tooth_dr

Hi Craig I have imaged with this camera successfully binned 2x2 over 1200s, but I think the general consensus is that it prefers 1x1. I would have imaged very faint stuff with no bright stars in the field though, and through narrowband filters.

Finally managed 3 hours with the new camera, 300s x 36 with SkyWatcher 250px. Quick process in APP and PS, cropped below. Slight spacing issues but overall very happy, as conditions weren’t the best with high cloud.

I have both dome and shutter drive. The shutter is handy but definitely not essential. The dome rotation is essential for me as I image. My shutter drive battery seems to drain quickly so I end up doing it manually anyway sometimes, and it isn’t any trouble.

Indeed.lol

I caught the cables one evening in the dome with my sleeve so just made up a sort of bracket. On the refractor the cables really protrude out the back. My last camera had side exiting cables.

That’s brilliant. Handier than my felt and print stick. Going to order that now.

Cheers @Adreneline I went with that idea. I found an old pair of tube rings from an ST80 in my parts box 100mm internal diameter, and printed liners to reduce the internal diameter to match camera 90mm and lens 78mm. Then lined with felt from the kids craft box. Test run last night looks ok Atik 2600MC with 105mm F2.8, hope to process later. Cheers

Might not need it now. APT has the option to connect to a ZWO camera, not via ASCOM. Is there any difference this way?

I'm trying to locate the previous version of the ASCOM drivers for ZWO cameras. I dont want to run ASCOM platform 6.5, but the ASCOM drivers on ZWO require this to operate. Is there any ZWO ASCOM drivers that will work ok with ASCOM 6.4 platform, and if so would anyone have a copy or link as I cant find it. Cheers Adam

Hi Julian I didnt even realise that rubber cap covered a port for screwing on the external desiccant tube. I'm going to do what Tomatobro has done and place the clamp a bit further forward, but still make another bracket to support the lens.

I’m trying to make up my own holder and was looking at the product for sale. Surely that a terrible place covering the fan outlets?

Very nice Reggie. Had almost forgotten about Mars now all the hype has gone.

That’s a remarkable result Geoff. Totally acceptable level of halo that does not detract at all from the image.

Thanks for that info. I briefly owned a 94 EDPH. Is this an upgrade or a cost cutting measure by SharpStar , moving to EDPH?

I always find this very much controversial. I’ve found my ED80 focusers to be very adequate, as long as a motor focuser is fitted to the shaft and the focuser is well tensioned. At F6.3 it’s very tolerant to slight tilt, and mine held 1.8kg imaging kit. Spending £300 on a focuser doesn’t make sense on a scope of this price. My daughter wanted a gold telescope so i gave her my ED80(!) but i suppose I just fancied a change anyway. I got the ED80 new in 2009. Im looking at a few options - Esprit 100 with flattener or APM 107/700 with 0.75 reducer. The APM is a little more money but like you I’m considering this as a permanent addition.

I’m currently in the process of upgrading from an ED80 DS-Pro. It’s a fantastic scope for the money, and I think you’d be hard pushed to show the difference at first glance. But with more and more use I believe you would start to see the differences, whether that’s worth £1300 more is a matter of personal choice!

I have NINA downloaded, but havent got around to setting it up yet. I've had enough of SGPro, too many places to enter details - equipment profile and then in control panel, etc. The new profile choice on opening APT if a nice touch, and I have now it set up for my cameras/EFWs/focuser combinations.

I also deleted the drivers and installed the older legacy version. I cannot definitively say that the new version works, but it's very likely. I am however going to stay on 4.x until otherwise required to upgrade.

I now realise that this isnt the case, and the fault lies at my end. I changed out to a different hub (Startech 4 x USB2.0) and the problem still persisted. So I changed to a different power cable, and that seems to have resolved the issue. I was able to connect all the kit, including the 2 x EFW3s and run off a few filter changes with no issues. The camera 16200 worked 100%, and I took 48 darks last night. Got up this morning and all was still connected and functional. Hopefully I can mark this issue as resolved

Very nice Bryan, nice to see this is WL.

I have a 10” 1200mm Newtonian in my 2.2m dome along side another scope. Fits ok 👍🏻 But wouldn’t hold the 12” 1500mm newt without tweaking pier height and adding weight to short balancing point back

Still not working in any software program including Atiks own Dusk! So I’m concluding it’s the latest 5.x Ascom/drivers that are dodgy. I ran 2 x EFWs previously (a EFW2 and a EFW3) on an older version of the Atik software. I’ll try to find the 4.x version and see if it helps.

Finally got around to doing this, worked a treat. Cheers

Potential meteorite fall near Cheltenham | British Astronomical Association (britastro.org)