PhilB61

So it appears both motors/drivers are working, just not as expected. Agree with the above poster, before anymore disassembly etc check that you have a good power supply, inadequate power can cause all sorts of strange behaviour.

Given the accuracy needed for good PA (for astrophotography) I would never do the alignment without the scope and accessories already attached as the chance of sag/settlement or just bumping the mount is too high. Doing it that might be ok for visual use though. Just my opinion others may differ especially if you have a very large or robust mount/tripod combination and a lightweight OTA

It depends on how close you are "roughly in the right direction" but to be certain yes, best to use your finder scope first.

I've had mixed experience, sometimes quick response other times zero response. The latter leaves a bad taste and puts me of buying their products even though I would like to support a UK company

On the other hand the step counter fingers/ encoder wheel should be visible moving at any speed (although very slowly at tracking rate) you could very very gently try turning this by hand. There's nothing serviceable in the gearbox end, other than trying fresh grease but the grease in my 10 year old was still good and soft. Be aware if you do take apart as well as the tiny plastic gears, there are some much smaller shims which sit on some of the gear shafts, from recollection just 1-2mm in diameter and very thin. The motor/gearbox is only available as a complete unit if you need to replace it.

It shouldn't turn by hand, it's an extremely high reduction ratio and attempting to do so risks stripping the tiny plastic gears inside, only the last few reduction gears are metal. To see any discernable movement when powered you need to select the highest slew speed first. Also it's a good idea to try swapping the two motors over, to isolate if it is the motor/gearbox or the control board. These are relatively simple DC motors not steppers, the opposite end from the gearbox is a step counter, take care not to damage the fine fingers or dislodge the optical sensor.

I think it depends on how busy the servers are, I've had images processed in approx 10 mins or less and others failed to process as after 30 mins. These are large stacked fits files approx 300mb.

Depends primarily on what focal length and pixel size you will be imaging as to whether it will work, and also your expectations. Without guiding I think either will struggle to image reliably much beyond 30s with a focal length above about 200-300mm, and that assumes a mount in good condition and very accurately polar aligned. I also think the Star adventure has too low a weight capacity given that you already mentioned an upgraded telescope in the possibly near future.

Came upon some discussion of this new software on CN, anyone else had a play with it? It supposed to be a free open source alternative to BlurX and Topaz Ai Downloaded the zip file from GitHub and gave it a try, not much info on how to use it and the first thing I had to do was edit a line in the run.bat file regarding the output file path Anyway, it works sort of, besides reducing noise and sharpening details, nebula, star shapes etc it also upscales the image massively (by a factor of 4) so output file sizes can be huge. Unfortunately in my test examples it also introduced quite a lot of artifacts in particular a repeating blotchy background pattern, it also seemed to have interpreted some close together faint stars as one star and generated some new stars from hot pixels/noise I'm hoping the developer will continue to improve the software, as I think it could provide an alternative to those who don't want to commit to PixInsight, but I do think it needs more development first. Any thoughts.....

Just seeing the current temperatures in Helsinki, I can image such cold temps can create all sorts of issues both mechanically and electronically. Not an issue we generally have in this part of the UK especially in recent years

I think it is normal for the EAF to run a significant number of steps, possibly in the hundreds, at the start of an auto focus routine, so that it can start from an out of focus position. If the initial position is wrong, or if something has slipped (possible with crayford style focusers) then the EAF may be hitting some hard or soft limit whilst trying to achieve the start position.

Have you considered boxing all the heavy bulky stuff up in advance and then having it couriered out to you after you arrive at your new location, probably no more expensive than what it would cost you in selling your current gear and then having to buy replacements in Europe.

I have to agree imaging is a minefield of choices; mono or colour camera, cooled? planetary or deep sky, reflector or refractor, EQ or Alt/Az mount, filters, guiding, electronic focusing , software etc , etc Much opportunity to make mistakes and spent too much money on all the wrong stuff… It can also be a lot of faff, frustration and at times disappointment but then when it all comes together it feels totally rewarding to have taken an image of a distant galaxy or nebula with equipment you own from your own back garden, regardless that it may not look like something from Hubble/James Webb. I still a count myself as a beginner imager having been at it for a couple of years so I am sure others with much greater experience will also chime in. My advice would be before spending any money, if at all possible try to experience the process of imaging, its nothing like visual astronomy, especially if you only have experience of a manual Dob were you can be up and viewing in a matter of minutes. I know a couple of people who bought all the imaging gear but just didn’t appreciate the amount of work involved in setting everything up and didn’t enjoy the imaging sessions , so all their equipment sits unused. Myself, I really enjoy the whole process of researching what I need/want, acquisition of the hardware and software and putting it all together so that it works for me. I also enjoy the actual process of imaging, pre and post processing etc, the only thing I don’t really like is the often long breaks between clear imaging nights here in the UK. Sorry I’ve not given any advice to actually help you narrow your choice, I think you would have to first decide between planetary or deep sky, as they both have very different requirements and then maybe we can help further…

This looks like the same casing as the earlier USB2 version of the camera, in which case the whole body just screws apart...

Don't these have a spring loaded worm to gear arrangement, is it possible the worm is riding up slightly then being pulled back down by the spring in a periodic manner. Possibly made worse with an out of balance setup or just worn out/displaced grease.

A couple of other things to consider, how tech savvy you are, and do you like to tinker and adjust mechanical things. If neither, then as mentioned a Seestar might be the way forward or at least purchase new from a reputable dealer who is able and willing to provide assistance if you have problems, in my experience FLO are excellent in this regard. If you are happy to spend hours/days researching putting together and fine tuning a setup, buying used can be very rewarding both financially and intellectually. Again as mentioned Astrobuysell is probably better than eBay, many sellers are more than happy to provide addition info photos etc and I have always spoken in person to a seller before committing hard cash. This is how I have put most of my system together.

Depends a bit on what you think the triplet might give you that the doublet doesn't? same aperture, same f ratio, what glass do you currently have fpl53? compared to fpl51 equiv but in a triplet so probably comparable colour correction, 3" down to 2" focuser. If your happy with the views/images from the doublet I can't see you gaining much. Hopefully someone with experience of both can advise specifically...

I originally imaged with a Nikon 200-500mm zoom lens but found it difficult to get consistently good focusing, too much backlash in the manual focuser, moving to a Skywatcher 72ED was a revelation in both ease of focusing and overall image quality, and at a fraction of the cost. M31 is nicely framed at the native 420mm focal length, I use a flattener but not a reducer.

I think you can't rely too much on the 55mm backspacing, its really just a reasonable starting point and in many instances will be to be adjusted depending on each individual setup. For my SW 72ED with the StellaMira flattener 55mm spacing still gave significant corner elongation, increasing the spacing to 58mm helped but in the end I swapped the flattener for an adjustable one and was able to completely cure the problem.

It could also be voltage drop from the power cord. I had a very similar cable, also sold as suitable for dvr cameras etc, which I wanted to use for my CEM25P mount but it constantly showed a low battery warning when slewing, changed to a heavier gauge cable and issue was resolved. I actually tried using the cable for another application and cut the connector off to fit another type and was surprised how thin the inner core was, so not surprised it couldn't deliver enough current.

I used the same cable for use in both alt/a and eq mode, note that although generically called an eq mod cable you don't need use the eq mod software it works fine directly with the skywatcher pc software.

I upgraded from the AZ-GTi to a CEM25P about a year ago, no comparison in terms of weight capacity, smoothness etc, massively better all round especially guiding performance. I am now disappointed if guiding accuracy over a 2 to 4 hour session is worse than 0.8 arc sec RMS whereas I was pleased when I was able to achieve double that on the AZ-GTi. I did have to fine tune mine initially as I think the previous owner had "adjusted things" incorrectly but lots of service info available from iOptron and some good Youtube videos. Since then I've not touched it mechanically and it just works well, if guiding deteriorates it is almost always due to seeing conditions, wind or other external factors. Price seems reasonable to me assuming everything works as intended and it is in good overall condition.

Siril for pre-processing and stacking, I also prefer to do this manually rather than with the scripts. Very quick and lots of control at each stage. More recently almost exclusively use Siril for post processing, with the latest version having Starnett++ integration and powerful GHS functions. Prior to this I used Startools and GIMP for post processing. Also sometimes use Neat Image as a very final stage of noise reduction after all other processing is complete (I only have the free version which is limited to jpegs, hence final stage only) usually have to tone down the default settings otherwise it can make images look very "plastic"

I too have an SPC900 (flashed 880 model) which I had previously used as a guide camera, it definitely worked under Windows 10 with the Philips 2007 driver and I have just now tried with the most up to date Windows 11 version and it still works with the same 2007 driver. I tried using both Sharpcap 4.0 and the latest version of PHD2 and both worked fine, about 30fps in Sharpcap

I agree with a previous poster, try with the camera you already have, lots to learn and it's quite possible to get very good images with older cameras. A remote programmable intervalometer will make things easier, I picked up a wireless one for my Nikon for less than £20. If you do decide to upgrade the camera, I wouldn't get a D3400/3500 series as they are not natively compatible with many imaging acquisition programmes via usb, the D5200 and above are and also have a tilting screen. As you are planning to use relatively lightweight camera and lens another option for the mount would be to get an AZ-GTI, they come up regularly on Astro Buy Sell and Ebay for about the same cost as a complete Onstep kit for your existing mount.