nightster

On 06/08/2022 at 13:07, iapa said:

It would be good to see a hed2hed [sic] between different manufacturers and their models

What would you like to see. I have the RC26 in mono, my observatory partner has the ASI in M and C, and our fellow club members have copies of the QHY mono. And that is just the guys with permanent obsy’s maybe more with the setuo and tear down folks. 

I emailed Eddie several times, he answered all the questions I would of expected him to answer. He couldn't comment about those other blue cams on AliX, but I didn't expect to get that answer. Felt a lot better after that discusion, ordered through AliX, UPS shipping, they sent me a tracking number with schedule Dec 15, about 12 days total, from China to east coast US. I did suggest to Eddie that they thread the other side of the Female M42, the surface that protrudes out a few mm,  with a Male M48 and then its possible to get a bit closer to the corrector lens if you got that cursed 55mm back focus problem. (Please stop designing corrective optics only for DSLRs) Sorry, had to be said. I am switching from my trusty SX USBFW to their Mini with integrated OAG, much smaller back focus. Terry has a M48 nose piece that he modifies(ask for this special) for the cameras with 17.5 BF and said it gets the distances right close to spec.  Was hoping to use my existing wheel, has been bullet proof, but the BF would require permanent modifications, drilling cutting grinding. The Mini is not that expensive. The old one is sellable. I know Mini only holds 5x36mm. I am only putting L, Ha, Sii, and Oiii  and a black blank for darks. We have ASI2600MC in the obsy and will be using that for RGB.  Will get L and NB from the 'ATR3.' They need a much better Model number for this thing. RC26, RCam2600?...something. So very excited, believe I got a workable back focus plan, and moving from 12nm Astronomiks to 6nm is another big change. My obsy partner has theASI2600MM with those same 6nm filters and the results are stunning with this sensor.  We plan on doinig a full side by side of this cam vs the ASI2600 vs the QHY268 which there are 2 others used at our club's dark site. Put them all on the same optics for an hour or so, same target same night, same weather and try to see if there's a difference. Let me know if anyone is interested in that data. Should be a fun test, plus will allow me to really dial in, flat field, tilt, focus, cable routing all the stuff we obsess over. 

Hello All,

TLDR= https://mosaic.darkdragons.space

Backstory: with a fellow club member and friend, we built a roll off roof obsy at a dark site in May ‘21 named Dark Dragons Observatory. After imaging partner convinced me to try Kstars/Ekos I was hooked except for framing my sequences. Coming from SGP their planner was intuitive, accurate and fun to use, but its seemingly proprietary. He agreed that the Kstars planner isn't as good. He is a contributor to that project. After brainstorming cool features he had an idea. Couple weeks later he sent me a link and I was just giddy over it. So let me present:

The Dark Dragons Mosaic Planner

A wholly online service that will output easy to solve, synthetic star fields, produced from data you enter that should be usable by any plate solving system that accepts .fits files. This is generally how it works. You enter in your specific hardware info, sensor size, pixel size, focal length. I believe it will save these in its database for future use. You can then enter a target by name, number or use an Ra and Dec to show that area of space into the planning area. Specify your desired number of panels and their matrix orientation, 2x1,1x2 etc… Also adjust the overlap you’d like for those panels. This is also for Non-Mosaic planning. Find your target, select 1x1 for a single framed image. Now just move the rotation slider to get that galaxy to fit corner to corner just the way you like it! 
Now heres the fun part, select either View Image or Download Image and the software creates a synthetic star field that is solvable by any plate solver.  If you use a standalone like Astrotortilla, one of my favs, you can select solve file and sync, this will put your scope on that target without more complicated all in one sequencing programs. How many of us have had the plate solver fail for unknown reasons and your in the cold and dark losing Lights time because your not ON TARGET. Fallback to ATortilla, or ASTAP,  solve the synthetic field, get on target and back to work. Please let us know what you think and if it works for you. Our short sample size of 2 scopes and only 4 images so far isn’t really enough to call it a beta test. And if you come up with any ideas how else it my be useful let us know. 

-Jeff 

I dont have a closeup of the angle iron used as a track, can grab one next time Im down there. Here are 2 pics showing way to secure roof for different reasons. First, we have 4 latches that simply tie down each corner when roof is closed and we are not planning in using it. Or if a strong extended storm is forecast. The shed has already taken a 40+mph short duration thunderstorm with latches not secured. The second pic shows another use of angle iron. This time, 1.5x1.5” angle is screwed to walls parallel to roof movement. 6 short 3x3” sections of angle are screwed to rolling roof. These are placed in an interference orientation so that roof will slide south to north but any wind or upward movement of roof causes the angle to touch dissallowing further separation. If that makes any sense…If not I can get more detailed pics/video later.  Also note on the interior latch pic the galvanized roll steel we used under the pressure treated top board(which is what the inverted angle iron is screwed to to make the track) which will keep moisture away from the non-pressure treated portions of the wall headers. Also see the steel v track wheel hiding to the right bolted in place between the roof “trucks” as we called them. 

Your design shows caster wheels. I recommend V groove metal wheels with inverted Angle Iron steel drilled and deck screwed to wall headers as the track. Friend of mine used C channel and synthetic caster wheels and the channel would cut into the wheels after a year of settlement around structure and made the roof very difficult to move. Suggest putting wheels on bolts as axels with some amount of play between the hubs and the wood that they are attached to to allow them to float left or right as the roof moves. Also use wheels with roller or pin bearings to reduce friction.

Test and Tune Night. While we still have work to do, mains power to the load center, home cooked arduino based control system for the roof motor, interior paneling/trim/etc, I was able to reinstall my pier and mount the gear. Mostly wanted to test the 32m active usb 3 cabeling. Found one with repeaters small enough to snake into the 3/4” floor conduit to the control room. Worked at the word go. All equipment connected and that was all I wanted to test, but the clouds cleared so I rolled the roof and ended up capturing data on the Mark Chain for many hours without a single dropped connection to the gear. I had no idea how luxurious sitting inside while imaging was. 

From last weekend. 2nd pic shows the control room with the stationary roof. Using that foil lined insulation, we inadvertently created a Faraday Cage! Its radio silent in there. WifI Nope, 4/5G Nope, So maybe is suitable for radio astronomy?  Who knows, we are imagers and will need signal will figure out a repeater. Also we are scheduled for a Starlink, ya I know, but this place is really rural and if we are to control it remotely, we need a fat network pipe.   

After 7 years of imaging and finding another imager wanting to throw in, we have built a decent sized obsy. We took a weeks of vacation for framing and spent the last couple of weekends working. Still have a little way to go before the piers go in but we are close.   Planning has taken over a year. We built the forms, poured and finished the concrete ourselves. Designed the building, framed it, sheeted it, roofed it ourselves. a 12'x16' scope room with 13' of that open to sky. 3 feet under the south eaves when  roof rolled back, workbench under that section.  In the north is a 12'x12' control room, no roll off roof there. Heat/AirCon, mains power, network and low voltage wire thru conduits poured into floor with exit points at all 4 walls of scope room and in center of floor where 2 piers are currently positioned. room for at least one more, maybe a fourth if we move stuff a little bit. DC roof motor we designed and built from standard off the shelf components.  Mayve another month or 2 of interior work, drywall, electrical and it will be fully operational.  

 

On 22/11/2020 at 09:49, Paul M said:

I've always enjoyed playing with planetarium software and packages like ASTAP add a new dimension. It has a very useful deepsky annotation tool using the Hyperleda database and the asteroid and comet annotation tool. It all takes some setting up, files to download and install in the right place etc.

ASTAP is also an up and coming plate solver. Very fast when set up right. Though it does struggle with some of my imaging attempts, no surprise there. It's a bit like trying to plate solve splashes of paint on my overalls...

I’ve recently switched to ASTAP from Planewaves PlateSolve2. I use SGPro and ASTAP is the other free plate solver. I have not used it for anything else at this point but to precisely frame and rotate my targets. Looks like a I got yet another complex software app to learn about in depth. Let me add that to the list. LOL

About 4 hours total.  5 minutes exposures. A couple have been thrown out for focus or other reason. 

I switched to ASTAP recently as 1. It is compatible with SGPro now, 2. Its Faster than the PlateSolve2 3. Less buggy than PS2 and 4. Its fun saying Ass Tap (note previous comment about jokes.)

I will spend some time and attempt to figure out the Asteroid capability of ASTAP. 

 

Hello,  The Seven Sisters has been my White Whale. Since I started AP in 2015ish I have been trying to get a quality M45. Mostly due to poor skills, cheap equipment, lack of patience I was never able to complete it. From DSLR to ATIK 460, and side mounted guide scope to an OAG I have progressed and almost every fall I target Pleiades because it just so beautiful and so bright.  Finally this year the concrete pad and permanent heavy duty steel pier went in. (ROR soon to come.)  But I think I am a place where I can lay this to bed. I may do some fine tuning based on critiques here but here is my 20 hour M45. That said I have probably over 50 hours of actually subs on the drive BUT do to bad plate solving, bad rotation, pea soup skies and other errors and omissions I have settled on this. It does look much different than other M45s I see online. I've always had problems with color gradients on this. mostly do to the local shopping center that was built in 2016. And until I got imaging at a dark site exclusively in 2018 I had always thought it LP in my M45, but now I think that much of that color has to be in there. I mostly see BLUE 45's but I found reds in there also. 

Thank you for viewing and feel free to comment, post links to your own for comparison. 

Jeff

 

WOW!!!! You guys are absolutely amazing. Thank you so much for all  this work.  I need to learn how to do all this. My imaging buddy and I talked about this capture last weekend. I asked him if there is any 'live blinking' software. He is a pro-coder. We couldn't think of any and said he may write one. Maybe someone knows of something similar. I am not asteroid hunting, just imaging,  but as many know, we have LOTS of spare time as we sit around down at the club obsy. It would be nice to add asteriods to the list that includes, jokes, whiskey, maybe a cigar to the interim activities. It would be great to find these things as we capture them.  I can't wait to share this thread with my club mates. 

 

Thanks again everyone!

Jeff

Wow I did not see the other object a 2 o’clock. Does anyone know how fast the star link sats move? I suspect a lot faster than this. 

While imaging M45 8-11 pm 11/7/20 -5 UTC (east coast U.S.) found this moving near M45. Stellarium shows no satellites. How do find out if it’s a know object? 
 

Jeff

Long time since I've gotten anything worthy of showing my family let alone posting. But I've gotten lucky and have at least a workable image to share.

Taken with my SV80 over 2 nights. Only 6.5 hours of light  after pitching bad subs in this but this is the first image that I was able to get all subs at 15min so thats and improvement.  I do have the RGB stars but haven't started that stack yet.  Will add later. 

 

 

Retire at will, Andrew, as is your perfect right, but please don't do so before accepting my heartfelt thanks for the most edifying of posts! I must admit to functioning at about 15% of an already limited mental capacity following an accident which leaves me unable to sit in comfort for more than a few minutes, so my mind is not really on the task. I'll go through all this in a month or so when I'm back to what passes for normal!

Olly

Olly, you are such an excellent teacher of these most difficult skills and theories that I, as well as others, get excited to see a reply from you. I appreciate the time you give a mere beginner such as myself.  I hope you recover quickly and fully.

Thank you,  

I spent some time working with Vincent at Highpoint Scientific (my favorite stateside astro dealer.)  He helped me with the backfocus calculation for my scope and the new CCD today.  We found the error in the Astronomik thickness, so I was correct on that line.  He also contacted the maker of my OTA, Flattener and comfirmed the setback distance and the allowable margin of error.  The dealer stressed the importance of a tight tolerance to the prescribed 55mm distance.  I thought I'd share the worksheet he sent me as I thought this a great way both understand and calculate this space for any novice such as myself.    

Item Part # Backfocus remaining   Stellarvue flattener SFF6-25 55 55 Male T-threads (M48 spacers can be used) Stellarvue Spacers M48 Spacers 10 45 10mm thick M48 to M48 spacer Stellarvue Spacers M48 Spacers 3 42 3mm thick M48 to M48 spacer     0 42   Starlight Xpress SXUFW-1T 29 13 Telescope side (female T-threads), Camera side (male T-threads) Astronomik NB+LRGB -0.33 13.33 Assuming 1mm thick filters (1/3rd filter thickness) Atik 460EX 13.5 -0.17 Ends in female T-threads

And I was just trying to save the 19 dollars for an additional 1mm spacer when I order the mono ccd tomorrow. 

And if I knew how to edit my post on SGL I could rescind the previous post as Olly says it subtracts from the backfocus.  My dealer told me it adds also.  The QSI report says "Back focus reduced by (glass thickness / 3)."   At this point this topic seems clear as mud.

Ok, so it Adds to the Backfocus.  Since the Astronomiks are thick it add 1/3mm which is negligible.  But the Astrodons @3mm would add a full 1mm for a total of 56mm behind my specific flattener.  

To further my understanding, and I understand every flattener different, there has to be a small amount of leeway on the 55mm backfocus, right?

I talked with my dealer to prepare the equipment list for the move to mono, the 460ex. As we were determining the backfocus for the spacer requirements, he told me that you need to add for the filters. He said 1/3 of the filter thickness. The Astronomiks list their glass at 1 mm, which is inconsequential. But my dealer said they are 3mm hence an additional 1mm backfocus. This is something I haven't read about before.

1. Has anyone heard of filters adding to backfocus?

2. Is the 3mm for Astronomiks correct?

First Image: M104 Sombrero  

Altas Eq-G, AT6IN, 450D, ST80, SSAG, ATCC, BYEOS, PHD2