jefrs

Yes it does work on the AVX. The StarSense camera and controller can support several different mounts. StarSense is available for Celestron and Sky-Watcher but they are different flavours and are not interchangeable, (N.B.!!) To align the AVX by the book - read the book of words (it is very tedious) Fist set up the mount pointing northwards (I'm North but your pole may differ). Level the scope mount with a bubble, important! Roughly set alt and dec, I do mean alt & dec the mount screws - so the (optional polar scope ) tube is aimed somewhere near Polaris. See Polaris through the tube if your back will take it. I bought the polar scope, and a right-angle viewer, it is not needed. Enter time and date. Do set Real Time Clock (RTC) so it will remember in future. Set your exact lat & lon location. Time and date must be correct, if it will not hold correct time and date and/or your location change the backup CR2032 battery. Always check the time before the off, the backup clock is as accurate as a cheap watch. If you use WiFi the interweb time servers synchronise to NIST so they should be accurate. (Although NPL (UK) has the realisation of UTC and offers a time server too) . You can select your time server on a computer but Microsoft gets its shorts in a bunch if it doesn't use their own) Now Align - Auto Align. It will slew to two stars and then want to Calibrate on up to a further four. Follow the instructions on the controller. It will slew to a star, align the OTA to that star. It will then slew to a second star, align the OTA to that. Now it will want to Calibrate. It will display a list of stars that are up. Pick one you like, it will slew to that, follow instructions and centre on that. Repeat with three more. Now we want to do the Polar Align aka All-Star Polar Align. Press Align, find the Polar Align, select. We are presented with a list of stars. We want one on the meridian, due south and fairly high, Rigel would be nice. Select your star. It will slew to it. Follow the instructions on the hand set! First it wants you to centre the OTA to the star. Now it will slew off to where it thinks it should be. It will tell you to move the alt & dec screws to centre the star again. Finish up. Polar Alignment done. But now it will want you to do another Align and Calibrate. This time however your corrections will be very small. The whole Align and Calibrate, centring the OTA on the star is boring! This is what the Star-Seance does for you whilst you make a hot drink. Setting up the StarSense though - read the StarSense book! First time is not just plug it in and run it. First time is Run it then Calibrate a few stars then run it again. Imo the Align and Calibrate instructions in the manual(s) are not written in a straight-forwards "do this" manner. Please make sure you read them forwards, backwards and sideways. The actual processes are nowhere near as difficult as the interminable instructions imply. The StarSense takes the boring bit out of the Align and Calibrate. Especially with a stand-alone mount. If you cave cameras and computer there are other software methods of automating the job. WiFi - if you have WiFi (who doesn't?) we can use the Celestron CPWI to run the StarSense Auto-Align then slew the OTA to target. Again there are other computerised methods available. WiFi Sky-Portal v2. Issue as yet unresolved, Celestron tech are helpful but have yet to come up with a solution. This device is a WiFi dongle. The V2 is much more powerful than the V1. First you connect to iPad/iPhone then tell it to connect to your home router and connect to Laptop. It will support more than one mount. You can run Celestron CPWI or other planetariums (I've not tested) to run StarSense Ailgn etc, and slew the mount about. using the planetarium, Until your ISP gives you a nice new router! If you change the router name it will not connect to the new one and <rude-word> thing plays dumb insolence. It becomes utterly useless, I had to buy another. The V1 (which is not powerful enough for the range needed) has a reset hole, nice. The V2 does not (and there is no button inside 'cos I took it apart to find it). What you should do /before/ they change your router is switch the Sky-Portal back to iPad from the computer(!) and then delete the old router name from it, then give it the new router name from the iPhone.

I have a T7C. There is also a T7M (mono). It is an almost-clone of the ASI120 MC (T7C with possibly a better sensor) and should identify as an ASI 120 for drivers etc (ASCOM https://www.ascom-standards.org/ ). It works in PHD2, I use Windows though. ZWO (ASI) drivers otherwise. Decent cheap camera. Don't expect too much. Mono would have more sensitivity for guiding but I also wanted to take photos without bothering with filters. Guiding, moon, planetary, - deep sky possible. Decent digital camera and lens better for wide field. A decent digital camera mounted prime on the telescope will do a better job of imaging.

Cute! - If they bark they're doing their job of alerting you. A dog is by far the best alarm system. I've kept Airedales my entire life. They're naturally friendly but know when not to be, and can detect a gamin breaking into the neighbour's and then find out if they can run at 40mph up the street.

The BT Home Hub expert I spoke to told me he used the mains plug in type himself. We have the BT Home Hub. The hub and two extender discs which can reach the garden shed 20m away. I had Netgear extenders as well but they interfered with the BT discs. The wifi dongle in the telescope needs to be quite powerful too.

I have a guider but want to mount it and other toys off the OTA so that the OTA can be removed independently and replaced with another or something else like DSLR and lens

Large dog. Our Airedale will actively guard and protect the property, Even though the garden gates are locked, he is the motion detector even from indoors and an intruder will be left in no doubt that he means business. But any dog that will raise the alarum will do the job.

Interchangeable OTA but keeping guider etc in place on the mount platten. Maybe like a side to side adapter but that would be overkill. Surely this has been done before? I'm not sure I am using the right language for search engines but I cannot find what I'm looking for. This is a nuts and bolts problem. I have an AVX but it could be any mount. I have a telescope. I have a guide cam scope. I have a Celestron StarSense alignment MacGuffin. When I change the telescope the whole kit comes off, because it is mounted on the scope. Suppose I want to mount a camera and lens. I may well still want the guider and StarSense, but there is nowhere to mount them. So what to do? The AVX has a combined Losmandy/Vixen which means I have a spare M8 screw hole to which I have a dovetail clamp and a Y extension for the two devices. This works but I cannot help feeling this has been done before and there will be a better solution.

For say the Star Adventurer lifting a camera and lens - my heaviest outfit would be the Lumix G9 and PL100-400, total mass about 1.5kg. Adequate for the job.. For wide field, a much lighter lens. If we are looking at astrophotography with a camera and lens - they're not all that heavy. With an Alt-Az though, you're going to get comma except with short exposures, which defeats the purpose of a motorised EQ. You can spend a lot of money modifying a mount, it may be fun to do, but they are out there are reasonable prices.

Old thread similar problem. Clutch slipping. But not because the knob had loosened. I could not get the thing to align, the motors were running but the axes were slipping on the clutches. By tight I mean tight like gorilla, I know I can snap knobs off so I go easy on them, but they're tight. So I took it apart - There's a plastic button below the screw as a friction pad against a drum. Drum and button were slathered in grease. That is never going to grip. Presumably excess bearing/bush grease had oozed out making an unholy mess. The top dec plate comes off the AVX, so it came off to reveal the drum. Degreased by wiping in naphtha (Zippo lighter fluid). The bottom ra doesn't want to come apart, or at least not easily. Degreased with WD40 ('orrible stuff) squirted in, not too much as I don't to wash grease out of the bearing/bush where it belongs. Then tissue wipe soaked in naphtha poked down the clutch screw hole and turned. A lot of black muck came out. Repeated a few times. (I often mix up the terms ra and dec because I don't need to use them to move the mount, forgive me if I've switched them about) Degreased the clutch screws and buttons. The dimple side of the button should provide most friction. I roughed that side up a little on a fine file. A little, just to roughen it, not to remove material, and washed off in the naphtha. Reassembled and arranged the knobs tight at ≥90° from stop. Frees off, locks absolutely solid with no undue effort.

I've no desire to go to full frame neither. Mainly because they are not good enough for what I use a camera for. Which is mainly wildlife where the crop sensor doubles the magnification (FoV) making the G9+PL100-400 a wildlife photographer's dream. But I also shoot landscape and nighttime and use the cameras for astro. I've been using MFT a long time and cannot think of anything a FF or APS-C can do better. Most astro apps are tailored to the Canon EOS e.g. Backyard-EOS. However as Canon lenses can be fully adapted electronically to MFT, if you find you need to use those apps, a cheap used Canon EOS might make a useful secondary system. Some used Canon can be had very cheaply, like under £50. I have considered it but so far not. Rather than Nikon which can only be dumb adapted.

I'm afraid DxO smite MFT by correcting the low light (sports) performance for sensor size. If you know anything about photon sensor testing you know that is a massive no-no. There is even a code of practice that says thou shalt never, ever, never, correct for sensor size. To uncorrect the DxO number multiply by 3.98 and you will see they are a lot better in low light than FF sensors. Several reasons. The smaller the size, the less heat produced, the less noise. LMOS sweeps stray electrons off the sensor, CMOS does not. Smaller size, less read noise. MFT can shoot video at night in a tent lit by a candle, news reporters have relied on that. The Lumix G7 and later Lumix have "Starlight AF". It can AF on say, Jupiter. You won't have AF with it on a telescope but it does mean the focus peaking will work reliably.; Jupiter is not at infinity. By default Lumix NR is a bit too aggressive, turn it down for less artefacts. Whilst the G7 is not as cleaned up as the G9, it's not speckled like the G5. Whilst the G9 does not have "Dual Native ISO", it does have a step in its ISO range which makes ISO 12800 as clean as ISO 6400 by trading off dynamic range. Compared to the oldest digital cameras I have ISO 20,000 on the G9 is more than acceptable.

SLT have a range of Clip-In filters for Olympus and Panasonic. I.E. have filter and prime mount on OTA. They are not the same fitment. I use Astro-Multispectra to reduce town lights. Depends on your Bortal. You can get the astro filters screw on but as they are expensive it makes no sense if you ever consider mounting the camera onto a telescope, An ND makes sense for moon photos. You can get clip-in ND and coloured filters too. It is very bright and we want a DoF of 1,700km, so we want a smaller aperture. However MFT tend to do better wider than f/13 - f/16 and f/22 tend to produce aberrations. You can get around things but spot metering highlight on the moon and superimposing a nighttime foreground metered there on long exposure (moon blown out). Lance Keimig "Night Photography ..." ISBN 978-0-415-71898-1 The Auto-WB and exposure metering goes to pot with the moon. The metering tries to adjust to 18% grey but the moon is not grey, and the sky is not black. Much of it is grey but also sandy-gold. If you let these cameras do their own thing you can get a daylight blue sky at night. I do still use polarising and Wratten 85, The latter more to take the sting out of flash and warm it up. I used an 81A "cloudy" to warm sunsets on film, The 82A "Morning and Evening" is bluish and does the opposite. The AWB may knock the WB back to midday sun temperature. The colours can be pushed about in the Lumix Photostyles, but not like the PEN-F where every colour can be adjusted to emulate film stock, or such that never existed. I've got ND, never had much use for them. I've played with coloured grads, a bit meh. Nota, the Wratten 85 is a proper film conversion not a typical Orange 85 but more subtle; 85B is bright orange, 85C is "Dawn & Dusk" but the 81/82 series are light balancing, amber 81A provides subtle warming. Coloured filters were more for film but digital can usually push the colours about by fiddling the WB or Photostyle.

I've been using MFT for many years and surprised the GH5 is giving you hot pixels. You have fixed that Cameras I have and have used on OTA - G5, G7, E-PL7, E-M5ii, GH4, G9, PEN-F. SLT clip-in filters for Olympus and Panasonic. Astro Multispectra. Much depends on your Bortal. Some pros and cons. The G7 and E-PL7 are lightweight From G7 on, Lumix have "Starlight AF". With an AF lens they will focus on Jupiter or the moon. On an OTA we don;t have AF but it does mean the focus peaking works, G5 does not have focus peaking. But does take good images, it shares sensor with the GH3. The E-PL7 has the same innards as an E-M10ii The PEN-F and G9 are 20Mp, probably the same sensor, like your GH5. We do not need the extra pixels but they are newer tech, quieter, more dynamic range. The E-M5ii shares innards with the PEN-F but 16Mp. The GH4 is one big heat sink, the sensor does not get hot. The key point of the G9 is its ridiculous stabilisation, we do not need stabilisation on a tripod Back focus can be an issue mounted prime. I had to get a couple of different extra-shallow T2 to MFT adapters. MFT doubles the magnification like a X2 Barlow, reduced field of view, may need a reducer. Advantage less edge curve. There is no Backyard-EOS for MFT. Olympus Workspace is good for Olympus but Lumix Tether not so much, nor the wireless phone apps for them. They will not allow more than 60s exposure Default NR can be too aggressive ans remove faint stars, Long shutter NR is a dark frame subtraction, how much it does can be adjusted and is good for single shots but a waste of milk for stacking. All native MFT lenses are "good". Some are more equal than others.

Do not buy cheap and nasty. Or something that needs three more parts of equal expense to make it work. For simple astrophotography with camera and lens, the Sky Watcher Star-Adventurer with a hefty photographic tripod (Manfrotto 055XPROB or similar). . With that you get the wedge, the motor, the mount, polar finder, and counter weight. And it is relatively light and portable. About £330 quid plus about £150 for new tripod. Eats batteries and wants a power supply. Latest version comes with wifi. I cannot think why you would need that on this. It can be guided but not really needed because its motor is good and it's only got one axis to control. It is simple. It works.

That is exactly right. It's a 1200mm lens on your camera, any camera. We focus an image circle diameter of the diagonal of the sensor. It has nothing to do with pixel pitch, it's an optical image size. With crop sensor cameras we often refer to equivalent length to full frame. On a MFT with a x2 crop factor the 1200mm lens will be /equivalent/ to 2400mm on full frame. It's properly called field of view. I hate using "equivalent focal length", it's a poor term. The image circle diameter is smaller thus reducing the field of view. In other words, the moon looks bigger.