RolandKol

OMG  
never seen Ganymede soooo soo
No words!!!!

So after some usual AP struggles (adaptors, cables and etc) ... and even after some really painful disasters (like faulty NEQ6 motherboard), I do have my first light

Collimation was not yet done, - image is as from "factory" and as I had no bright stars in the view, - that "miss-alligned" star issue was not a problem...

My NEQ6 was struggling...

HD925 @F7 is probably max what it can handle and not in the perfect manner... PHD2 graph was all over the place,

And I was not expecting to achieve anything close to this image below...

P.S.
my apologies @malc-c, - I have not yet posted my old/faulty NEQ6 board to you as I was occupied with all kind of AP issues + my car decided to make life even more "funny"

So I completely forgot.

Morning mate,

I would use bias as  darks (instead of darks) on ASTAP, 

but 

@han59 is the ASTAP dev (or one of them), - maybe he will advise you better once he has time

On 31/08/2023 at 16:25, AndrewRrrrrr said:

yes that's a replacement polarscope illuminator as the connector to the motherboard is different.

Like you, I recently put in a new motherboard on my neq6 but i didnt bother swapping out this part - I would have done for completeness but it would have meant moving the motors to the side and I didn't want to do that as I have my mount totally dialled in! 🙂

 

Yep, saw it inside,

It would be a pain to replace (I guess...)

I simply re-soldered the J10 connector (had few extra) and have all in place like from the textbook...

So if someone will plan to swap the boards, better to have extra J10 connector or, simply, cut it out from the new LED provided.

@malc-c drop me your address by personal message, - will post it if we are not neighbours by any chance

P.S.

What A slewing SOUND!!!

Like a spaceship! is it normal?

31 minutes ago, malc-c said:

That's a shame.. I have two EQ6 boards that have been repaired sitting here, one of which I could have provided on an exchange basis... If you want to donate your old board to the cause drop me a PM.

I'm sure that the supplied LED in that ring is used to provide polar scope illumination. 

Thanks Malcolm,

Not sure about the old one...

It has some kind of randomly acquiring connection issues and will cause more headache than joy...

Hi Guys,

just received my new motherboard for my oldie NEQ6 and I am a bit confused...

They included led in the plastic circle with J10 connector (as per image below), - 

anyone knows why it is needed and should I connect it at all?

For Polarscope maybe? (never used it before...)

49 minutes ago, knobby said:

No expert but ASTAP is showing some tilt ... not much though ?

hmm,

ZWO OAG is probably the weakest point and can give-in a bit under weight of EFW and Camera... 

Will check and re-attach before next session, - thanks for idea!

OK, 
At the moment, I ended up with Baader Steeltrack Diamond Sc For Sct (from the first look, a very solid focuser! I hope my excitement will not vanish!!!).
Full focal train:

x0.7 reducer + Baader Focuser + noise piece + (ZWO AOG V1 + ASI120mm mini) + 11mm ZWO ring + 2mm T2-T2 adapter, + EFW, +ASI1600.

All as per image below. Focus point is in around 25mm drawtube out.

I will try to refocus using Primary Mirror with Baader's drawtube around 15mm out, - I guess it should work, but first night was quite short...

Just FYI,

I also tried to focus without 11mm ring and without T2-T2, - no luck... AOG camera distance does not match with the main cam in such a case and only one camera comes into focus.

Sadly, my first light was disappointing...

Look at Vega below, the star is not centred in it's reflection  

I have not touched collimation yet, but such star alignment looks like not a collimation issue...

Any advice?
Maybe L filter was slightly tilted?
Will try other filters next time.... 

OK,
So I found kina interesting focuser: TS-Optics 2" V-Power Crayford UNCR2V

Cannot find any users online with it...

Any though? 
TS 7kg vs Baader 5kg

Looks like your shield should be quite small and postage will be the main cost.
If you will not find anyone locally, - drop me a line.

Hi Mate,

Any findings on this field?
I just received HD925 with Vixen... and thinking adding Losmady 

Hi guys, 

most likely I am not the first one posting about it, - but will try to summarise my findings in this post for myself and for any future queries.

1) My EdgeHD comes with Vixen dovetail and looking forward to add one more... Losmandy preferably... Any cheaper options with matching holes and length and curvature? it Looks like it has to be attached with one bolt closer to the secondary and 2 bolts at rear (near focuser) if I am not mistaken... The scope , itself, has quite a few bolts screwed into the OTA which look like matching the location for dovetails holes, - but do they covering the "proper" strong slot/hole for the dovetail screws, - the bolts in place, look almost decorative... I have no Focal Reducer yet and want to add the dovetail ASAP as I cannot attach my EvoGuide by any other means.... I dont want to play around AOG the first night...

2) Focuser... Looks like everyone goes for Crayford for AP... Thinking to add Baader to the money-blackhole in my pocket... Baader Diamond Steeltrack (BDS) 2" Focuser for SCT/EdgeHD (SC) - Baader Planetarium UK (baader-planetarium.co.uk) but I am not sure if it is backfocus friendly... As I understand 146mm will have to be added to the Focal Reducer, - does this one even attachable to the FR?
Any other cheaper options capable to hold ZWO AOG and Mono setup (EFW+ASI1600)? (ZWO EAF is waiting for a job... so Not interested in any automated "quantum/nano" £700 options).

Anyone tried this one?

OVL   Crayford Focuser For SCT Telescopes - Rother Valley Optics Ltd

Why not?

3) Focal Reducer.... standard is 0.7 at the price of my kidney, - any alternatives at all?

4)  Moving forward will go OAG way, - I do have ZWO one, will test it on at least F7 as I am sure it's prism is way too small for F10 and I will not find guiding stars with my ZWO ASI 120MM Mini....
have not investigated this field much, - will update later. Any advise is welcome.

Hrrr,

All in all, HD925 asks for around £1000 in accessories.... (Focuser+Reducer+dovetails+dewheaters+other small bits)...
I would like to prioritise my spending to enable Astrophotography ASAP...

Mount NEQ6, - so I guess, Dovetails+Focal Recuder goes first...

But if no Crayford focuser is used, I will also need T Adapter and special bracket for ZWO autofocuser... (kinda waste of money... as these two are around £100)

BTW, which one T Adapter goes for ASI1600 the larger or smaller one?
I guess, the larger one, - Celestron M48 T-Adapter for EdgeHD 9.25”, 11”, AND 14” | First Light Optics 

Also, are there any LARGE couplers on the market to buy separately, which I would be able to use for ZWO focuser's motor and focuser knob which is around 10mm diameter....
I would print the bracket, saw some on internet (around £45 in savings). I guess, the one below will do the job as Focuser's Shaft diameter is 13mm.
I could find only 5x12mm

Any advise is welcome

P.S.
Tri-Bahtinov printing...
Not sure if I need Bob Knobs for the secondary, - simple PC screws will do... I guess... they are usually quite reflective, but shouldn't be a problem.

It is always a trade off,

Depends what you want to achive....

If you want to increase the guiding perfomance, - AOG will do it, but Only Slighlty, - the main guiding factor is the Mount.

If you have not yet bought guiderscope and not sure which way to go to save money, - guider scopes are cheaper and easier to set up as you will be made to dance around AOG at the start for sure.

My personal experience: 
I did not like AOG on my small 130PDS + ASI1600MM as the prism casted a slight shadow on the chip, also I had some issues with polar alligment using Nina and/or SharpCap, - it was quite long time ago, so maybe updates have sorted PA issues out.

My rig is extremly Front Heavy (130PDS is quite small), - I just always need something  heavy at the bottom to offset it and the guider scope + cam was a good match.

These problems were quite managable, as I could do PA with guider scope I had (plus it worked in darker nights using AOG anyway), plus I could spend more time placing AOG prism in a correct distance to reduce the shadow,

However,

I was Not able to get a Correct ASI1600 SPACING! it was 1 or 0.5mm I missed and I just could not get rid of comma, it drove me mad, so I went back to the classical guiding. 

However (again),

I still think  AOG is the best way to go anyway and will try it again, as :
1) Easier balancing + less cables as you will not need dew heater for the guidercam, plus both cameras are in one place, cabling becomes easier (my guidercam was connected to the main cam with a short USB cable).

2) Slightly better guiding (I have not noticed any extreme guiding "profits").

3) The main advantage (in my opinion),  -  easier to go for the "Double Rig" with Newtonian, -  as you will be able to place a smaller rig on the top, - for example something with Samyang 135 which also works as counter-balance for the Front Heavy Rig (in your case it will be quite different as 250PDS is much larger)

You should include Narrow Band or One Shot cam used....
I do H imaging further away from the moon, but dont touch LRGB

Hi guys,

do 1.25" size filters still work weel with Sam?

I have a the main 36mm setup, - thinking about the second one

P.P.S.

I found online claims SW and TS GPU's are the same,

Lacerta guts, look (correction: almost) Exactly the same as TS...

Correction: as Some lenses are not shaded like Lacerta's.

so it is all the same... Looks like...

Wow,

my search has not given even close results

Thanks Vlaiv, you are the star as always!

P.S.

(lest hope it is the correct order, can you give a link if it's not copyright protected ot something? )

1 hour ago, AstroKeith said:

Here are two 4 element designs. Quite similar in principle to the 3 element TS Optics design, so should give you some head start on the jigsaw.

Commercially. protecting a patent is much easier if you haven't knowingly or freely released the design.

Thanks again, - It looks like I will be made to play it all out in my "sandbox" solo...

Sorry,

I am still boilling inside after the email from TS...

as per "Design", - it is quite a different beast (at least in my understanding), I have not asked them for measurments, materials and etc, just a sequence of the spacers and the lens oriantation between them...
Whoever works with the optical instruments, probably would laugh, as they know which lens shape would go there and which direction they should face, sadly, I am not one of them.

In other words, a simple assambly cleaning/schematics is not even close to all the specs of the design and should be with the instrument inside the box....

These CC are not protected from any Dew and sooner or later, they will need cleaning (plus, 4 elements, locks the humidity inside quite well, - if it is inside, - case closed)...
In addition, - currently there are plenty of the similar "designs" to TS GPU... Maybe it is even the same manufactrurer "re-branding" them. Don't know.

To be honest, don't even care.

23 minutes ago, AstroKeith said:

TS Optics are trying to protect their designs from being cloned. 

A quick google search produced this though.....

Thanks, - I saw this one,

but it has 4 lenses not 3, plus there is no lense as the middle one in the picture...

As per trade secrets, - if anyone would like to "Clone" the assembly of the lenses, it is not hard to do so, - simply by obtaining one example wich is easy to get for almost £300 so it does not make any sense....

A bit of comedy here before the weekend,

any advise would really help.

Hi guys,

Has anyone had problem like this?

In my case it's even worse... As I was not able to get rid of humidity inside the CC, so I removed the outer lense for cleaning...

(Lense was holding inside quite well even without a holding ring... So I had to shake a bit... holding CC upside down...)

Long story, short, - all lenses and spaceres inside the CC fell out of the CC tube/holder, flipped, mixed and.... I have no way to trace how to put them back in the correct order and side....

In request to help and to provide any guiding or scheme how to put all back into the CC tube/holder, TS Optics replied quite strange...

"they (the  manufacturer) would definitely have some informations about it, but due to trade and company secrets, they will not give any details, unfortunately."

FLO does not hold similar data also....

If anyone does, - I would be grateful as I will spend whole week or even two, by placing such a mount of lenses and spacers in the different orders and sides, plus focusing-testing, to figure out the correct order.

If you use autofocuser and NINA, it has nice aberration inspector,

It will run autofocus and will calculate the aprox distance to move sensor to/from Coma Corrector.

This is the target which is on my "Next list".

I am using 130PDS + ASI1600MM...

The main problem, - Bortle7ish skies with the street lights so I cannot do long LRGB exposures....

Should I even try collecting around 8h of data (total)? I plan to check if it will show something in the Narrow Band first.

just checked my office PC....

does not look nice incomparison to my Laptop :)))

*******************************************************************************

The Official PixInsight Benchmark version 1.0

Copyright (C) 2014-2021 Pleiades Astrophoto. All Rights Reserved.

*******************************************************************************

Benchmark version ...... 1.00.08

Input checksum ......... 2cd72b67e12fff2812ef5b5da054ab2a70a25e23

Serial number .......... IU3WFBBTFOYFHAB7O05101N12W66E664

CPU Identification

CPU vendor ............. GenuineIntel

CPU model .............. Intel(R) Core(TM) i5-8500 CPU @ 3.00GHz

System Information

Platform ............... Windows

Operating system ....... Microsoft Windows 10 Pro

Core version ........... PixInsight Core 1.8.9-1 (x64)

Logical processors ..... 6

Total memory size ...... 23.797 GiB

Execution Times

Total time ............. 01:58.37

CPU time ............... 00:44.28

Swap time .............. 01:14.07

Swap transfer rate ..... 223.776 MiB/s

Performance Indices

Total performance ...... 3974

CPU performance ........ 8548

Swap performance ....... 1239

*******************************************************************************

10 hours ago, Gumminess8083 said:

(Not yet 100% sure on this, as I'd first like to run some tests on whether or not my camera has sensor tilt)

My suggestion would be, - do Not touch the camera tilt adjustment, check your focuser and all connectors you use first or "eyepiece clamp" you use in the focuser, - this may introduce slight tilt, especially once you place so many "mono toys" to hold.

RedCat looks like have quite solid focuser, so maybe you have not clamped it properly or any addaptor or even EFW introduced it. Disasable the optical train and assemble all back first, - double check.

In other words, check all other possible points of failure before adjusting the tilt of the camera.

And, to be honest, your FOV is large, so stars are quite small and the tilt is barely visible, - I would suggest to ignore it unless it goes out of control.