StevieDvd

There is also the AstroHat project that is being followed on the IndiLib forum here

Again it needs skills with small soldering.

Perhaps:

A wooden or red perspex sheet that sits on the 2 tube rings using the upper screws.   Would be easy to drill/stick the Pi on to.

Or for proper style a Losmandy-type Universal Dovetail as a base plate something like this, other colours, makes & sellers available 🙂

It would be a nice touch to try the free alternative software SkEye on Android with the same adapter hardware. If it works almost or as good then we just need a 3d printer guru to come up with a diy adapter 🙂 though I suppose it may not like the mirrored view captured.

1 hour ago, DainiusU said:

Well, this sounds very attractive... 12V power in and stepper motor control can potentially save quite some space. Do you know if waveshare hat got Ascom drivers? I can’t find anything looking like it in Ekos...

the box is off the shelf solution: https://www.anodas.lt/raspberry-pi-4b-dezute-diy-su-ventiliatoriumi-juoda

 

There is a driver for Indilib see here  not looked at Ascom as it's a PI hat.

You could consider adding a stepper motor hat ( for example the waveshare aound £20)  which would drive a focuser without the need for another power connection and usb port - plus it can run the Pi from a 12v feed too.  Though that depends on what focus motor you are planning to add. 

The case for your Pi looks very project friendly, was it purchased or diy/3d printed?

'Bear in mind' the deed has now been done. 

Hope it has all gone as you hoped and views well.

Ends 31st June!!!

Whoops.

If you have an HEQ5 then probably your tripod is the SW 1.75" stainless steel one already. If you wanted to get a sturdier 2" stainless steel one then either a used CG5 which is a 2" leg version but fits HEQ5/EQ5  - can be hard to find, or the EQ6 one but that needs a £50 adapter.

Are you using the legs fully extended? Perhaps consider keeping them short and buy an eq5 extension pillar to fit on your existing tripod.

13 minutes ago, carastro said:

Hmmm, Well maybe the PA and RA would work, but what about Dec if it's not level?  

Carole 

If you have PA and RA sorted then DEC has to be OK, the axis is 90% to RA and is not adjustable.

Consider the opposite way where your mount was fixed and had no adjustment bolts. If your pier/tripod started perfectly horizontal  you would need to adjust it to centre the mount axis with the NCP. 

It does not matter too much if you adjust the pier or the mount as long as the axis ends up correctly aligned, it's just a little easier (and cheaper) to use the mounts adjusters.

How the heck are your new thumb screws loosening!!? When you align the reticle ten give the thumb screw a good snug. Its a metal ring that the screws tighten against. Are 4 wheeling to your site with the mount in the back of the vehicle? I can not see once tightened how they can come loose.

Don

That last snug turn would mis-align the polarscope though

Never use the polarscope now, the Handset polar alignment was good enough for an accurate setting until I used a permanent pier setup and the Polar Align software from Themos (a forum member) provided an even better one.

I'm on a Mac and do not have Astrotortilla. I have also updated the PPA.ini file manually.

Could you please post your Astrotortilla config files?

My local astrometry install works fine, I can solve-field images without any issues from the command line.

I'm using PC windows and a local astrometry without astrotortilla and found what was needed.

If the api field is empty it does not save all settings (I guess that's a check for the new user to make initial settings) just put a number in the api key box.  Second the config file is for the location of the astrometry config (mine is /etc/astrometry/backend.cfg)

Just need to get the solve settings and local copies of the solve files all tidied up for the cameras I plan to use. Will be using the local solve for SGP too.

Hope that helps.

Thanks Stevie, that looks like a tolerable error, I am not sure I could do better. I am right-handed, so I stand east of the mount, looking north, and to turn the polar axis right, I need to turn the east azimuth knob clockwise (having loosened the west one). I should probably measure how much angle a half turn buys me. I expect each person will make their own mental notes.

Themos

I had a slightly larger error, but small enough I thought, so I tightened everything up to keep the settings and took one last image - but it would not solve. In the morning  I uploaded the image manually and it would still not solve until I processed it to make it clearer, must have been some thin cloud that I'd not noticed as the image timings were constant and all earlier attempts were solved fine.

So quite pleased the final settings, after tightening everything, ended up the best.

BTW.

A couple of points I thought worth mentioning:

• If a poor image is uploaded and the server takes too long while attempting to resolve should PPA handle that?
• Instead of having an extra button for Nova & Local for each image would it be tidier to have a select radio button to set either Local or Nova and have just one Solve for each?
• Not sure if using AstroArt5 as a solver will work, although it does have SDK for scripting I'm still having issues using it directly so would not hold out any hope of linking to it.  A local nova on the other hand sounds a good idea.

Managed to spend a bit of time getting the alignment as good as I could before the hour got too late or the clouds started to interfere.

I hope this is accurate enough to use when I get my guiding setup finished.

Once you get the feel for the amount and direction of changes to make on the mount alt/azz bolts it becomes quite easy. I was using a DMK21 with focal reducer and live view so I could almost work out the rough position the stars needed to move to beofre taking and uploading an image. Would have been a lot easier if my computer was nearer the scope, the latop was hooked up in the garage so was popping in/out each time to check improvements.

Thanks Themos that's a real nice utility for alignment

Steve

Thanks Stevie, every little helps. If you can, open PPA.py in an editor  and go to line 1305 and change it to 

           #  lfn = os.listdir(dir)           lfn = []

keeping the same indentation as before.  That should allow you to carry on with the program.  It will be interesting to see if AstroArt can work with PPA. You will need to save images as JPEG format and also save the plate-solved .fits file that AstroArt produces and rename it with a .wcs ending (so there would be, say, img2014.jpg and img2014.wcs files)

Thanks, I worked around the missing directory once I saw the cause.

BTW, I also meant to mention that when using a mono camera the overlays are also being saved in mono. As a quick test I added  .convert("RGB") to the image open (s) and got the overlays in colour. If that's a safe thing to do without checking the incoming file colours.

Hi Themos,

Sorry for not getting back quicker on the v1.03 error O enocuntered. I started ppa.py in Anaconda console as suggested and got this:

The system cannot find the path specified.

C:\Users\Steve\Anaconda>cd C:\Users\Steve\Documents\PhotoPolarAlign

C:\Users\Steve\Documents\PhotoPolarAlign>ppa.py
Traceback (most recent call last):
  File "C:\Users\Steve\Documents\PhotoPolarAlign\PPA.py", line 1501, in <module>
    APP = PhotoPolarAlign(master=ROOT)
  File "C:\Users\Steve\Documents\PhotoPolarAlign\PPA.py", line 1495, in __init__
    self.Sniff_AstroTortilla()
  File "C:\Users\Steve\Documents\PhotoPolarAlign\PPA.py", line 1305, in Sniff_AstroTortilla
    lfn = os.listdir(dir)
WindowsError: [Error 3] The system cannot find the path specified: 'C:\\Users\\Steve\\AppData\\Local\\astrotortilla.sf.net\\AstroTortilla/*.*'

Not having dabbled in Python before I can't see if there is a new config setting I'm missing to enable/disable local solving.

I'm using Win 7 pro as OS and don't have Astrotortilla installed - but do have Astroart5

Hope that's a genuine bug I found for you and not me doing something stupid!

As it looked as if I was going to get some clear sky for a few hours I was ready to use this in real-life mode.  Seeing that you had done a couple of updates I downloaded v1.03.

When I ran it a command window flashed/disappeared too quickly for me to get the message - though I think it may have been looking for astrotortilla.

I then tried v1.02 as well and put my api key in as expected and it would not connect to astrometry.net.  So I went back tot the original which did not connect either.

It was all my fault as I had the api key stored in an email I sent from work to my home email which capitalised the first character, doh.

After fixing that v1.02 worked but still no luck with v1.03.

Does v1.03 need a config setting to be made for local solving?

In the end I did get it setup and was getting the error down until the next capture I did had no visible stars - the clouds had come across and stopped me from finishing - but good practise and all seemed to be working as advertised so hope to get it finished on next cloud free night.

Hi Themos,

Have installed python and PPA and like Earl had the same issue with saving the api key.  Though thanks to Earl breaking the ground first I moved it from the defaulted directory (C:\Program Files (x86)) to my user directory and it was then accepted OK.

Loaded and solved the example images (h.jpg first then v.jpg) and finally the i.jpg and did the Find Polar Axis and then the Show Improvement. All worked as per your instructions.

I presume we would only iterate through the improvement (i.jpg) image(s) as we adjust and get better aligned.

Also, noted that the test images are shown as solved (in green) when re-doing the test after closing and restarting due to the saved wcs files. Would suggest a button for reset which deletes the wcs files in case people use the same names for each image - would make an interesting adjustment if they used the wrong ones I'd expect.

My next task is deciding which camera to use if we get a clear night.

So good work thus far.

PS Earl your api key is visible if that is a concern
 

PPS As a new purchaser of Astroart5 I too would be interested in using it for solving as well.

if you can send some clear skies I'd like to have a go as I need to polar align my mount to the garden pier again. I'll be the idiot user  - if I understand it then most will.

Hi Steve,

Sorry been sick!  I believe it was the Crayford and I tapped and used the two access holes on the underside of the focuser.  I then bought a thin strip of alli cut to size and drilled for the screws.  As soon as I get chance I'll take some pictures to give you a better idea.

Best regards

Karl

Thanks for the reply Karl, hope you're feeling better.

Don't worry about the pictures as the crayford and superfocuser (rack & pinion) seem to have different  housing near the focuser knobs. Was hoping yours was the superfocuser.

Add to that I'm too much of a coward to tap into it :-)

Hi Nibor,

I have this focuser also and like you had to get hold of a longer lead for more remote viewing. I got my cousin to wire something up for me but I think the connection is an RJ11?? I also had to make up a makeshift bracket to attach to the focuser but it works a treat and a great little gadget for the money

Cheers

Karl

dx1 115.JPG

Is that the Revelation Superfocuser or the Crayford? it would be nice to see how you attached the bracket and which holes were used for the screws/bolts, if that's OK.

Thanks

Steve

Oh, one thing. I'm selling my tripod. Just want to make sure if the pillar mount comes with everything I need to attach the NEQ6 mount, or do I need to keep, say, the tray knob from the tripod???

On the assumption the EQ6 pillar is similar to the HEQ5 pillar I have then there are three allen headed screws holding the pier adapter in place. Remove these to extract the adaptor and connect this to the mount (mine has a captive bolt and handle) then replace the combined adapter/mount back and secure in place with the screws.

It'll pay to get an assistant when assembling the pillar as the three legs are a tricky to hold in place unless you have more than 2 hands.

Steve

True. Legs are black on all versions. It's surprisingly solid btw!

My HEQ5 version is all white.

The pillar mount from SW (as shown in the FLO link) is suprisingly well made, and a lot heavier than I'd expected. The pier/mount adaptor is included and is better than the one I have on my Explore Scientific pier. The height is a little low so an extension may be a good idea.

Zakalwe (forum member) has a neat litle video of it showing how he protects the mount.

Update

Made some bahtinov masks for each using the generator at astrojargon - Bahtinov Focusing Mask Generator: Version 0.4 by printing them on inkjet transparency and sandwiching this between 2 layers of card.

By the time I'd got them finished the clouds had rolled in but from a quick test using a street lamp down the road the focus lines all lined up nicely. That sort of confirms my visual collimation and should be good enough for now.

My thanks to tetenterre and Pleiades (SGL member not the star cluster) for the helpful threads on binoculars.