kman42

Ahhh thanks, forgot about field rotation. Lucky I held back from the impulse buy!

I've seen a Celestron FI 130 come up locally for pretty cheap. Had a close look at it, and since it has a dovetail mount I can remove the scope and put my DSLR rack on it. The aluminium legs are very slightly wobbly, but I'm pretty sure I can stiffen the tripod with a few extra bracing members. At first glance it looks like a cheap and easy way of getting motorised tracking for my Astrophotography, but my main question is how good is the tracking on the mount? Is it accurate enough for wide field Astrophotography up to about a 400mm lens? 

I have a mount with DEC and RA stepper motors, driven by an AstroEQ box and controlled with PHD2/EQMod.

I'm getting a recurring problem where I plug everything in, an it works at first. I'll start EQMod running Sidereal to get some drift alignment going. However after a few minuts the stepper motors make weird noises (eg. the DEC stepper, which should be inactive, starts a constant whine with a rising pitch!?). At this point, the mount becomes completey unresponsive to any EQMod commands. I managed to reset the problem once, but next time I set it up it happened again. Now I can't reset it and can't remember what I did. If I disconnect and reconnect everything, the whines just start back up where they left off. I'm not even sure if its a problem with AstroEQ or EQMod. How do you reset either of these?

So I went to reconfigure ASTROEQ but when I try to read the code in the Config program, it just hangs on "reading eeprom" and the times out after a while. Similar situation when I try to update firmware - it just cant make contact with the ASTROEQ. I've checked different com ports too... Anybody else get this?? 

Ahah! So, I was missing a step - set the EQMod home position. The puzzle falls into place. Thanks! 

I don't have a handset. I'm running with PHD2 and an ASTROEQ box. 

7 hours ago, alacant said:

Reverse RA does not change tracking. You have no park mode set.

What mode should I set this to? And what about unpark mode? 

18 minutes ago, Cornelius Varley said:

Just under the N E W S slew control buttons there is an option to reverse the RA. You have this unchecked.

 I remember trying it and it didn't seem to make a difference, but I'll try this again. 

When I set my location correctly (Toowoomba, Australia), EQMod runs the RA axis in reverse (West to east). This happens whether using the slew commands or the tracking function. To get the RA to move correctly, I need to set my location to North and West (rather than South and East). I've screenshot the EQmod settings below, have I got some setting wrong?? (Port is not available because I just opened EQMod to capture the settings).

42 minutes ago, Merlin66 said:

See my reply above.....

OK, so I can see now how PHD2 would be able to get RELATIVE  position from EQMod. But if I walk through the steps on a night of astro:

1. I set up the tripod with a rough polar alignment

2. I load PHD2/EQMod, which has my Lat and Long saved 

2. I point roughly towards the meridian & equator, and do a calibration

3. I open the Drift alignment tool, and it tells me I am currently pointing XX RA and XX DEC. How did it work this out? At no point have I given any kind of information to PHD2 or EQMod about where I am pointed. 

I feel like I'm missing some crucial part of the set up, which I hope will be revealed by digging into the above question

46 minutes ago, TerryMcK said:

Yes

OK, so that just leaves my question of HOW does PHD2 come up with the values it reports in the Drift alignment tool for your current RA and DEC? Where is it getting that information? 

1 hour ago, michael8554 said:

We're at cross-purposes with "where it is".

I mean the RA and Dec positions, sorry if I lead you to think I meant  the Lat and Long of your location, that to me was something I'd assumed you'd already entered into EQMod right at the start.

The RA and Dec position where the mount is pointing is information the mount supplies once it's correctly Star Aligned  - I don't mean PHD2 Calibrated, you seem to be using the terms Calibration and Alignment as the same thing, they're not.

And you can check in the Drift Align as already mentioned, maybe EQMod shows it too ?

Michael

 

Sorry, yes we're interchanging a few terms here. My confusion summarised: How does PHD2 have any idea where the telescope is a) pointing, and b) physically located? It reports current RA and DEC position in the drift alignment tool. How does it come up with these numbers? And surely these positions are dependant on both where you are pointed and where you are located on the earth? Or am I mistaken on this? 

Also, you mention that Lat and Long need to be entered into EQMod - I have done this, however this made EQmod run sidereal tracking in reverse. I had to change my location from South to North to get the correct rotation.

Thanks Terry, I was misunderstanding the role of calibration - am I correct in saying that it calibrates for the equipment, not location?

7 hours ago, michael8554 said:

1.  If you have a data connection between the mount and the PC, then PHD2 should know where the mount is pointing. 

To check, open the Drift Align feature in PHD2. A  window should open showing the current mount position, and an option to move to Dec 0 and the Meridian. 

But how does it get this information? Is it extrapolated from the calibration process? Otherwise there must be a GPS or something telling it where it is...

So it sounds like the calibration process tells PHD2 where the mount is? And once I've calibrated, I shouldn't move manually using the clutches. 

How would I troubleshoot / fix the mount correctly reporting its position? 

Ok, so had a go tonight and it turns out a) that I do indeed need to be running the EQMod tracking while in PHD2, and b) the EQMod was tracking in the wrong direction. I can now get sensible results from calibration and the Guiding Assistant.

Next questions are about drift alignment. I'm seeing "current scope pointing" numbers that don't make a lot of sense to me. When I go to adjust the Altitude, it wants me to slew to 0 DEC, and thinks I am at 90 DEC, but I am pointing at the Equator??

aside from that,

1. How does PHD2 'know' where I'm pointing?

2. Can I manually move my mount to where it is asking? As in, unlock the RA and DEC gears and rotate the mount head where I need it to. Or will that stuff it up?

12 hours ago, michael8554 said:

That's the Crop Factor you're thinking of. 

Doesn't alter the focal length, 58mm is correct. 

There may be a good reason for the introduction of the term Crop Factor,  but in my opinion it's meaningless advertising hype..... 

Michael 

This was always my understanding - 58mm is the physical size of the magnification.

After some more research I have come to realise that I think I need to engage sidereal tracking on EQMod, after which I should go through the guiding steps on PHD2. Seems like a basic thing to miss, but believe it or not this is not mentioned in any tutorials! I'll give this a try when I next get a chance.

6 minutes ago, michael8554 said:

The way I read your original post I thought you meant you had Calibrated pointing near to the SCP.

No I said Calibrate at Dec 0.

If PHD2 doesn't move the scope far enough at Dec 0 then have you have entered a sensible Guide Rate setting? 50% or more of Sidereal ?

Michael

Calibration at Dec 0 makes sense. Does the RA position matter much?

Where do I enter the guide rate setting??

1 hour ago, almcl said:

Have you set up the new equipment profile with the correct figures?  I ask because a common slip is to input the wrong guidescope focal length.  This can lead to PHD2 miscalculating the number of steps.  The other thing is to nudge the scope in DEC in whichever direction it calibrates in the southern hemisphere (it's north in the northern hemisphere but not sure about the southern) until you see the selected star move, before starting a calibration.  This helps with the often quite large amount of backlash that the EQ5 can suffer from.

I am using a Helios M44-2 for my guidescope. It says 58mm on the lens, which is what I enter into PHD2. Hopefully the Russians report their lenses correctly...

I will try clearing the backlash, although the Guiding Assistant says my backlash is 'low'.

I'll try the starcross test too.

Once I've selected a guide star & calibrated, do I just press 'guide' in PHD2 and it should work? Is there anything I should select on the EQMod window, or are these buttons unrelated to guiding??

If i understand this right, you're saying I should have the guide scope pointed just about straight up for good calibration? I had been calibrating at 0 Dec but down low near the horizon. 

I have been working through the best practices but obviously got stuck at the calibration step. They seem to suggest I can do a rough polar alignment, calibrate the scope, then do a good drift alignment after that? Is that the right order? I'm guessing I would need to recalibrate after drift alignment. 

Hi, I am trying to get my guiding setup working properly. I am using stepper motors to drive an EQ5, via an AstroEQ box and PHD2.

So far, I can get my laptop to move the mount manually via the EQMod slew controls, and everything seams to move in the right direction at the rate it should.

However, when I try to calibrate the mount, PHD2 never seems to be happy with it (either 'calibration was based on very few steps', or 'angles are questionable').

If i then start guiding, PHD2 quickly says that it was unable to make sufficient corrections in RA/DEC.

When I use the guiding assistant, it says my alignment error is massive. like, around 100,000 arc-min; But I am pointing fairly well at the south pole.

The weird thing is that if I leave the mount guiding, I can hear the DEC stepper motor make ongoing corrections, but I can only hear the RA stepper motor make a large correction every 20-30 seconds - even though it powers normally when being controlled manually via EQMod.

Any ideas? And yes, I have double checked that I  haven't RA and DEC switched around.

Pretty sure I've been going 12V Power - USB connection - Software startup. I'll have another go.

I have been developing a DIY mount using AstroEQ. I took a break from the project for a while (had a baby). When I had left the project, I had connected the AstroEQ board to my laptop and could move the telescope via PHD2 - I just needed to finetune some stuff with the DEC axis. Now, I've picked the project back up, and nothing seems to work. I plugged in the AstroEQ board to the laptop but EQmod reads "Connect Error - Timeout". I have verified the correct COM port in device manager. I ran the AstroEQ config again to change ports, but it won't connect to the board either - it reads "AVRDude - programmer is not responding". I've got 12V to the board and lights flashing on it. Also, PHD2 recognises that the mount is there, it just times out before connecting. All other PC settings haven't changed - the only difference may be some Windows Updates in that time (running Windows 10). Any suggestions?

17 minutes ago, Philip R said:

Not au-fait with the southern hemisphere, but I think the Small Magellanic Cloud & Large Magellanic Cloud are easy[ish] targets.

Yeah, I've previously imaged the LMC, and I'm keen to try again with the better lenses I have now. Am yet to shoot the SMC. 

I have just gotten my guided mount working with a guide camera and astroeq. What deep sky targets would you recommend for shooting in Queensland, Australia? I have the following gear:

Motorised EQ5 mount

Pentax K5ii (unmodified) 

90mm lens

135mm lens

200mm lens

300mm lens (coming soon) 

1000mm Skywatcher 200p

Awesome!  I'll try it tomorrow. Sounds like that's the missing link. 

When I google EQmod download pages, they all lead to Ascompad??