david_taurus83

I do the same. I find if the 'focuser' is screwed out too far its more tend to wobble about in its thread. Much more stable if its lower down and only a few minor adjustments to be made then.

Got excited there for my Esprit order when I seen the title 😥

Why did you take it out? Jupiter is very bright so you would tend to take very short exposures to capture some detail. Milliseconds. Thats why pictures you see of Juliter and Saturn don't have stars.

I agree with Alan. That doesn't look too bad at all. CCDI should only be used as a guide really. Do you have an image you can post up showing your concerns? The 183 isn't a big sensor so it should be pretty good for star shapes on the Redcat.

Have you got the stable 1.10 version of NINA or the latest nightly 2.0? When in NINA, can you find the imaging tab? If you move any of the windows or tabs around its difficult to get them back to where they should be. When on the imaging tab, you should see some capture controls on the top right hand side and on the middle of the screen there should be some more tabs where you need to select Image.

2 hours ago, Laurin Dave said:

It may be that its just not designed to work with the Atik which has 13 mm bf ..  SX cameras have 16.5 or thereabouts.. There is an 8mm adapter on the back of the Esprit100 flattener but I’m not sure that even with that removed there’s enough distance to get a custom adapter in whilst moving the camera back the 3.5 mm required to get the OAG focused..  I certainly couldn’t find a way to get my Sx46, SX usb fw and OAG on my Esprit100..  the newer SX filter wheel with integral OAG may work as it’s designed for 55mm bf with SX cameras .. 

It's a shame really as it's a quality piece of kit.

Someone is kindly lending me a slim TS OAG unit to try so will see if I can get that to work.

4 minutes ago, newbie alert said:

I'm sure it can be done as I do know people that use oag with bigger fracs but they use atik FW with 460/ 383 camera's with lodestar as a guidecam.. it's backfocus is 12.5mm to incorporate into that figure..

The SX oag can only be used with the SX fw as it bolts directly to the faceplate. It's not screwed on. If others are using an Atik fw they will be using a different oag as well. 

Believe me, I have tried. Tried fixed guidescopes (no rings) on top and on the focuser. Always get image drift. OAG just works and image doesn't budge.

6 minutes ago, newbie alert said:

Not so sure that there's much to gain from oag at 550fl..

I like to take half hour subs!

1 hour ago, newbie alert said:

Looks like you're measuring from the bottom of the prism and can't work not where the guide sensor will be,  does it slide inside or is there a c or cs type thread on the top.. lots of people use a sx pay and lodestar configuration,  so it must be possible 

It's 50mm from bottom of prism to top of stalk. The prism is 8mm so half that and the distance from centre of prism to top of stalk is 46mm. That is as close as a guide chip can get. To stay within the bounds of 55mm total backspacing for the Esprit flattener, the Atik 460 needs to be screwed directly to the filterwheel which when you add it up, makes it 44mm from Atik 460 to centre of prism! I can't move the Atik back say 10mm or so and do the same with the guide chip as that would put me at 65mm back spacing! 

I agree, people must use it successfully with a Lodestar etc but there's no way I can see it working at 55mm backspacing which seems a bizarre scenario seeing as 55mm is the de facto length for most flatteners/reducers. In fact, if I'm correct, the Trius cameras from SX have 17mm of spacing so add this to FW and OAG and total amount is 59mm? So not compatible with an Esprit it would seem? 

18 minutes ago, newbie alert said:

You need to measure the distance from the prism to imaging sensor, and the same distance from the prism to the guide camera sensor, taking into account the backfocus distance ..

Slew to a large starfield and fine tune.. 

 

I have done. The distance from prism to main camera is 44mm. The distance from prism to top of stalk is 46mm. Its not possible to achieve focus with any guide camera. I'm really struggling to understand SX's design with this. Granted, I'm using an ASI120 but even with a Lodestar, how do you get the sensor lower than the stalk? I need another guide camera and have considered a Lodestar but I'm not spending over £400 if its not going to work either. 

I picked up one of these yesterday to replace my ZWO oag. Reason being, I have ordered an Esprit 100 and the required backspacing for the flattener is 55mm. With my Atik 460, SX FW and ZWO oag, the measurements were 13mm, 29mm and 16.5mm=58.5mm. Too much. So I've swapped for an SX OAG head (13mm) to achieve 13mm, 29mm and 13mm=55mm. Perfect. But for the life of me, I can't figure out how to focus a guide camera. Am I right in saying, with the main camera in focus at infinity, the distance from the prism to main sensor should equal the distance from prism to guide sensor? If so, working at 55mm spacing, the distance from centre of prism to main sensor is 44mm. However, the length of the prism stalk is 50mm. The prism is 8mm so the distance from top of stalk to centre of prism is 46mm. So with the main camera in focus, my guide sensor needs to be 2mm lower than the stalk to achieve the same focus? Tell me I'm missing something obvious please? I have tried with my Redcat this afternoon on some distant trees but the Redcat only has 4mm of focus travel (59mm backspacing).

It's the thick grease they use. The AZEQ6 rotates on needle bearings so large surface area to rotate.

What made you give up mono before? Lack of time? Weather? It's a long term project, mono, imo, here in the UK. If your considering the investment why not look at the latest colour cameras like the ASI2600MC or QHY268C? Assuming you'd need to buy a mono cam, filters, filterwheel etc your probably not far off the cost of one of these new colour cameras. 

Have you tried a different cable to the mount? I don't mean any disrespect but that clear one with the ferrite block looks like those cheap ones you see available on ebay etc. Would be first thing I'd look at as you can't be spinning the dice eveytime you want to set up your kit.

What the hell is that?

1 minute ago, Newforestgimp said:

I think i will try this tomorrow, and go back to a quality hub. Do you think i should connect the mount via a separate USB cable to the laptop, and the other bits via the hub ?

Also just looking at the serial cable option from USB to RS232 to connect via the handset, will have a chat to FLO about that tomorrow. Thanks

Worth a try at least. Connecting each item individually helps track down the root of errors.

Regarding the Serial to USB method. I should have been clearer, this is the only way to connect a CEM25P to a PC and it worked great. It didn't have a USB port on the mount. Sounds like your GEM45 does so the Serial to USB method may be obsolete.

I've just read your first post again. Try just connecting the mount to your PC first. If successful, make a note of the COM port. Then add the other devices individually. Not sure about the EAF but my autofocuser (DeepSkyDad) uses a COM port as does the mount. I fired up my kit a few nights ago but forgot to turn the mount on. It caused a bit of an issue with the COM ports and wouldn't connect the DSD until I done a restart. I also wouldn't trust 100% the on board USB hub. Might work now and again, might give you headaches just as much.

Do you not connect through the handset on the iOptrons? On my CEM25 (now sold) I had to use a serial to USB through the handset. And to be honest, I found Commander much more stable and less buggy than EQMod. 

All joking aside, has anybody ever had the chance to look through an observatory class scope like this? 

I've just setup a fixed pier with scope and mount under a TG cover. After a couple of days heavy rain I was a bit alarmed to find some condensation under the cover. I put a spare dew strap around the Dec axis of the mount and leave 12v supply switched on. Seems to have solved the problem.

I can't say it will work out well with the barlow. Your doubling your f ratio and will need much longer subs to get above the noise. With the newt you have aperture and f5 so that's what I'd be using if you want resolution.

What camera? Dead pixel? Does the offset necessary translate into 16bit ADU?

On 01/11/2021 at 12:32, AbsolutelyN said:

Not yet complete but I've compiled a list of mods that I've made to this scope so far here - https://www.absolutelynothing.co.uk/blog/skywatcher-150pds-modifications/

First light image:

That is some first light!

The 268 has its highest QE peak around the Oiii band anyway so will register way more photons than the KAF. Around 90+% v 55%.