Radec

Good afternoon all. Confession time - I've not been posting here for years! Yes, I'm afraid I went to the darkside - Facebook for a few years, but recently I've been having a torrid time there - the FB algorithms remove my astro images because they 'offend community standards' and now I'm restricted from posting in certain places due to this! Ridiculous and beyond reasonable and of course, there is no appeal or redress. My images may not be brilliant, but I didn't think they were offensive LOL. So, I'm going to pick up using the forum again instead and borrox to FB! If you'll have me (haha) Radec (Keith)

Thanks Peter - I finally resolved the issues I was having with black artefacts caused by cold pixels from the dark frames and so was able to do a full calibrated process. Here is the result, which I think is an improvement on the light frames only version; certainly better colour depth. So this one is 11 x 360s lights, darks, flats and dark flats processed in PI using WBPP. Interestingly the recommendation from Adam Block was to put the dark flats in the Bias tab and let PI sort from there (rather than in the darks or flats tab) and this worked extreemly well. Modest tweaking in post processing as the data is quite good from this excellent Altair 269c camera. Just need some clear skies instead of 23mm of snow!

Thanks Bryan. Could do with more exposure but the cloud gods thought otherwise. Just grateful for what they allowed me. Keith

This has been years in the making for all the wrong reasons - wrong telescope/wrong camera/wrong weather - I've had the lot, so I've never managed to get a single image of the Andromeda Galaxy, until now! This is only 66 minutes and is also only lights - no darks, no flats & no dark flats - taken with my AA ED102 Triplet, A .79 reducer, AA 269c CMOS camera and processed in Pixinsight. Minimal clumsy interference from me, so I'm quite happy with it.

This is first light through my new set up. Altair Astro 102 Triplet using an Altair Astro 269c with an Altair Astro Quad filter. Guided with QHY 5-11m and a QHY mini guidescope using PHD2 This is a total of 5 hours 20 minutes exposure in 360 and 600 second subs - 560 Gain and Offset 24, captured with APT and calibrated then post processed in Pixinsight. It has to be one of the best data sets I've ever had the pleasure of processing, taking little effort due to the low noise. It was captured on 19th & 20th December under partial moonlight. I now have the Altair .79 reducer/flattener which will get rid of the streaky stars at the edges next time the weather & moon give me a break!

I seem to be the only one to have this problem (?) With the new version 1.8.8-7, I get a processed image that shows Hydrogen emission nebula in IC405 as green with the image flipped. When I revert to V 1.8.8-6 and process exactly the same data with exactly the same settings, it comes out as red and orientated as I would expect from previous images. I am driving myself nuts with this as I cannot use the new version (or move forward with PI) in this state. The images are captured with an Altair 269c using APT and processed using set parameters in PI that I have used for some time. I have checked all known settings to be the same. I have attached an image processed by each version - Calibrated in WBPP then registered & integrated. Any thoughts or suggestions much appreciated Radec

Interested to know what happened here. I have an old SXV M8c that I have had for years. I have recently been using it in an old William Optics ZS66 with some excellent results.

Thanks for the info guys - it’s almost pristine and looks hardly used. I reckon the gears should be ok having owned a CPC800 for a number of years, unless wedged, they don’t suffer too much. Knowing the lady, I very much doubt she ever wedged it. I’ll go for 375 with the extras and see what happens. Easier to go down than up😂 keith

Afternoon all I'm going to sell for a friend a Meade 90ETX with electric focus, 3 x EPs, variable polariser, Barlow etc, Autostar handset and the eq/altaz mount and tripod. Optics are in great shape - it's from circa 2004 and complete with a case for the set up. I need to just test it to make sure it fires up, but pretty sure it will be fine. Any pointers as to potential ballpark value please. I want to try to max the price for her as C-19 has hit her hard financially and she needs every penny she can get. From some research, an asking price of about £400 ono - how would that sound? Thanks in advance Keith

Thanks for the advice. I also posted on the SharpCap forum. Robin replied that it's a case of the previous settings from the camera being retained and needing clearing with the new version. Opening the camera while holding down CTRL totally worked and the QHY5 is working fine again now. Jeez....!

This is a weird one! I have two QHY5-111 178 cameras - one mono and one colour. I use Sharpcap Pro V3.2.6433 and W10 The mono camera is recognised, frame rate around 50fps and the black screen goes bright white when I remove the sensor cap. The colour camera is recognised, frame rate around 25fps (because it's colour) but the screen remains black when the cap is removed from the sensor. The camera was sent back to QHY and they 'repaired' it but I have no idea what they did. When it came back, it was the same. Modern Astronomy have sent me a brand new one to test - same thing happens! It can't be that two cameras are faulty. I have updated all the QHY software using they 'one stop package' and the mono version still works fine as before. I downloaded the EZCAP 64bit software (I hate using this) but guess what - both the colour and mono cameras register an image by turning the preview screen white. So - I am a loss as to what the problem is. Why would the mono work in SCPro but not the colour. I have tried lots of various exposure/gain/offset/usb settings, all to no avail. Any thoughts please help! Thanks

It's funny how some glorious images just don't get the recognition they deserve on many forums. This is not only an excellent capture, but it's very sympathetically processed too. Not overly aggressive or forced. It shows the value of good data in the first place, that requires sensitive processing rather than 'pushing'. What software did you run it through?

That is gorgeous! You are not just a planetary imager any more. One of the best amateur versions I've seen.

Well I'm happy. I went ahead and bought one, installed everything, mounted the PC to my setup and tested it. Everything works well and using W10 Remote Desktop I can look forward to the autumn & winter without freezing myself half to bits. Thanks for the assistance and advice, much appreciated.

So, to conclude - this looks like a good one for the price. It will presumably run all the necessary software (Maxim, APT, Sharpcap, PHD2 & CdC) with me just linking to it from the laptop, thereby avoiding WiFi drop trashing my set up & guiding. Am I right with that? Only ever used usb hardwire till now Radec😐

Evening guys I'm thinking of getting one of these to run my imaging rig wirelessly MINIX NEO Z83-4 Does anyone have any comments, suggestions or better alternatives? Thanks in advance Radec

Late to the party here, but I have an 831 as well. Long story, but it has taken some stunning images of the moon - amongst the clearest I have taken. I’m desperate to find a finder for it though..... They are amazing scopes. Keith

Just to wrap this up, I pulled the trigger on the 178m today. Couldn’t justify the extra expense and didn’t want the larger pixels. Thanks for the help all, will post some images when the penance is done🥴

Until recently I had a CPC800 and that's how I took my recent planetary images (as with the avatar) - had to go though due to physical constraints where I live now (carrying it a long way from storage to patio along an uneven cottage path). Dave - the 178c I have now gets the full disk in perfectly; it's just a waste of pixels using the colour matrix.I had some great results with the 5P-11m once I got Mr Newton sorted! - shame it's borked.

I’m looking at the 174 as a mate has one and swears by it. The pixel size is an issue for the 50mm Lunt though (the only solar I intend to use). This tends to lean me towards the 178m and back around the circle I come. Not too happy with the fact that the 5P-11m has apparently decided to retire early plus there are some possibilities with the 174 and certain DSOs which add to the party a bit. thanks for the continuing input chaps Keith

Thanks for that, I'll check them out. The reason is that the QHY5P-11m has decided to cease most functionality. It records light passing over it but cannot sustain more that about 0.1 FPS - no idea why so I'm trying to investigate the causes (it used to work fine but has been dormant for 2 years or so before trying again recently) with a new laptop. It is also usb2 which compared with the 178c is just way too slow. The 178c is a good camera and has given some pretty good results on Jupiter but for solar in particular and in mono mode, it is not sensitive enough. Colour on the sun is a waste of pixels imo. So, all in all it's time to move on and hence my question. Thanks for the comments

Guys - time to choose a new camera. I have been using QHY cameras for some time but have decided to think again. What is the view on alternatives for lunar, solar and planetary? The only constraints will be USB3 obviously and price as I don’t want to spend a fortune (circa 500). The solar is Ha through a Lunt 50 and I’m partial to full disk images. Scopes can be seen below with the exception of my Swift 77mm refractor which has been very good on the moon. Thanks in advance Keith

Thanks Cotak - that is what is so excellent about these forums. Your info has nailed the problem. The board that I pulled out is V1420 (obviously an old-ish one) and the one the retailer sent me to include the balance option is V1441. No plus, so that's the issue. So easy to think it's something you've done or not done yourself. Thanks for your help - sanity saved. Keith

Yep, I checked it wasn’t the same as the one I pulled out. Do you happen to know what the number should be?