malc-c

Andy, the protocol documents can be found on Skywatchers own website, I just attached them for convenience. If you are looking at ST4 as a mean of crude control, then there are already USB > ST4 adapters for around £55 - FLO sell them here The ST4 "standard" has been around since the late 70's and the web is full of home made adapters using traditional transistors and opto isolators, through to arduino nano's. I'm afraid I can't offer any further help as I don't really know how to get the SW protocol decoded by the SW firmware so that the mount tracks sidereal - It might be worth posting on the EQMOD IO group, as Chris and a few of the developers should be able to help you out with that.

The ST4 port on the handset is for direct connection from the guidecamera's ST4 port using an ST4 cable. You need a USB connection between the guide camera and the PC running PHD2 with PHD2 set to "on camera" for this to function. The alternative is to purchase a USB > ST4 adapter such as this one ( for years the GPUSB "shoestring" adapter was popular) which you can fit between the computer and your controller, and then use any USB camera as a guide camera provided it is ASCOM compliant. This way, PHD sends the corrections to the mount via USB, and the adapter mimics the pressing of the NSWE buttons to make corrections. ST4 guiding is not like pulse guiding via a synscan unit. All an ST4 port does is basically parallel wires the push buttons on the handset, and pins in the port get shorted by the ST4 device thus mimicking the pressing of the buttons.

Great to see a decade old post revived Still have my SPC900 - but seldom do planetary work now - In the day these were the sought after planetary imaging cameras given the CCD they used. I did have a LX exposure modded one too, but have since lost that over the years ! Here's some of my images taken with this webcam, with stacked barlows used for Jupiter and Mars !

Thing is "guiding" to most people these days means using a guide camera and software that runs on a computer which can also control the mount. I think this was pointed out when you were considering which motorising option to go for, as the synscan unit makes computer control a lot easier. With the controller you have the only real option without having to modify the handset (and thus void your warranty) is to use an all in one autoguider such as Skywatcher SynGuider but at a pound shy of £290 it isn't cheap. Before the days of computer control and guide cameras manual guiding was done. This involved using a guide scope with an illuminated eyepiece that formed a cross-hair, and by using small XY knobs could move the two lines so they intersected over a bright star in the field of view. You then used the NSWE (or Up Down Left Right) buttons on the handset to make small corrections manually to keep the star under the intersected lines. However, guiding is really suitable for long exposures, and given you intend to use a mobile phone is probably not worth it. I would suggest your first target is the moon, ideally when in any phase other than full. Polar align the mount (doesn't need to be exact) and get the Moon in the eyepiece and set the drive to LUNAR. Then use the movie function to record a video of the moon for several minutes, ensuring the projected image is as sharply focused as possible. Then you can use software to take the movie and split it into individual frames and then stack the good ones to form a detailed image with lots of data. You could try this on some of the larger planets, but Jupiter and Saturn and not as well placed as they were in the summer time. You might (depending on the capabilities of your phone) be able to image the Orion nebular (set the drive to SIDERIAL ) if your camera can take long timed single exposures of 30 - 60 seconds (any more and you are into guiding territory). Take 20 to 50 exposures one after another, then just before you break down for the night, and without moving the camera, place the cover over the front of the scope and take 20- 30 exposures of the same length (called darks). You can then stack all these images in deep sky stacker. Providing the polar alignment was good and there was little or no trailing then you might just end up with a half decent image. For anything more, IMO you are going to need to invest in a rig that is better suited to imaging, which involves a decent camera for prime focus photography, and a means of guiding the scope.

The strange thing is that you can get it working if the app is minimalised and then maximised... This suggests a bug in the Stellarium code - Again, I would suggest posting on their forum or raising a ticket - especially as NINA and other applications don't suffer this same issue and work perfectly

Andy, I must admit most of your build thread went right over my head, but my thoughts on control are "why reinvent the wheel". There are two / three existing protocols used by manufactures such as Skywatcher, Celestron and Meade. These already handle the instruction set that their corresponding motor controller firmware understands. I'm no expert, and there are those on here that are far more knowledgeable than I, but as far as I know, drivers such as EQMOD or GSServer will receive the "I want to goto this location" message from the planetarium software, and then tag on the "slew to these" instructions to the co-ordinates and send it to the firmware running on the motor board. The firmware then does the maths based on the parameters (worm gear teeth and ratios etc) programmed into it, so it can sent the required number of steps to each motor. Now your mount is not your standard EQ mount, so maybe EQMOD and / or GSServer command set won't work in your case, but it may give you some catalyst to develop your own protocols etc. skywatcher_motor_controller_command_set (5).pdfsynscanserialcommunicationprotocol_version33 (4).pdf here's the protocol and command set for SW mounts EQMOD page http://eq-mod.sourceforge.net/introindex.html Hope that helps

Yes, if the mount has its own USB port then you can use a USB A-B cable to directly connect the mount to a PC and then use ASCOM and software such as EQMOD or GSServer to control the mount. The mount will show up on a windows PC as a new COM port, and you will need to change the default settings from 9600 baud speed to 115200 in order for it to work. This is well documented on the forum. When connected via USB you should disconnect the handset (when powered down - do not plug/unplug the handset whilst the mount is powered up) Ideally use passive USB cables of less than 4m. If you want longer then the USB cable needs to be an active cable

Andy, not read your other thread, but would it not be simpler to try and customise EQMOD or GSServer as the ASCOM compliant driver to handle communications between software and the mount ? As both are open source the documentation may be handy in developing your own driver ?

The problem with viewing through the window is that the optics will be at room temperature rather than at the cool outside temperature so may suffer from thermal issues, if the window is open. Viewing through a closed glass window is not recommended. The subject of goto has been debated on this and other forums for decades. It's a tool. It can help locate targets and help teach you the night sky. Others think it's a costly cheat and navigation via star hopping should be the only way to use a scope. It depends on your view point and if you are more likely to get frustrated spending hours trying to find targets rather then be placed in the ball park area and able to find the target in a wide field of view eyepiece. Naturally these goto systems as several hundreds of pounds to the price of a non-goto version of the same scope. - The choice in every case is a personal one, based on finances, how you want to locate targets, and your patience span.

Remove the control board... If you have a nut stuck, heat is typically the only way to uncrack it. Remove the electronics, and get a blow torch, or an electric heat gun used for paint stripping out and warm the nut up.

Merry Christmas and a prosperous New Year to the guys and gals at FLO And I would like to extend that to all the members of SGL....

Wasn't Helios the brand that used internal barlow lenses in the focuser and used spherical rather than parabolic mirrors ?? -

I don't think the issue is the mount, after all you've stated it works fine with other software, just not with Stellarium. Maybe post on the Stellarium user group seeing the issue is unique to that bit of software. If it were the mount not responding to the protocol then you would have the same issue with CdC etc, which you have stated works. After all the command to slew will be the same code.

Not sure what grease SW now use in these mounts, but a few years ago a lot of people would strip an HEQ5 / EQ6 down straight after the 12 month warranty period just to replace the tar like gunk with a better lubricant, often lithium grease. Some would even replace the main bearings with higher tolerance / precision SKF ones. I stripped and serviced my second hand HEQ5 when I first got it, only to find it had already been stripped and had the grease replaced, but at least I had the satisfaction of knowing that any issues thereafter were down to my reassembly ! - I've seen people question the fitting of higher spec bearings, especially as our mounts seldom (if at all ) make a complete rotation, so the bearings are hardly going to see much wear, but over time the constant motion over the same part of the bearings can cause flattening of the rollers as its the same sets that take the forces when the mount slews or tracks, plus the idea of any service is to reduce backlash and play, and often higher precision bearings will help us achieve this. Good luck with the rebuild. It will be interesting to see if your get any improvement

A quick google and it seems a common issue example here - some workarounds such as downloading the ASCOM .NET Driver 2.4 and reconfiguring TELESCOPE to ASCOM and choose ASCOM telescope to iOptron Telescope .NET It seems to bypass the iOptron Commander - but the guy could live with that

In the northern hemisphere the default home position for goto mounts is with the mount facing North with the RA axis centred on the North Celestial Pole, and with the weight bar pointing to the ground. The DEC axis is parallel to the RA, so the scope is also pointing at the NCP. - Like this example taken from the net. When you power on the mount the handset assumes that the mount is in this position, and will then use it as a basis for the first alignment point. But with the hand controller you have, unless you are controlling the mount via a PC it's not really relevant

Can't really offer much advice as I'm not familiar with Celestrons, but having repaired several blown SW motor boards though I would give my 2p worth. The no response message on a handset would suggest the issue is with communications between it and the mount. However, if you can run a firmware manager / uploader which presumably connects form the PC to the mount via the handset, and this reports no errors, then this would suggest that the cabling and indeed the microcontroller are fine. The confusing factor is that if the same arrangement then has an issue uploading the firmware to the microcontroller then it brings into question exactly how does the firmware manager check the communications. Which one is giving the false positive. On SW boards (other then the newer ARM processor based ones) two PICs are used, with their UARTs connected via two blocking diodes, and sometimes these have blown and thus the serial comms fails. Other times, the failure of these diodes have lead to blown UARTs on the PICs and both PICs needed replacing with pre-programmed new ones. Now not having worked on Celestron boards I can't say if this is the case here, nor what would be the likely cause. More experienced users have suggested it may be an encoder error. The fault could be at the decoder itself, or if the microcontroller is blown then it won't be processing or detecting the decoder. I've never tried hacking a celestron firmware, but as its just a binary file it should be no different to the process outlined in the long thread here the only issue you may have is the availability of the micro controller. The 16F886's used in most of the SW goto boards now have a 22 month lead time, or you pay 6x the going rate from some rip of merchant on e-bay

Are you guiding or relying on the accuracy of your polar alignment and the precision of the EQ5 drive (presume your are driving the mount although you haven't mentioned that) I don't have your camera, but you can get the trapezium and part of the bright nebula with something like ISO800 and a short 30 second exposure if the mount is unguided, Increasing ISO can result in a more grainy image, but to get the full nebular a guided 5 minute exposure yields similar results to those seen in books. The only drawback is this over exposes the trapezium, so you'll need to do some magic in post processing to balance between the two exposures. This was 1 x 360s exposure at 400 Iso - Canon 400D - SW Explorer 200PDS

I must admit I'm shocked if they feel poorly aligned gearing and gears that barely mesh is acceptable and "normal parameters". But if that is from the importers (OVL) then there is little redress as even if you could claim on the warranty, the retailer wouldn't be able to return it to the distributor as in their eyes the product is within operation limits. However this would also back up ONIKKINEN comments above. The only suggestion I can offer is for you to do some fettling to try and make the gears mesh better, but it sounds like there is nothing much you can do for the noise of the motors

Humour never comes over well in posts (well not for me as I seem to miss the obvious !! 😳) I was going to say drilling holes in glass is possible... but thought better of it, your wife might cut off parts of your anatomy if you tried ....!!

Really?? - Before I purchased my HEQ5 (second hand) I had a new EQ5 which uses a similar arrangement as the EQ3 motors and the meshing and clearances were a lot better. The motors also didn't grate in the same way. - Maybe I was lucky and circa 10 years ago Skywatcher QC was better back then.

It doubt it will be much use to you as I believe that under UK consumer law the contract is between the retailer and original purchaser, and warranties are not transferrable.

Always drill through the uPVC frames 👍🤔

You'll get some noise when a stepper spools up, but it shouldn't sound like that. Was the mount purchased new or second hand ? If new then contact the seller and point them to these videos as clearly that motor sounds poorly (well compared to my HEQ5 it sounds more like a coffee grinder !). I would be inclined to ask the retailer to issue an RMA and have them collect the mount with a view of replacing the drive kit. If they collect the mount complete then they can make sure the new one is working before sending it back to you

I don't have one of these mounts but that's clearly not right - they should mesh better than that !!