martin_h

100% cloud so not a lot of imaging going on here this weekend.

Something new for me, having a go at planetary/lunar imaging.

Advice needed as well, what would be a good number of frames to stack? this image is the best 50% from 900 ish frames.

RC8 + ZWO ASI 120 mc-s

I too use LesveDome control to run my ROR using the circuit shown on their website. I use SGP to orchestrate the running, but its nice to have a backup(just in case). Like Steve I use the Cloudwatcher system for weather monitoring, and inbuilt to that unit is a simple relay which i connect across the "close" portion of the motor control. that way if the computer hangs, the roof will close on an unsafe weather situation.

1 hour ago, Ouroboros said:

Ouch!  £1600! Frankly I'm disgusted Action Fraud can't  do anything about it. What's the point of them? I can understand they can't do anything about your specific case maybe, but in general if the company are selling  something fraudulently shouldn't AF be doing something to get the company shut down or whatever. Are they still advertising? 

The company I got mine from have dissapeared it seems.

Just fired up the computer to recieve a message from Adobe telling me my version of Photoshop 5.1 is not a valid copy.........NOT HAPPY!!

I paid good money for this in good faith from an online software company....hey ho!

Anyone in the Grimsby/Cleethorpes area are welcome to attend. It will be a worthwhile visit for anyone considering a future in astrophysics.

6 hours ago, GCG-Observatory said:

Did you find it difficult to configure and get everything set up?

Not at all, it takes a bit of trial and error to tweek it to individual systems, autofocus, meridian flip etc but fairly straightforward.

18 hours ago, GCG-Observatory said:

So are you automating with SGPro?

Yes I am

Cliff Johnson is part of a team of astronomers studying galaxies that are dominated by dark matter. Using the Dark Energy Camera (DECam) on the four-meter Blanco telescope at the Cerro Tololo Inter-American Observatory (CTIO) in Chile, the team are running a three-year survey called DECam Local Volume Exploration (DELVE) to observe nearby galaxies.

Last night, they were taking about 40 exposures of the night sky, looking towards the small and large magellanic clouds, two dwarf galaxies that neighbor the Milky Way. But during one set of those observations, 90 minutes before sunrise, the train of SpaceX’s Starlink satellites moved into view, glinting in the early morning sunlight and taking five minutes to pass across the telescope's line of sight.

Our beginers session on Friday 13th December has changed to a special event.

Professor Brad Gibson, Director of the E.A. Milne Centre for Astrophysics, University of Hull & several of his students will talk to younger members of the Beginners' group and their parents about pursuing careers in astrophysics.

He will then give a talk entitled 'Are we alone in the universe?'. This will be followed by the usual tea break and a short session on stars and constellations to look for over Christmas and New Year

Please note a new start time of 18:45

A very good reason for automation happened to me last night. I started my imaging run at 20.00 hrs and went to bed at 22.00 hrs, at 23.00 hrs it clouded over (typical!), the observatory shut down and parked the scope, closed the roof etc, then sat there in anticipation until 03.00 hrs when it cleared and everything fired up and continued to image untill 05.30 when the run finished.

14 minutes ago, sloz1664 said:

Talking of computer issues and associated problems. I was merrily plodding along, minding my own business, and happy in the thought I had a trouble free system.... When SGPro announced it was NOT supporting Win 7 in the New Year. This meant that I would have to upgrade to Window 10. I'm not afraid of the operating system, far from it, I have it installed on three machines already. It's the fact is it "astronomy ready" I have built a fair few Arduino projects that automate a fair bit of my equipment and an old filterwheel that has never let me down. All of which I need to work but don't know they are Win 10 compliant. So in a moment of "He who dares" I compiled a disc image of my Win 7 machine and Loaded Win 10........ An hour or so later I had a fully functional Win 10 machine, fully compliant with my astro gear. The only casualty was my old Philips SNC900NC webcam I used to monitor the Observatory. Well pleased.

Steve

 

 

I did the same a couple of weeks ago with no problems at all.

Just in case you wondered what they do all day.

When using SGP are you using the Ascom driver? Just wondering if there id an anti blooming setting in the native software that is not set in the ascom driver?

Marvin Jenkins..

I too run a remote Observatory using a different software option to Steve but with a lot of the same hardware and the main advantage of this is to take advantage of every clear hour of the night sky. My software is very stable now, and yes a few clear nights were used setting it all up, but not as many as packing kit up because of cloud cover only to find it clear an hour later!

https://www.forbes.com/sites/jonathanocallaghan/2019/11/18/this-is-not-coolastronomers-despair-as-spacex-starlink-train-ruins-observation-of-nearby-galaxies/

Just stepped out of the house in time (05:30) to see a meteor shoot past Orion!

Worth a look..

2 hours ago, Carbon Brush said:

If you managed a full W10 upgrade and observatory software running short of only a key - WELL DONE.

I never seem to have things run so smoothly.

That was my 3rd W10 install this week! Plenty of practice there.

Ever had one of those days?

I decided that last night was the time to upgrade my observatory computer to Windows 10 (from W7) I have been preparing this move for a few days now, taking screen shots of all my software settings, making sure I have all the software keys to hand for new installs etc.

So, at 4 PM I set to and did the deed, and all went well and a nice new desktop presented itself to me on the first try. Now to load and set up all the other bits and bobs that make it all tick as an observatory, well it took a few hours to download and install all that was required, software and all the drivers for the kit, until it came to test it, one huge problem I had downloaded the software and driver that runs the roof and switches the power to the scope and camera etc, only to realise that it needs a new software key that is only obtainable by email to the author, everything is ready for testing but I have no power to any of the kit!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!

Long story but there is only so much you can do with simulators so at 11 PM I packed it all up and went to bed.

Fast forward a few hours to this morning, I'm stood at work at 6AM chopping onions when a thought hit me ………………………. I had installed a manual override switch to the power relays to enable power in the event of a software failure!!!! Flippin' heck!

As the title says MUPPIT!

Its been a while what with one thing or another.

A pair of interacting galaxies imaged with the RC8/QHY9 combo all strapped on top of the EQ8

Lum 60 x 3 mins + 20x 5 mins(no moon)

RGB 30 each x 3 mins.

its a small sucker even in the RC8....need a bigger scope!

I use a led flat panel and Dim it down with 3 layers of .5 nd lighting gell and difuse it with a soft focus lighting gell

Many thanks for that.

What's the difference? If any.

I use offset 100 and gain 25%