tooth_dr

I actually could do with 1 more 😂

Ok, i wasn’t joking though.

Second attempt at imaging with the Nikon lens and QHY9 mono camera. Wasn't a great night with the dome not moving to where it was supposed to go, and by the time I faffed about with that the clouds came in. The guiding was all over the show, and the moon was ?full. Not worth starting a new thread, so will just catalogue them here. M16 - 60s sub in Ha NGC7635 - 1200s sub in Ha

Just for anyone interested - my finished electrics. I trimmed and glued two ikea shelves to the curved wall. I used Turbo Bond, similar to No More Nails type stuff. This gave a suitable surface for mounting monitors and sockets, and made it easy to hide the wires behind it all.

@Laurin Dave and @inFINNity Deck Thanks for the advice. It was wet last night, so I took at look at this. Adjusting the GEM offset would not be a proper solution, as it needed to be changed no matter where the scopes were pointing. I set about changing the EW and NS offset figures last night in POTH, and this gave real time updates on the position. After half an hour of moving and adjusting, I'm pretty convinced that I have it sussed. I can point the scope East West South North, in low and high declinations, the dome follows the scope, and all optical hardware is aligned within the slit when the dome stops. I havent tried tracking the scope for a longer period of time, but it would follow that it should remain correctly aligned, if it stays in the correct position when I moved it to any position as above. My only concern is that the scope had been moved manually during the day and I manually moved it back to its park position before starting my measurements last night. I am concerned that although the position of the slit relative to the scope is now correct, when the scope is platesolved and it's position corrected properly relative to the sky, then the slit will be slightly out.

Fantastic. You did well to control the extraneous light. I did capture the aurora on a plane myself.

Hi Anne. I just made a piece of aluminium to fit, attached that to the top of the rings of the scope, and used Velcro.

I think you know you are an imager at heart when you prefer looking at, rather than looking though, your scopes.

Blu Tak the filter in front of the sensor.

Very useful, thank you! SGP comment is interesting. What I was thinking was that if my parameters are correct, then it should line up the centre of the mount everyone, but it doesn’t do that all. I got a single 20 min sub last night and the mount and dome weren’t aligned any more.

Still having no luck with the dome slaving. Last night I faffed about for two hours. @Xsubmariner sent me his input figures for slaving which I’m going to try tonight but they look similar to mine. Pointing west if I change offset to 800mm I can see through dome. Pointing east I have to set it to 0mm. I have gem offset measured at 410mm. Any suggestions welcome.

I noticed a light pattern recently that I hadnt seen before I added a tilter. There was light leaking in through the tilter, so I just run tape around the edge and it is ok now. This may not be your issue, but just another possibility to investigate?

Thanks Andrew 👍🏻

Hi Andrew. Is uneven illumination the only consequence of this? But should be corrected with flats ok?

Very good Sean. Love the animation.

A very nice well considered image 👍🏼

Not that it matters since I’m still trying to get my dome slit pointing in the right place 🤪

Very nice Simon. I have a tilter and in my experience I also cannot get rid of the N rings that my 120MM produces no matter what angle I try. The 290MM i bought did give NRs but these were completely resolved by the tilter.

The back focus of a Nikon is 46.5mm compared to Canon at 44mm so this can be done and adapters are available.

Hi Martin. I read that Olly off here uses one filter for a flat for all his filters (well most of the time) so if his standard is the bench mark then that is a reasonable level of imaging for me. @Spaced Out Gary you will get differing views on this and some say one filter and some say all filters. I find dust appears to be consistent with all my filters so it must be on the camera or FF. I have two scopes with 7 filters in each EFW. Running off 14 sets of flats isn’t a 5 minute job with a camera that uses a mechanical shutter. With my light panel at one setting and using one piece of acrylic sheeting, my flats for lum could be 4-5 seconds. If I try then to take an Ha flat at the same configuration it can 30 or more seconds for a properly exposed flat. Then I need a corresponding dark flat. For each filter i really need to run the flats wizard to get optimal exposure time. For me it is much simpler and without negative consequences to have a single luminance flat to use for all filters.

Hi Gary. Focus isn’t that critical. I personally use luminance flats for all filters even though there is a little bit of difference between focus position.

Aw I was tired last night when I posted! Lovely processing.

Lovely princessing Carole, nice reds and blues.

Fantastic Carole - a piece of art. And 16 hours seems relatively reasonable all things considered.

Just a quick comparison of the day time and night time cameras. Not fair given the different exposures and limitations of the daytime camera, but still there you go, the day time one is a lot better than the oculus during the day however.