tomato

Do folks still make sky models in the days of rapid and reliable plate solving? It was all the rage when I bought my Mesu back in 2014, the Sitech manual had pages and pages dedicated to it, but now I slew to the target from the park position, then a 10 second plate solve and centre on the object. This assumes you are imaging with the scope of course, not visual.

Worthy winners indeed, and it is a wonderful dataset. Any chance of a galaxy based dataset?☺️

Back in 2014 I nearly purchased a used Paramount from Ian King, but the positive chatter on here about the Mesu 200 took me down that road. You are certainly buying from a trusted source, and that counts for a lot. My brother went after a used Mesu but upon inspection it ahem, had a missing encoder so he rightly IMHO, walked away.

It looked very green on my iPad although less so on my processing monitor. Here is a tweaked version with the iPad photo editor:

Thanks to @wimvb's encouragement I have continued my attempts to add in the meagre 1 hr of dual band data I collected. This is my best attempt so far, adding the red channel from the NBZ RGB into the red channel of the RGB broadband data. I've cropped it so the Ha regions can be seen a bit better, but of course that is revealing my processing artefacts also.

Cool, what’s the device near the Objective on the big brass scope, perhaps a spit valve to drain out the drool?😄

Thanks Wim. I have to confess, I saw your image and realised it is well worth collecting some Ha. I have just one hour of data through an NBZ dual band filter and OSC camera but to date I haven’t managed to blend this in to produce a better result, but I haven’t given up!

Ah, come to think of it, I had a very large oak tree directly below the object at the start of the session, I thought it was out of the FOV, but maybe not.

Here is another seldom imaged galaxy, IC 2574, discovered in 1898 by Edwin Foster Coddington using the Crocker Photographic Telescope at the Lick Observatory. It is part of M81 galaxy group and is some 12.5 million light years distant from the Milky Way. This is 6 hrs integration with the Esprit 150/QHY268 LRGB rig captured over 3 sessions. I was hoping for 3 times that amount of integration but every session in January which promised so much has been plagued with either intermittent or persistent cloud so I have thrown in the towel at this point. I'm not sure what has caused the spikes on the star to the left of the galaxy, usually this is because I let the edge of the shutter aperture intrude on the FOV of the scope but then this usually affects all of the bright stars, not just one. Processed as usual in PI/Xterminator suite/Affinity Photo, thanks for looking.

Very impressive, I reckon the UK leads the world in "stuff to do to improve your astro imaging while it's cloudy"

Powered up the 268c tonight, initially showing -56 deg C😳, this slowly “warmed” to -6 deg C, over an hour, cooler power at 0% throughtout. I then set it to cool to -10 over 10 minutes, this it did, requiring 1.6% cooling power to do so, which is definitely not right. I will update the driver and see what this does…

There is a comprehensive thread on here about the RASA8 defect: It’s just my opinion, but I would have some faith that Celestron have fixed the problem if they have started shipping units again.

Nice model, I am about to start converting a 1:1 scale version into an Obsession style truss tube Dob, a project also partly driven by the continual cloud cover.

I’m assuming you are referring to the odd overlay of some of the frames? This is because some of the frames were taken with different rotation orientation and APP has had to rotate them to align the stars with the others. Something has changed on your set up at some point to produce this effect, I see it a lot if I combine historic data, as I’m afraid I am not disciplined enough about the camera position each time I set up.

Good to know, the Rising Cam dew heater can be switched on or off in NINA, but it’s not up to much, I had to fit a ZWO external heater to stop the sensor window misting up.

Is that independent of NINA displaying the cooling power? Mine shows zero % cooling when connected to NINA but the cooler must be on to bring it to 0 deg C.

Yes, my camera does exactly the same thing, I was always puzzled why it showed 0 deg C initially, my Rising Cam version always displays an initial temp closer to ambient.

I might have a temperature control issue with my QHY 268c, I set it to cool to -10 degrees C as usual it got about half way there then the cooler power went to 100% which I didn’t notice straight away, when I did it was at -25. I set it to warm up but the temp is stuck at -18 to -20 deg C with 0% cooler power. Powering it down and on again had no effect, I didn’t want to waste the clear sky so I imaged with it, no problem with the subs. It clouded out at 20:30, the temp indication is not moving, so I’ve powered it down and will look at it tomorrow.

The IMX178 sensor suffers from significant amp glow, I don’t know why they didn’t go for the next generation 678 sensor, unless Celestron already have a camera based on the older sensor. A smaller sensor also minimises back focus and tilt issues, which is what you want in a just put it outside and go system. At around £4K it isn’t aimed at the Seestar market, I guess the quality of the initial images will determine if folks looking to put an AP rig together from individual components will be tempted.

The IMX 178 sensor has significant amp glow which can of course be eliminated with dark frame calibration, or minimised with short exposures, but I wonder why they didn’t go with the IMX678 which is about the same price but has zero amp glow, is the 178 camera already in Celestron’s product range? It should certainly out perform the Seestar but then it definitely isn’t in the same price bracket. It will, I think, tempt someone thinking of putting an AP rig together, especially if they have been seduced by the RASA output regularly posted here on SGL.

In APP I would stack each scope/camera combination and then combine the stacks, you can do it all from the raw sub frames, but my PC gets quite hot and bothered in the process.

"The Olly and Paul Deep Sky Photographic Atlas of the Northern Hemisphere", I'd buy a copy.👍

Might fine, I don't think you can call this the Hidden Galaxy anymore when you see images like this.👍

Yes, and their customs officers are very well briefed on the nature and value of astro imaging kit, so you are rolling the dice if you try to go light on the values you declare on the shipping paperwork.

If the RASA is a cloud gun, mine is shooting blanks…