adyj1

2 hours ago, Ian McCallum said:

365Astronomy gave me a tracking number, after it was finally dispatched by Royal Mail yesterday. 

I'm still getting an error with the tracking number, so goodness knows when it will arrive. Covid-19 and holiday season permitting. 🙄

Sorry, we're currently unable to confirm the status of your item with reference??????????? . Please try again tomorrow.

It's annoying, some of the parcel services that offer next-day delivery don't actually have a tracking system capable of actually registering new packages for at least 24hrs!

Anyway, have you seen the Clear Outside forecast!

12 hours ago, Ian McCallum said:

I got my refund from RVO, earlier this afternoon. Zoltan from 365Astronomy emailed me to say that the order was processed and would be dispatched tomorrow, probably by DPD. 

#offtopic

In my life I've got to make sure I buy at least one thing from a guy called Zoltan. 

18 hours ago, Ian McCallum said:

I wasn't that bothered about the goto option, as it was more "it would be nice to have".  The cost put paid to that...

Perfectly sensible approach 👍 - I just thought the general flow of the comments, mixing guiding and goto terms, might be confusing to a beginner reading this thread.

44 minutes ago, Space Explorer said:

When I clicked on reply to this post under M40's post, I had to delete my last post in order to write this one, is this normal? 

I have experienced this - not every time, though

Sorry, been away from this thread... 

Just to be clear, the dual axis motor kit - whether it is the standard or enhanced - does not give you goto... As commented previously, you need 'brains' in the handset to map the sky and know where you are pointing, and these don't have it (and the motors would not be practical for goto either) 

St-4 guiding should be possible (your guide scope is connected to the pc and handset, and your camera is connected to the pc and between them all they work out the tracking correction instructions to give the 'dumb' handset.)

Granted you can never rule out an amazing technical breakthrough while you weren't watching, but when I wanted guiding I sold my enhanced dual axis kit and went for the 'diy synscan' option. 

1 hour ago, Ian McCallum said:

I've noticed in YouTube videos that the SynScan stepper motors should louder than the DC motors, whilst slewing. 

I know that the stepper motors are more precise and faster at slewing than the DC versions, but the louder noise puts me off. 

Thoughts? 🤔

I would use the term 'slewing' to refer to the 'goto' movement between targets a reasonable distance apart, and you only get that with a stepper motor, so the £350+ synscan upgrade (or diy alternatives). The DC motors of the dual axis kit are not able to move the mount at anything remotely close to the same speed, and are just used for 'adjustmemts' once you've manually rotated the telescope to approximately the right location... No wonder they are quieter 😉 (a 15 second slew on the SynScan would literally take minutes if you were to try it with the dual axis kit) 

I've probably read far more into your use of the term slewing (and applied my own personal definition), but as you were comparing stepper and DC motors thought it worth pointing out just in case it helps. 

I had an eq5 with the enhanced controller motor drive upgrade. 

Decided on the DIY route of an AstroEQ with stepper motors. Hardest thing was finding someone to 3d-print the eq5 stepper brackets. Paid for most of it by selling the dual motor upgrade kit.II 've had that for a few years now and been very happy with it.

You do need to want to do diy thing though - don't expect it to be as easy as the pro upgrade kit... (there has to be some payback for saving all that cash, right 😉) 

If I was doing it today, the onstep diy got upgrade would be my first choice. 

1 hour ago, AdeKing said:

Thanks @Stu, I'm very happy with my collection though I have a feeling that I have too many but can't bring myself to move any on.

I do make sure that I alternate between them so that I feel less guilty about having them.

 

Mighty impressive collection, @AdeKing,

definitely not compensating 😂

1 hour ago, MartinB said:

Aha!!!!  Thanks Xiga.  I have now managed to install astap which tricks my old version of SGP into thinking it is Platesolve2 and am also going to give ASIair a try.  

I think the dev/s of ASTAP need extra credit for making it work with the same parameters as PS2 to allow this to happen. ASTAP is the best platesolver I have used - by far - and the ability to use it in any program that supports PS2 is a stroke of genius. 

I think when recommending the asiair to beginners we should really point out early in the conversation that it only supports ZWO cameras if you switch to a dedicated astro camera (for dslrs it is fine). I have a ZWO camera myself so don't think this is the worst limitation in the world, but it is quite a unique 'feature' compared to the alternatives that needs to be highlighted. 

(only posting this as there's been two different recommendations without this rider) 

The most effective filter of all will cost about a fiver from ebay - search for "8mm A/F Security Hex Key". As I understand it, behind the cover is often just a normal single-fuse MCB, like you might have in a garage. 

However, I've only seen this used effectively when the light in question is less obviously located - and I imagine you would have to have sympathetic neighbours who know not to report it as broken when it stops working every cloudless night... 

2 hours ago, Pitch Black Skies said:

as the only thing I require for that is an EQMOD cable.

For the minimal 'semi-auto' PA addition to your current setup, you connect the laptop to your mount by EQMOD and laptop to camera by USB. You do a 3-point polar align with, and then you disconnect your laptop and run your intervalometer-based session and tracking-with-no-guiding.

I'm not sure if you were actually considering this minimal approach, but wanted to make it clear what was needed. The benefits are the small-ish learning curve and not having to work out how to get all-session computer control.. 

But there are massive advantages to jumping  completely to software-controlled guided imaging sessions... Plate-solving is a huge game-changer, (way more than guiding imo...) 

Once you've experienced it, computer-controlled imaging sessions is almost certainly where you will want to be. 

Personally, I ended up putting one of those smallish waterproof keter boxes next to my mount and putting a wifi-connected mid-size i5 office pc from ebay (£100) inside - cables run out from under the lid to the mount (USB3 hub and home-made 12v power distribution block reduces number of cables) , and mains power via long extension lead from the garage. I then remotely log in from a laptop in the house. (I have also tried a Raspberry-Pi-based Ekos/Kstars setup with some success - and done successful semi-auto PA.)

All of these components can be upgraded with 'proper' astro gear, but that's not my style (waaaay more astro things to buy than budget allows! ) 

Good luck! 

Ady

2 hours ago, Pitch Black Skies said:

Ah I see, and the EQMOD cable basically just connects my mount to my laptop correct? I've heard something about a WiFi adapter too, would that do the same thing?

Yes, but with an extra level of complexity. You'd want to configure it in 'Station mode' ideally, so it was just another device on your home network, rather than being a private WiFi access point for its own network. 

I won't give you advice about saving £20 or so by making a DIY cable, as anyone considering a polemaster deserves only the best 😉 

43 minutes ago, Pitch Black Skies said:

Exactly what I was thinking. If I was planning to progress to guiding in the next couple of months, that would make Polemaster redundant as I could achieve perfect polar alignment through the guidescope and guidecam through NINA.

... but you wouldn't be using the guidecam for your polar alignment in NINA - it uses your primary camera.

By all means get the guiding setup, as you'll progress to that quickly, but you already have just about all you need for PA using NINA (apart from possibly the EQMOD cable which should *definitely* be your next purchase if you haven't got one).

For the guidescope I have both the astro essentials and ZWO 32mm guidescopes, and they are fine. I prefer the AE one for usability and accessories. 

I'll let someone else comment on which of the colour or mono is the best choice - I have mono because all I want to use it for is to guide (and that was the first one to come up on the for sale forum 😉). Both will work. 

6 minutes ago, rickwayne said:

I'd say it's full-auto these days, unless you want it to turn the AZ and ALT knobs

You say tomarto and I say tomayto 😉 

I was indeed referring to just pressing 'go' and letting the software control the camera and the mount to do its stuff, after which it tells you which knobs to twist, in which direction, and by how much...

To me, that's not *fully* auto - it's auto apart from the manual bits. 😁 

On 06/11/2021 at 01:27, ONIKKINEN said:

To be honest i have not even considered methods other than sharpcap pro polar alignment since i tried it the first time. It is impossible to do wrong and never takes more than a few minutes.

I was a sharpcap pro user for a couple of years, but had serious problems with my travel setup (az-gti) - which has no polar scope at all. Unless I was already within 5 deg of PA by eye, then sharpcap couldn't platesolve and I was left randomly moving Dec and Ra until it could. (I would not have had this problem if I had a polar scope and could have roughly polar aligned) . No such problem with NINA, which can PA even if you can't see polaris at all. 

35 minutes ago, Pitch Black Skies said:

Would it be a waste to buy

You do realise that a polemaster likely costs MORE than a guide scope and guide camera? 

... and to get guiding working you're going to be pretty far down the road of connecting camera to laptop to mount and running NINA. 

I reckon you could get NINA working *just* to use the three-point polar alignment fairly easily - at least as easily as getting APT up and running, IMO - and then when you're ready it will be a small step to full-blown automated image acquisition ☺ . 

Just my 2p worth

(By the way, Linux has a very capable alternative in ekos/Kstars, and it has a similar semi-auto PA routine to NINA) 

APT is probably easier to get your head around as a beginner (I used it for 3+ years) and but it doesn't have a PA routine, unfortunately. 

Watch this and tell me you don't want it 😉 

Ady

1 hour ago, Pitch Black Skies said:

Is there a way to polar align through my OTA and DSLR using a laptop and a software program?

There is, but it's a slightly steep but worthwhile learning curve; control your mount with the laptop, and use astro capture software that supports semi-auto PA.

For windows, an EQMOD cable attached to your mount, ascom, eqascom and nina software (nina 1.11 nightly build) and the 'three point polar alignment' plugin. 

(I'm assuming you don't use Linux or you'd have mentioned it.Probably a couple of times 😂 ) 

Ady

Edit: three people typing at the same time 😂 

4 hours ago, StuartT said:

Not hugely impressed with the results. What am I doing wrong?

Have you done any post-processing in an image editing software package? That's where you really get to make the milky way pop. 

The iso does seem high - what camera do you have?

Also, 10 seconds with an 11mm lens seems low - did you get eggy stars when you tried longer? Id be hoping for at least 20s. Are you using a remote shutter release, or the built-in delayed release? 

But regardless of that, definitely taking multiple exposures as @mcrowlesuggests and then a stacking them is the right way to go. I'd be looking at many 10's of exposures. 

50 minutes ago, Paul M said:

I use ASTAP as the plate solver in APT too.  Just need to download a couple of catalogues and point APT to the executable in the Point Craft settings tab. It does a lot of things including live stacking. So as APT saves out individual subs ASTAP will monitor the selected folder and attempt to stack any images it sees there as soon as they arrive. It's a good tool for seeing whether an imaging session is heading the way you wanted.

 

Switching to astap in APT produced a dramatic increase in speed and reliability of plate solving for me. I think it should be the default install now

2 hours ago, Turbocoo said:

like it! I must patent the drawer runner method😀

 

Hmm, this is 3-yr old thread, with the OP first buying his runners 4 yrs ago - rather than patenting it, you may end up having to pay royalties on yours! (which I like a lot, as it happens and will hopefully be copying when I can finance my own...) 

12 hours ago, Budgie1 said:

I've haven't tried it with subs which include satellite trails etc to see how well it deals with those.

I've had a quick look at asi studio stacking and was reasonably impressed. It did get rid of satellite trails and although does a certain amount of auto processing (which was good enough for me to show round at the star party) I do believe you may be able to just get the stacked image. It's on my 'to-do' and list to dig deeper... 

Just now, adyj1 said:

Dave, I'm part-way through doing the blackwaterskies mod to a tracing panel and would appreciate a copy of your code, if you wouldn't mind? 

although I notice you have more electronic components than on that mod, which I assume is also an improvement?