tooth_dr

I'm always blown away by these big mosaics. That is indeed a fine piece of work Adrian.

May or may not be relevant. I have a MHPro also. I was finding my guide camera wasn't connecting sometimes, and then my Atik CCD or QHY9 CCD would stop reading the temperature. Also EQMOD EQ6 would drop out. Very frustrating. Turned out to be two USB cables messing about. Bought new cables, touch wood, all working well. I can now turn on my PC, connect all kit, cool camera, platesolve, start guiding and be focused and imaging within 15 minutes. Before it was an hour of messing about.

Nice detail for short integration time!

PS -> camera raw filter -> move colour noise slider to say 10-15. Nothing to technical in it but it makes a difference.

I know that you asked the same questions on this thread, and got the same answers. It might be better dropping Lucas Mesu an email directly if you need more info?

It isn't a very strong example of walking noise. If you can dither then definitely do it. I removed the colour noise from your image, which helps the overall background I think. Left side has colour noise reduced.

Just went off to read that. Over 150 that’s shocking. Serious risk to your health 😞

Very nice. Love the FOV.

That’s impressive. What’s more impressive is the sunshine? This doesn’t look like the UK!

Class! You can see the texture, colour and depth coming through. A mask will make life very simple to get focus exact. A great start indeed! Adam.

There is.i think that’s what he says in his post.

The three bolts are at an angle on the top plate of the wedge so moving the bottom two can rotate the mount slightly as they are pushing and pulling it . That’s how I see it, but which may also alter declination at the same time.

Great job, stars are bright, but a bit like jewels so I don't mind in this case.

The stars are a bit odd in the upper picture. I wouldn't be surprised if the smoke affected things. Still a great image despite the minor issues.

Nice one Bobby. I have one too, haven't got using it much, but any time I've used it works well.

Steve The step down ring effectively reduces the aperture of the lens. This is the same job at the aperture blades do, but because the step down ring is round it doesn't produce flares like the blades do. It doesn't need to be the same size at the blades, rather it just needs to cover a proportion of the lens at the front. I think of it the same way as you use an aperture mask for a telescope.

Looks awesome. Clearance wise you says its pretty close to the end of the bar. Is your pier in the precise middle?

Hi Paul When I added belts to my EQ6 the tracking according to PHD2 was about 2-2.5 times better (based on RMS values) - this was significant. The EQ6 is hard enough to do yourself, nothing like the HEQ5 where you just remove a panel and can see and feel the belts as you tension them. I had to strip mine back down a second time due to the dec belt slipping off, but this was because I hadnt aligned the cogs exactly. Once this was sorted my mount has been excellent and reliable and quiet. If you decided to upgrade, what would you be think of going for? Adam

Thanks! No point in changing for the sake of it!

Thanks Vlad! No need to upgrade my cameras 👍🏼👍🏼👍🏼

See I thought that 2.23 was in the realm over oversampling and I wanted to aim for half of that?

I really think I want to go CCD again, adding gain settings isnt something I can be bothered with, nor the ampglow or calibration issues, nor the large number of files captured per night! My current camera has a quantum efficiency as follows - Red 33% Green 40%, Blue 33%. The sony chips seem double that.

If I wanted to get the most out of my current scopes, I was thinking that I may need to change my current camera - Kodak KAF8300 with a 5.4um pixel size. Scopes: Tak Epsilon 180ED - 500mm F2.8 + SW 250px - 1200mm F4.7 With the 180ed this gives me a resolution of 2.23"/px, and the 250px I get 0.93"/px If I changed to a camera with 3.69um pixels I would get a resolution with the Tak of 1.52"/px, and if I binned 2x2 with the 250px I would be on 1.26"/px What do you think about this? Are there other factors to consider? Would it be worth it overall? Thanks Adam.

Thanks guys, I admit that galaxies and the structure of especially edge on ones really floats my boat. I just need a longer FL scope, and then of course a better mount to hold it all. The list goes on...

M106, I took the data last night using my Epsilon 180ed, 500mm focal length at F2.8. I started imaging this at 5am, and continued until the sun rose. I attained 20 minutes red, 20 minutes green, 20 minutes blue and 30 minutes luminance - total of 1 hour and 30 minutes. I didnt have darks to match the 60s subs, so I went without. I can see that darks would have improved it as there are black flecks that disappear using darks. I'm still learning the ropes on LRGB imaging, and tend to finish with a yellow cast on my images. I've tried to address this by shifting the blue balance. Red stars should have be reduced in size first, as there is a discrepancy compared to green and blue. Comments welcome. Adam