-
Posts
1,612 -
Joined
-
Last visited
Content Type
Profiles
Forums
Gallery
Events
Blogs
Everything posted by skybadger
-
Vixen FL55SS and QHYCCD/ZWO
skybadger replied to DroneSaif's topic in Discussions - Scopes / Whole setups
IIRC, you take your canon t adapter apart by unscrewing the clamping screws at the side and mount the canon bayonet part on the smooth angled flange of the vixen adapter by tightening the screws up again. -
I'm just finishing building my own on a pulsar-like dome . The key benefits are that it is so much quieter, holds in place part open and does not slam into the end stops. It's taken a while to prove - it uses continuous steel wire around a winch bobbin and I still need to add a tensioner but mostly there. Largest cost is the motor at £140 and then some Arduino and motor control modules for wireless control. The wire is pennies and the guide wheels I made myself but can be obtained from Amazon equally nowadays.
-
How to mount a camera lens + astro cam?
skybadger replied to dannybgoode's topic in Discussions - Cameras
Like it ! -
I'll take a look there. Ta.
-
Full well is 26 K e and the anti blooming gate should catch most of that unless really bright. What is the guide axis ? Ide be looking at PEC or tracking first.
-
Sky Sensor 2000 Handset Lithium Battery
skybadger replied to Merkhet's topic in Discussions - Mounts
Squeezed mine in when I did it last. -
I've been running mine for the last 6 months solid and it's been reliable. I use a led lens to concentrate the sky FOV onto the sensor. I compare with a portable unihedron and astap Sqm calibrator and it remains consistent.
-
The problem with timers is the interval continually needs to change due to the changing alt, AZ movement rates. If you build yourself enough of a motor driver to drive the dome with switches, then you have enough to add the lesve dome control to for full dome auto control, or the velleman USB interface for the same. Both of these are open source on github or similar. Mines there too if you can do Arduino and some fairly simple soldering.
-
Using (Multiple) Rotary Encoders with Arduino
skybadger replied to Macavity's topic in DIY Astronomer
Glad to see you got it working. I use the same library for my esp8266 encoder dome tracker. All gpio s on that chip bar one can be used as interrupts. It's quite hard to use the i2c expander to do this but there are dedicated chips to do this which you can interrogate via i2c and I believe the teensy has two internal encoder interfaces built in for free. But I use the same interrupts to directly measure pulse frequencies up to 200khz . -
You only need a few watts each, so much less than 2A.
-
Thanks Mike. It's not unsimilar to many other domes. A friction wheel driving on the underneath of the dome rotation may do your job. Alternatively if your rotating internal or external profiles are round-ish, a motor could drive on that surface. My dome drives on the internal edge but still uses power and control electronics for the shutter motors which are powed from solar & battery and uses Wi-Fi to communicate with a central controller PC . Hence allowing continuous rotation and independent power. Either way, take a look at cytron power controllers from the likes of the robot parts websites, they are cheap and provide large currents for simple motor controls.
-
Or maybe someone here can provide you an ascom compliant dome driver ? There are numerous large motor drivers out there, some for less than a tenner, that will work directly from a bidirectional switch. My dome shutter manual override works like that.
-
Hi Mike. As an engineer I will now say those important words , what are your requirements ? If you can rotate in a circle , a number of motors (between 1 and many) are probably easier to implement. They could be friction, belt and pinion or some other method of engagement but there are numerous open source and off the shelf solutions for that which would means your skills requirement can be kept to the appropriate level. Any details on the dome and physical layout ?
-
Can you help me in spherical astronomy
skybadger replied to kindersaft's topic in Physics, Space Science and Theories
I'll have a stab.. Calculate the local hour angle for the meridian at Istanbul at 12-3=9am . Which star ? Ecliptic coords are ra and Dec ? Lower transition ,is that the same as upper and lower culmination for a polar star ? IE need more details please. -
Agrees the stellar photometric way is the gold standard.it's just the way I read the post. I'm struggling to understand why the measurement is dependent on altitude, your signals are relative between star and background at any altitude. Perhaps you are saying the sky is brighter further from zenith ?
-
On mine I can see prominences without it being turned on. Solar disk detail becomes available with a low setting and solar self heating takes it past the tuned point so an erf is becoming essential . This is used with a SV80 Refractor so it's within the aperture range. Turn your heater settings right down and work through the range.
-
To balance my dual rig I use an extra long hand clamp against one end of the dovetail on the scope and the other end on the far end of the dovetail clamp to slowly push the dovetails through their clamps, retighten, and iterate until it balanced with axis clamps undone. The hand clamp addresses the high friction and weight on each dovetail, even when released enough to move. Otherwise I can't move them easily and smoothly by hand anymore. Measurement is possible by comparing motor current either side of the axis of interest. I haven't tried that yet though.
-
UK sources for Imaging Equipment Adapters
skybadger replied to Xsubmariner's topic in Discussions - Scopes / Whole setups
I recently had to do something similar for a M54 to M48 rotator - they are made and available overseas but by the time they are posted here the price is ugly and the delay is too. In the end I settled for making a M48-t2 rotator - its a t2 adaptor with a M48 front thread and a t2 rear. Something I really thought I'd be able to get hold of. I'm lucky enough to be able to make my own but there needs to be a place to get this sort of kit. -
thanks for the info. thatll help
-
I tried this which is why I'll put the illuminating ir leds on a separate switch. It also occurred to me that I wasn;t using an IR cut filter on the camera at the time either.
-
I put a fish eye night cam in the dome for this sort of reason and the IR bouncing around from the monitoring camera flooded the long exposures on the CCD camera. The telescope was well shrouded too. So I am building a switch so I can turn on the IR illuminator when needed.
-
Robert Brown Arduino dew controller build, step by step
skybadger replied to JamesF's topic in DIY Astronomer
Sounds like mine. Using esp8266-01 wireless and node-red.