Gina

Nice ?

Yes, let's see it! Please.

Been designing the mast-top cross bar. Not finished yet though.

It's a UK site and I can browse it - wonder why you can't James ?

Been sorting out my main computer and design software which is why this hasn't progressed recently. Now I plan to get back onto this project.

That rough outer surface is due to a known problem with the hardware which I shall remedy in time. I'm not bothered in this case as the casing will be up on a 5m mast and not very visible. It's strong, waterproof and UV resistant and that's all that matters. I could sand it smooth and give it a shine with acetone vapour treatment if I wanted. For finer results I use my Mini 3D printer instead.

Yes, all the pixels support the full visual spectrum and with the red filter removed respond to Ha. The sensitivity was reduced by removing the micro-lenses but compensated for by removing the Bayer matrix.

If a colour other than white had been available when I built my observatory I would probably have gone for UPVC cladding.

I moved on from DSLRs for astro imaging years ago. It was an interesting exercise but way in the past now.

Lovely - I have the Mark III.

Yes, it was.

The suppliers I used are based in Hemyock, Devon, I forget their name. It was 7-8years ago that I built my observatory so their standards could have changed but I found them excellent. Free delivery on orders over a certain amount.

Lucky you! ?

Looks like I need to buy some astro gear - we need rain for the gardens! Mind you, it would probably just bring cloud and that's no good!!

It shows progress - that's gotta be good! ??

At least!

Looks just like my hole ? Before I filled it with concrete. Lots of stones and clay here too though not building rubble. Found some old pictures of my build - been longer than I thought - 2011 - so it's 7 years old!

If you use good quality cladding you won't need anything inside it other than vapour barrier. That is how I built my observatory and it's fine. I think it's something like 4 or 5 years old now and showing no problems. 150mm x 22mm redwood shiplap cladding is what I used.

I did wonder if I should have done that when I wanted a floorboard out of the way but I found that if I slackened the screws I could lever up the wall and move the floor board. That was before cladding though. The construction has never been a problem in the several years since the build. The only upgrade was to replace inverted angle and home made wheels with FH Brundel rail and 120mm SS wheels which made an enormous difference.

Good progress James ?? I made all my walls on the ground first including noggins and bracing. The walls were then erected and bolted together with coach bolts. The bottom rails were fastened to the floor with large coach screws into the joists through the floorboards. The whole structure was/is modular.

Nice ?

Why? Colour doesn't matter - how well it works does ?

Now to the software. This is Ubuntu MATE operating system and INDI drivers to use remotely with KStars/Ekos indoors. I modified a 3rd party INDI driver for the controls for focussing, camera cooler and dew heater. The Raspberry Pi uses a micro SD card as system drive instead of a Hard Drive and the first job was to install Ubuntu MATE onto it. For this an SD card reader was needed on the main computer and software to write the disk image to the card. In Linux I used Etcher but if using Windows there's Win32DiskImager. Etcher has the advantage that it uncompresses the downloaded package as it writes the image to the card. With Windows the package has to be uncompressed first. Ubuntu MATE was downloaded from the Ubuntu MATE download page choosing the Raspberry Pi 3 version (takes two clicks) and downloading. The disk image was then written to the micro SD card by choosing the downloaded image, checking the the right drive was chosen for the card and starting the software going. The micro SD card was left in the main computer to edit a file before putting it in the Raspberry Pi. This will be covered next.

I agree with that!