Astrosurf

I did it! It was the secondary that needed adjusting 😊

On 08/05/2024 at 19:34, Astrosurf said:

I’ve recently got an Altair 200 Newt but the huge collimation bolts are confusing me. I can manage to collimate my SW 200P no problem but these bolts are new to me. There are the plain bolts with the white knobs and the black bolts that have springs. 
 

Do I loosen the black bolts and tighten the whites to adjust or vice versa? When I get the donut in the centre, some of the bots are still a tiny bit loose. So when I tighten them up the donut moves. It’s doing my head in. 
 

Alex

I’ve been trying again but with the locking bolts loose. I get so close but the donut just travels around to the right of the centre dot. The black bolts are getting shorter and shorter. Should they be longer?  It’s maddening! Any idea what’s happening? The bad drawing will hopefully illustrate what I’m seeing. Thanks, Alex

Thank you. I'll try collimating again and see how the stars look. I'm kind of thinking of selling the scope due to all the collimation difficulties it's giving me. Plus I often catch the bolts when I'm carrying it. I'm quite clumsy. I never had to worry about that with the Skywatcher.

I wish I could be shown. It's just all too subtle to understand in text. So some people don't have the white bolts at all? 

It's interesting that my simple SW 200P rarely went out of collimation and I traveled with it all the time. It has little Allen key sockets and small screws. These Altair ones seem like serious overkill.

Thank you. I never know how tight is tight. Just to the point the bolts stop turning?

Can you also over-tighten the black ones? It's hard to tell as they're springy.

Thank you all! 

On 02/04/2024 at 16:53, ollypenrice said:

I'm with Backyardscope and suspect pinching. The star looks distinctly triangular to my eye and that's a classic consequence of pinching. I'd try to relax the mirror clips just a tad.

Olly

Thank you. If I loosen the bolts off a bit I’m worried the mirror will move. They’re huge bolts! 

I’ve recently got an Altair 200 Newt but the huge collimation bolts are confusing me. I can manage to collimate my SW 200P no problem but these bolts are new to me. There are the plain bolts with the white knobs and the black bolts that have springs. 
 

Do I loosen the black bolts and tighten the whites to adjust or vice versa? When I get the donut in the centre, some of the bots are still a tiny bit loose. So when I tighten them up the donut moves. It’s doing my head in. 
 

Alex

The lady I bought the scope off is super clever and capable. She would have made sure the focusing tube was lined up properly. 

Thank you all! I didn’t make it clear that this pic isn’t from a sub as I didn’t get that far. It’s only a 3s snap while focusing with the ASIAir. I’ve used my old SW Explorer 200P for years with this CC and mount with few issues. It’s just since using this cam.  

Thank you all! I didn’t make it clear that this pic isn’t from a sub as I didn’t get that far. It’s only a 3s snap while focusing with the ASIAir. I’ve used my old SW Explorer 200P for years with this CC and mount with few issues. It’s just since using this cam.  

Hi all, I’ve been using my ASI533MC with my 72mm frac with real success. Now we’re into galaxy season and I’m using a Newt. I currently have two: a SW Explorer 200P and a second-hand Altair 200 from a friend. Both are f5. 
 

With the SW  I get stars that are distorted (tried to get a pic tonight of that but the clouds rolled in) and with the Altair the stars look like spaceships! See poor-quality pic. EDIT: this is a 3s snap from the ASIAir while focusing, not a guided sub. I never get that far. I’ve collimated both scopes to within an inch of their lives with an OCAL. 
 

I use the recommended spacers to make up 55mm back focus as recommended by the ZWO site. I use an all-purpose coma corrector which FLO said should be okay. 

To be honest I’m losing the will to live. Any ideas? 

I’m still new to my ASIAir (V1) and want to know how to enter coordinates. I want to image comet 12P but am not sure if it’ll be in the database. Just to try things out, I went into SkySafari, got up the comet and tapped a star near the comet’s head. That brought up co-ords. But how do I translate them to RA and Dec to enter into the ASIAir GoTo feature? I hope I’m not being too dim. I have a learning difficulty and the obvious isn’t always obvious. 😊

42 minutes ago, Freddie said:

Click on the latest version under downloads. That will take you to github where you click on the win64 version to download the zip.

Many thanks. I've worked it out. Got a few brain cells working!

On 13/06/2020 at 05:26, nicoscy said:

IMPPG is a software to do post-processing. I find it much easier and comfortable than Registax Wavelets for example. Link is here. 

Sorry if this is a stupid question, but how do I download the software on the site below? It looks very technical! I'm on W1.8.

https://greatattractor.github.io/imppg/

Thank you all! 🥰

Thank you all! 🥰

On 13/06/2020 at 05:26, nicoscy said:

IMPPG is a software to do post-processing. I find it much easier and comfortable than Registax Wavelets for example. Link is here. 

Thank you!

Thank you all so much for your help. 🥰

On 04/06/2020 at 09:46, Zakalwe said:

An X3 Barlow is pushing it and will darken the image considerably. I find that an X3 is barely usable with my Lunt L60 in singlestack mode, never mind doublestacked. You will also need excellent seeing to use an X3

Slow down and take a step back. Make sure that your solar finder is set up correctly. Stick an eyepiece in and get used to tuning the Etalon. The pressure tuning is very precise and with practice you will be able to take the 'scope slightly off-tune into the red and blue wings to make different feature stand out. Get used to focusing as well. Precise focus is essential.
Don't underestimate the effects of seeing (both local and atmospheric). On the recent really hot days the seeing is very turbulent and often makes it nearly impossible to get precise tuning and focusing. Even more so as the day progresses and the ground heats up. Try and set up away from concrete or patios and these will drastically worsen the local seeing.

Getting camera spacing correct can be a pain as the focal plane is very narrow. Until you get really au fait with the 'scope it's easier to tune and focus with an eyepiece, then insert the camera. A shade for the laptop screen helps enormously as you can see what's happening as you manually move the camera in and out of the focuser.

Most importantly, DONT PANIC. I've seen people getting really frustrated with the views until they realise that they are looking at a ghost refection! (Again, check your solar finder is properly set up). Take your time, unless you are very very unlucky the 'scope will be perfect. It takes a lot of experimentation to get the best out of the kit, but once you do the spectacular secrets of the Sun are there for you to see.

 

Very many thanks. This is good advice.

On 01/06/2020 at 10:08, nicoscy said:

Use gain to reduce exposure time and thus increase frame rate. Read noise also drops dramatically with this camera at a gain of 50. 

If possible, use ROI to only get the part you want (plus framing) and again, this will help speed the frame rate.

Have you tried stretching your images in say IMPPG? What you may consider dark, hides probably a wealth of information which can then be coaxed out in any image editing software 

I was recently told aboout ROI. O never thought about that! 'll try it once the damn clouds g away. What's IMPPG?

On 31/05/2020 at 19:46, Solar B said:

I'm glad you have resolved your focusing issues for imaging 

I am curious to know about what surface detail you can see visually v your PST.

Brian 

I've yet to try! Go away clouds!

On 30/05/2020 at 22:23, tomato said:

These dew shield extensions were made for the SW Esprit 150 from a piece of 8” plastic tube,  lined with the self adhesive flock material available from FLO.

 

 

 

 

Looks good! Where did you get the tubes from?

Hi all,

I've made a pretty rough dew shield out of a yoga mat, which I also used last night to try to block an annoying LED street light - it's shielded but still bright. There seemed to be strange clouding in my images, which change a little in each sub. I wondered if there was still some light getting in and reflecting as the mat isn't black.

Has anyone made a cheap but sturdy black dew shield who could give me some pointers? It's for a SW 200P. Many thanks.

Alexxx

Many thanks all. I did finally get it to focus. I was rushing in as my PST is so easy. I should have used an EP first, to get the pressure tuning right and see what activity there was. I did this on an 8mm EP. It worked well. I was advised to remove the EP holder from the filter diagonal and attach the cam directly to the diagonal. This worked well although I had to pull the diagonal a little way out of its holder, which I was also advised to do.

I can get focus with a 3x Barlow well now, but the exposure setting has to be pushed so far up in SharpCap that the frame rate drops down to practically nothing! I'm using USB 3.