DaveS

Realistically, I reckon the next SGL star party is likely to be at the back end of Oct next year, with notifications in May, though I guess an April / March meet might be doable.

I wouldn't even think about galaxies in moonlight, and I'm in a Bortle 3/4 location. About the only thing that is remotely moon-proof is H-alpha, and as narrow as you can afford. Even the brighter open / globular clusters might be marginal.

I emailed Rupert, but he's on holiday so no point in sending it back yet. He suggested (Not very helpfully) connecting using the supplied PSU and USB3 cable, but as expected, no LED, no fan, no show. I think it's dead.

I have a POE camera in the obsy, but can't use it during imaging as the IR floods get in through the ventilation slots of my camera. Wrecked a load of subs before I realised.

Yep, wind could be a problem rather than mass. EQ8 or CEM120 territory, if you didn't want to go Mesu / 10 Micron. An enclosed obsy would help.

What's the focal ratio? How about building a 12" astrograph?

Assumes that one wants a dob in the first place. I don't, of any size. I have all the instruments I want, at least for a good while yet.

Yes, the QHY needs the 12V supply, not just USB. Guess I'm going to have to email Rupert at Astrograph, though TBH he's probably fed up with me by now.

I measured the voltage at the camera plug, as I thought I may have had a connection problem at the terminal block where the power from the PSU breaks out to the camera, focuser, and dew heater.

Thanks, good idea. I have a power supply in the obsy that has metes for voltage and current, so will give it a go. Tomorrow though as i want to be imaging tonight.

Yeah, I had thought of that but was concerned about voiding any warranty. Though whether accidental damage would be covered is another matter.

My not-too-old QHY 268M appears to be dead. It had been working earlier in the year, but a combination of circumstances (Including a new PC for the rig) meant that I was only able to get it reconnected today. Except it's not showing up in "Devices", even as "Unknown USB Device". I've reinstalled the QHY drivers, including the ASCOM 6.5 drivers after uninstalling the old versions. Still nothing. Further investigation showed that the PSU I was using for the camera and auxiliaries was giving 13.6V instead of the specified 12V. The other PSU in the cabinet (Feeding the mount) was giving 12.46V. I am not sure if I was using this PSU or another one when I had the camera running previously as the installation went through several iterations of PSUs. Neither the power LED nor the fan were on when powered up. Is 13.6V enough to blow the input boards or even worse?

Definitely worth checking for any input protection fuses. A few years ago I thought I had fried my DDM60 by misconnecting the + and - power leads, resulting in a dead mount. After a couple of emails it turned out there was an input fuse, a simple automotive type, that had blown. A quick trip to Halfords provided a replacement. £6.5k worth of kit saved!

Q: What is the Sony for? Install ASCOM 6.5 sp1, EQASCOM, and the planetarium and capture programs of your choice. Plus PHD 2 if your capture program doesn't support guiding. Connect the ASI 120 to one of the USB2 ports on the ASI294, then connect the ASI294 to your laptop with the shortest USB3 cable that will do the job. Connect your laptop to the mount with an EQDIR Cable.

Yep, ASCOM. It's not as "pretty" as Stellarium but I find its control functionality better. Stellarium is great for planning targets.

Hi Dave and welcome back. I think I may have joined a few months before you left.

Never used Software Bisque stuff, but all my mounts work well with Cartes du Ciel. And it's free.

Thanks both. Just ordered the one from ebay. TBH it's the sort of thing that Astro Essentials could do for @FLO.

Or mirrorless. Want to do a bit of dead simple imaging with my Fuji X-T1 and SA, but would like to mount a Baader Sky-Surfer 3 in the finder shoe. Been looking around but cannot see anything suitable. Perhaps my search criteria are wrong, but can anyone point me in the right direction? The Sky-Surfer came with lots of "bits" but nothing that would work for this purpose.

Wonderful colours and lovely fine detail. Just gorgeous.

Wow Peter. Only just seen this, left speechless.

Hi Kev. A good night? What's that? Been a frustrating amount of cloud, plus fighting technical gremlins when it has been clear. Managed *one* 900 sec sub on the veil complex last night before cloud came over and put a stop to proceedings.

That's great Chris, time to put my XT-1 on the SA. I have a few old Leica "R" primes that might be quite good for wide-field.

That's brilliant Stu, really happy for you. I still remember my first night here after moving in, walking out onto the patio, looking up after no dark adaptation and seeing the milky way glittering overhead. Brought a big silly grin to my face!

I think it depends on how far below ambient you are. With my G3 16200 which goes up to -45 deg it can take 15 min or so, gradually reducing the cooler power.