshire... I've never seen such a bright display this far south - Naked eye visibility even in a town !

14 hours ago, Raulvdzande said:

i know but i want to start with a telescope where i can look to the moon very detailed just tell me what telescope with everything else is good for that for 1200 euros

Maybe contact your nearest retailer and go and look at some scopes and ask the salesman... you are not reading or taking on board the information I and others have provided

13 hours ago, GrumpiusMaximus said:

You've had three pages of help, son.  I personally think that's quite enough and my suggestion is to read around the forum a bit more first.

Yeah... I also get the feeling we are being trolled 

It's not great when you spend best part of an hour compiling a detailed post, explaining things only to get a single line response which contradicts what was mentioned in their previous posts.

To the OP - we've given you lots of advice, now its down to you to do your own homework...  

I might even suggest the Mods lock this thread as we're going nowhere other than around in circles 

On 04/05/2024 at 13:12, Raulvdzande said:

i want to see the moon and some other planets and stars nothing specificly right now and i want to make pictures with a phone or camera. i dont worry about the future because when i want to upgrade i will make sure that i have to money for the right equipment

From this and subsequent posts I don't think we should really be stating individual scopes.  There is no "one scope suits all".  For planets you need long focal lengths to get the magnification, but then with higher magnification the resolution becomes an issue so you then need a large aperture scope with a long focal length.  A lot of the really clear, fantastically detailed images of Jupiter with its large moons, or Saturn with is banded rings that are seen on forums and in books have been taken with something like a 12-14" SCT, which will have upwards of 2m - 2.5m (or more) focal length, and would take up all (or more) of your budget just for the OTA alone.  So there is already a compromise needed... a 6" or 8" MAK or SCT will still give decent magnification, and have reasonable contrast and resolution to a degree.   These scopes are also good for star clusters, but if you then want to see or image fainter objects then a long focal length scope isn't ideal.  Yes you can get focal length reducers, but in the same way as a barlow lens will double or treble the focal length of a short focal length telescope, adding lenses between the eye or camera sensor and the photons coming into form the distant object degrades the result a little.  This is why a lot of people either put up with the shortcomings when using accessories to change the focal length, or simply have one scope for planets and the moon, and then another for nebula's and galaxies, with a decent mount that can carry the weight of either (or both at the same time, but again, a mount that can take that weight is more than the budget is now).  

To try and give you some idea... I have a 200mm  aperture, 1000mm focal length reflector telescope.  This is an image taken in 2011 when Jupiter was close to the Earth in their orbits.  It's taken with a basic 640 x 480 webcam (nothing spectacular) but I used two 2x barlow lenses to get an equivalent 4000mm focal length.  I was quite pleased with the results at the time... but whilst you can make out some detail in the bands, a lot of finer detail is lost, and due to the glass of the barlow lenses it has a blue edge to the image.

Now have a look through the planetary section of the forum for images taken with 12" or 14" SCT scopes and you'll see the difference.  Here is an example I've found of an image taken through a C14  with a decent planetary camera,  

Notice the difference.   It's also down to your expectations.  If you are happy to get similar images of Jupiter to mine then sure a £300  reflector would do the job, but if you are already accepting that there will be a time where you will upgrade the equipment, then that is false economy.  If you are really serious and looking at a long term investment then increase the budget and look at getting something that will more than adequately cover you beginning steps, but also be able to provide you with the results you want to eventually end up getting.

For me I'm happy with the results my rig gives me, even though I'm in a town and so my skys are  probably a lot, lot more light polluted than yours are.  This is an image taken with a old Canon DSLR attached to the SW Explorer 200P, which I am more than happy with...

If this is the sort of thing you are aiming to achieve then you should be able to get a mount such as an HEQ5 / EQ6 / AZ-EQ6 and a 200mm f5 scope for deep sky, with a  100mm f9 refractor for planetary.  But if you think you will outgrow this level quickly then keep saving or increase the budget and step up to the next level.

Its always difficult to advise people what to look for as we all have different expectations.  I know of two people who have had pictures published in national and international astronomy magazines.  One has a 250mm Ritchey-Chretien telescope plus flattener; ZWO ASI 071MC camera all sitting on a Skywatcher EQ8 mount, the other has an Orion Optics ODK12, which sits on one of two EQ8 mounts in his observatory.  One of these guys started off with equipment like mine, but often wish that seeing where they are now had just gone for the mounts they currently own rather than having to constantly upgrade, and often losing out financially when selling the  equipment second hand.

Anyway, I've waffled on far too much, and probably taken this thread slightly off topic so I'll leave it at that.  

Welcome to the forum.

Before you make a purchase I would suggest you locate an astronomical society or club and give them a visit, especially if its at a star party where you would get a chance to look through scopes of different types and price points.  If you search or brows through similar posts to yours you'll see that there is no "one scope fits all"  even with your budget.  Scopes that are more suited for brining out planetary details of Jupiter's belts or Saturn's rings are not ideal for use with deep sky objects such as fain galaxies.  That also brings me on to what you expect to see.  It can be quite a let down when you view a galaxy that looks so bright and colourful in the pictures in books or on forums such as these.  What you see can be just a slightly greenish smudge with a brighter centre...  Part of the reason is that the human eye lacks the ability to see colour in low light, and unlike a camera sensor that can be open for long exposures, can't collect the light in the same way. 

This then brings up a second question... do you want to do visual observations, or do you want to use a camera to record the images of targets?  -  Visual setups requirements are different to imaging set ups.  The latter the mount is just as , if not more important than the scope gathering the light.  You are fortunate in that you have a decent budget, and you could get a mount and then use two different scopes, one with long focal lengths for planetary work, and another with shorter focal length and more aperture for deep sky work.

The third point is that it's best to plan for the future.  If you think that there is a good chance that you are going to be disappointed doing visual after a while and possibly go towards imaging, then try and get a mount that would be suitable for that.  It would save having to sell equipment to raise funds at a later date.  So many of us have made a purchase, and then find they limited by the hardware when changing directions and wanting to get involved in imaging.  As other members have mentioned, 1200 euros is basically the cost of an HEQ5 mount which has been the "entry" level mount for imaging, but these can be picked up for less on the second hand market.

A decade ago I needed to upgrade my mount , and an SGL member listed an HEQ5, ST80, QHY5 and all the cables to make it work.  Only drawback was he was in Sunderland and I live in Stevenage... but given the money involved  I arranged to meet up with them.  We arranged a time, date and location to meet, which was a roadside café akin  to a little chief, so bright and early I set off on the 480 mile round trip.  Given the car I drive (still have it) I planned for a sedately pace and drove to preserve petrol, and arrived at the café half an hour before the meeting so had some lunch.  The guy arrived, had a chat over a coffee and then we went to his car where he set up the mount to demonstrate that all was working.  Cash was exchanged and the goodies loaded in to the back of the V70.  On the way back all thoughts of economising on petrol  went out of the window as I wanted to get back in time for tea.   I was quite surprised that I still had 3 or 4 gallon left in the tank after around 450 miles.  

Now in retrospect the  it may have been cheaper to courier the kit, but as neither of us had met before, sending £600 or more via bank transfer to total strangers just wasn't going to happen.  Nor would they be comfortable sending the kit to me before payment, so doing the deal in the middle of a carpark was the only way forward.   Just a shame the deal was too good to miss and it was so far away.

The USB ports on modern mounts permits direct access to update firmware via a downloadable application from their main website.  The fact that it also provides an option to control the mount from a PC via a 3rd party application is  a bonus for those wishing to go down that route, but its not something Synta actively promote.  The only difference is the wi-fi dongle, which has an android app, and the start adventure, which has PC and phone applications to control the mount.

It's probably down to the cost of setting up the infrastructure to provide technical support. You only need to look through forums and user groups and see the posts related to PC connection, guiding, etc which if Skywatcher had a support line would be directed towards them.  But I agree with you, it does make sense to provide an application along the lines of EQMOD or GSS, even if it was stripped down and had less options.  

A "smart" socket was also thrown up in the search - with two USB ports - and in black !

details here

something like this which offers charging and network ports 

Amazon search listed a 4 port USB3 plate - but not sure if its a hub or just sockets here and best read the reviews though.

Failing that, contact any local AV media installation company as this is the sort of thing that would do on a daily basis and could point you in the right direction

The clue is in the title - EQmod is expecting the mount to be an equatorial mount.  An EQ mount set into ALT/AZ mode wont perform correctly when using EQMOD as a mount controller.  If you have to set up the mount each time you wish to use it then you need to clear all the previous saved sync points as they will be incorrect as the mount has since been moved.  

Also check if you have the DEC axis set correctly - if the dovetail is 180 degrees out then that could be another factor as to why the issue is with the DEC axis and not the RA which returns to the correct home position.

On a serious note.. part of the problem is that of the 12 useable channels, nearly everything defaults to channel 1, so there could be several devices all chatting on the same channel.  Turning off the router leaves just the wi-fi dongle as an access point so the app on the phone should connect without the need for a tin foil hat.... unless of course there is a flying saucer hovering over the house 

I set my finder / guider up so that the same subject is central in the viewpoint.  The main scope was centred on a bright star, then using sharpcap the same star was centred in the finder/guiders view.  The 9x50 scope provides enough field of view for PHD to pick a star and guide without any real issues.  Having the two scopes pointing at the same section of sky makes more logical sense to me.

Best advice would be to look at the requirements stated by the software manufactures.   These days with even entry level computers have multiple cores and threads, with16GB being the standard RAM, and both laptops and desktop system supporting Nvme drives so should be more than capable.  What tends to happen is that most software still uses older core code that isn't written to take advantage of the processing power.  In fact these days its the GPU's Cuda cores that dictates the power of a system, more so in the gaming side of things, as more and more applications can be more easily modified to use  the GPUs processor than to make it a multi core or threaded application to use the CPUs clout.

I have a first gen Ryzen 5 based machine, with 16GB DDR4 vengance RAM,  1Tb  and 250Gb Samsun Nvme drives, 2TB SSD and a 3Tb mechanical drive for archival storage.  Yet when I need to convert a small  STL file into a solid in FreeCAD it still sits there for several minutes whilst it does the math as it can't make use of the 4 cores and 8 threads all turbo'd to 3.7 Ghz !!

Mind you,  having said that Deep Sky Stacker does make use of multi core / treads and it's quite impressive watching it stack a shed load of subs on a modern day machine in a couple of minutes.  Prior to building this machine I had an old AMD FX processor based machine and it was often a case of setting the stacking off and then going off to mow the lawns or run the vacuum around the house and then still have to wait a few more minutes before it finished !!

If you want something simple that offers a wifi based controller that supports the Skywatcher protocol making a direct alternative to the synscan board have a look at the Open Synscan project  which will allow you to use any application compliant with Synscan protocol to manage the telescope mount over WIFI network connection

Why re-invent the wheel - Can't vouch for it, but here is a typical example of an open source Arduino based, standalone (use an app on your phone) goto system 

And another system, but this links to a PC

Wait, there's more 

Details here

Just google "arduino telsecope control"

Its dem dere ay-lee-uns.....  their cosmic rays can't get through tin foil hats    (sorry couldn't resist - but thanks for sharing)

It would not be possible to take the control board and steppers from an EQ5 and use them in the EQ6.  Aside from the physical differences, the firmware (the code inside the microcontrolers) has all the gear ratios etc for the mount they control, and as the two mounts use different worm  and gear ratios it would never slew to the correct place if  you did manage to replace the steppers with the correct ones (the microstepping of the motors used is also different, so you would need the correct spec motors as well).  And before you download the firmware updater application and try uploading the EQ6 firmware to the EQ5 board, it won't work, and the application will report the file is not correct for the board being updated.  You would need to reprogram the controllers directly with an edited version of the code.  One major factor is that the EQ5 synscan boards of that age use a single controller, where as the EQ6 uses two (one for each axis), with each one requiring a copy of the code burnt into them.

There are open source alternatives to the synscan units, based around Arduinos... that may be an alternative.  But using the existing controller won't work.  Oh and good luck sourcing the steppers.  The boards used in HEQ5 and EQ6 boost the 12v to around 30v to run the steppers due to the increased payloads.  Lets say for argument sake the motors physically fitted, the internal coils would not handle the increased current draw the larger mount would need, so they would run hot or possibly burn out.

Unfortunately  being skint and having an interest in telescopes is not a great combination.  A replacement EQ6 control board is circa £160.  You could ask FLO (sponsors of the forum) if replacement steppers are available, and how much they would cost, but I doubt you would get much change out of £100 for the set.  The only good news is that the synscan handset you use with the EQ5 will work with the EQ6 as the the controllers in the handset interrogate the mount to ID which mount its being used on.

I did have a few EQ6 boards that I repaired a few months ago. but these went quite quickly.  I normally offer a repair on an exchange basis, but a lot of kind SGL members who had already gone out and bought new boards kindly sent their old damaged boards to me for repair, so I had a few surplus.  If I get any more faulty ones that can be repaired I'll let you know, but don't hold your breath :-)