david_taurus83

1 hour ago, ONIKKINEN said:

You can use the manual focus stars tab in imaging to slew to a bright star. The list is extensive enough that so far have never run into issues trying to find a nice area of the sky for calibration. Much more convenient than fiddling with an external app imo.

? I didnt know there was a star list in there now. I use the older stable 2.1. Will have to have a look though I have an autofocuser anyway but still use CdC for slewing to near south for PHD purposes.

16 hours ago, Northernlight said:

my mount is a skywatcher Star Adventurer GTI and I connect via the Windows SynScan pro app.

I think that will be the issue. As mentioned above, try using EQMod? Just to point out, on my first AZGTi, I had to leave the encoders on otherwise EQMod wouldn't sync its position after a plate solve. Yes, a different mount but I bet they are very similar internally so worth bearing in mind. 

15 hours ago, ONIKKINEN said:

You should do all the movements and slews within NINA itself, you dont really need an external software like cartes du ciel. Doing everything in NINA has the least chance of some weird software interaction throwing a wrench in the works, so it is in my opinion preferred.

Generally I follow this rule myself but there are some occasions when I want to also use CdC. When calibrating PHD I like to slew to near meridian in the south and you can't do this with NINA. Also, if you don't have an autofocuser and still use a B mask you need an external app like CdC to select and slew to a bright star. 

So @ONIKKINEN I took your advice and decided to just process out the dodgy background issue I had in the other thread. I used GraXpert and in my opinion its as good as DBE but much easier to use. Any how, I created a monster and decided to see if I could combine the 6ish hours of Lum data I collected on the 200P with the above data from the Esprit!

Behold!

Edit: Above is a composition of 349 x 60s (5hr 49m) of Lum data taken with the 200P/533MM at 1000mm combined with the colour data of the Esprit 100/2600MC at 550mm. The 533MM was binned 2x2 so the pixel scale at 1.54 arcs/p is similar to that of the 1.4 arcs/p of the 2600MC.

I really wanted to image this with the 200P but struggling with flats on that at the moment. Still didn't want to miss the recent spate of clear skies despite no astro darkness so mounted up the Esprit 100 on the AM5.

252 no. 180s with the 2600MC, no filter. Just over 12.5 hours worth captured over 4 sessions 20th to 26th May. On a side note, the AM5 and ASIAir Mini performed flawlessly when left unattended. Not a single dropped sub apart from those I rejected due to clouds on night 1.

With many friends!

Sorry to hear you've lost a few hours of work! Its kinda like when you leave everything running after being happy with the first few subs to find the next day the rest are ruined by un-forecast high clouds!

I've also been unable to open that corrupted file. I tried to change it to an .xisf file and a tiff file but Pixinsight says no. I would suggest saving files direct to the ASIAir unit while imaging and transfer afterwards.

I've had no issues with parking either to standard home position or custom position. I have an AZEQ6 and I have turned off the encoders from within EQMod as have had the mount do strange things in the past with them on.

57 minutes ago, ONIKKINEN said:

You sure its not just a gradient?

Looks like a fairly normal linear sky gradient to my eyes and not good old newtonian flat headaches. Narrowband Ha would be largely unaffected because the sky is much darker at Ha wavelenghts so less gradient overall.

The uncalibrated stacks are a poor comparison when autostretched, because in those cases the shadow reference used by the autostretch would be from the vignetted corners instead of the sky gradients. Vignetting likely being significantly more severe than the gradient leads to the gradient being invisible on an uncalibrated autostretched image. Maybe try cropping the images so that only the fully illuminated center is visible and see if they still look different?

I'm not so sure. I do get gradients depending on where I'm pointing and they are your typical brighter on one side to less so on the other. This looks too localised to me. And almost identical on 2 different targets taken months apart with different position/declination in the sky? Could a light leak cause issues? 

7 minutes ago, pipnina said:

Is this on the 200P?

I didn't have any issues with my 130-PDS in this reagard, however I struggled endlessly to get my mirrors to stay put on my TS-PHOTON 8"

My conclusion has been that smaller mirrors can be held securely far more easily, and even the simple step up to 8" can make a world of difference to the rigidity required.

Out of interest, have you tried using a laser collimator, and turning the scope in the mount and seeing if the return point of the laser moves as the scope flips around? This revealed a lot of things in my photon.

Sorry, I probably wasn't clear. The mirror doesn't move, I meant movement of sensor relative to the mirror.  Colimation isnt perfect but i have round stars with your old GPU coma corrector so i leave well alone! It's the flats calibration that is giving me trouble.

The bane of many a newt imager, I'm sure! I shoot flats every session so as to eliminate mirror movement. On LRGB I get a weird dark patch to the right of centre. Ignore the dark shadow on the left hand side, that's from my OAG prism and I can crop it out. I thought I was doing everything correctly. Tube is flocked, I have a 12" dew shield, I autofocus my chosen filter at the start of the session as well before flats to get the position correct. Not sure exactly what it could be? Below is 2 targets, flats applied to the left stacks, flats and stacks without flats.

To rule out Pixinsight i tried DSS (below, left) and get a similar result. To throw a spanner into the mix, narrowband is completely unaffected and calibrates just fine! The Ha flat looks horrible compared to the broadband filters but works a charm.

Any ideas? 

How are you finding its performance Adam? Better than the AZGTi? Backlash in Dec was the AZ's Achilles heel

51 minutes ago, The Admiral said:

All good news David. The coffee-tin riser seems to do the business! So I guess you'd reckon the mount handles the Esprit 100 OK?

I see that you are using the ASIAir Mini. How's that working out for you?

Ian

Yes Ian! It appears so! Chucks it round as if it's a Redcat! I haven't inspected any subs yet and after setting up and checking the first couple of subs I left it to do it's thing. At 3.30am when my alarm clock went off to go and pack up, it was still going into its 4th hour. The Air Mini has been great. I've experienced no issues with it. I set the WiFi to 2.4g and I can still get signal from middle of garden to upstairs bedroom. I tried station mode but it's a bit flaky so tend to stick to the Airs own WiFi. Last night was the first time using the 2.1 firmware and all was OK. I did download it from the ZWO site though and not use the one on Google Play as some people think that version is problematic? 

I know there's another active AM5 thread but I'll stick this in here for continuity. Finally got to try the AM5 on my spare 2" tripod. Happy to report that it's nice and stable even without a counterweight. Guiding was also nice and stable last night, around 0.5 to 0.7 RMS. Was nice to get back out last night with my second setup. Last outing was back in February!

Great result with nice round stars at the edge.

I would advise on taking flats when it's dark though as I have found daylight from a window can add uneven illumination to the screen of the light source. Or at least when your light source is brighter than ambient sources.

Really, how difficult is it to run a mains cable from house to shed? I have (previous owner installed) armoured cable running from 3 pin plug in house to shed less than 20m away. It's pinned to the bottom of our garden fence so it doesn't look intrusive. I installed a new RCD outdoor socket in shed when we moved in. Powers my astro pier 24/7 and lights and power tools in the shed.

Sod paying 200 odd quid for the ZWO one. Made my own mini pier today. Had to get the 3/8 bar off ebay and drink a lot of coffee but works out a lot cheaper! Should compliment my custom custard counterweight nicely! The concrete side will go on top of the EQ6 tripod and the AM5 bracket will sit perfectly flush with the bottom side of the coffee tin. Will give it a few days to go off before trying it.

On 25/04/2023 at 20:18, potato22 said:

Should the polar scope scale be vertical? Mine is offset slightly, as shown in the picture. Sorry if it's a noob question, it's my first mount, and first time looking through a polar scope!

The picture is taken straight, so the scale seems offset 5 degrees or so from vertical.

Wondering if this is deliberately to compensate for magnetic North vs true North, or if the courier dropped it, etc...

My first mount was an old EQ5 and I adjusted the reticle on that. I set the tripod level with a spirit level and put the mount on but adjusted it as close to horizontal as possible and used the corner brickwork of a house across the road to adjust it. 

Since then, I have had 2 AZEQ6's and the polar scope reticle was loose and wobbly on both! I've never used them, always use software to align now. For imaging the polar scope is pretty much obsolete nowadays. 

So I mounted up the Esprit and its a marvel to see the mount swing it round without toppling over! I don't think I would trust it without a counterweight though or 5 litres drum for weight in the middle of the tripod. However the camera will clash with the legs at zenith so I need to think about it a bit more. I could get the extension pier but ita not cheap for what it is. I would much rather use my 2" SW tripod in the shed but the centre bolt is M12 so the ZWO extension won't work with that either. Need to think a bit more about it. Perhaps could make my own mini pier out of some aluminium plates...🤔

Just wondering if anyone uses their AM5 on the carbon tripod with heavy refractors? My Esprit 100 is currently sat in the wardrobe while the 200P is on the pier so I was thinking about trying the Esprit on the AM5? The Esprit isn't a particularly long refractor but it's weighty. I'm not doubting the AM5's capability but more concerned about toppling the tripod. I don't have the pier extension either. Would a counterweight be advised? 

It will get condensation on it so you will need to put some sort of heater under the cover with it. Some people use pet heating pads as an example. I use a small dew strap turned inside out (heated side facing out) and wrapped around the dec axis of my AZEQ6 and controlled by a smart dew heater. Keeps the mount and scope dry 24/7. As mentioned above, some screws etc will rust. The locking screws on the counterweights for example.

So 2" filters at a minimum. An expensive upgrade for the sake of an integrated guide cam. And how sensitive will it be if you swung a 3nm filter in front of it with a 2 or 3 second guide exposure? Love the idea but perhaps ideal only for OSC?

CFA (Colour Filter Array) is set to NO so it thinks they are mono. You need to manually set DSS to debayer.

As above, you might need to tell DSS the Bayer pattern for the camera, RGGB. Also, you really don't need to use darks with this camera, as long as you are dithering to remove hot pixels. I just use a master bias and dither for both my 533MM and 2600MC.

You should try just that and repair the installation. If you go to add or remove program menu, NINA should give the option to modify as well as uninstall. Click modify and try repair when the wizard pops up. If it still gives you issues, uninstall it and download a new install file from the NINA website. It should keep your profile settings even if you uninstall but as a backup, you can copy and paste your profile settings to somewhere safe on your drive before you uninstall. They are found at the path like in the screenshot below.

Don't be fooled by the guiding numbers in ASIAir app as they are very optimistic..

Do the jumps happen at frequent intervals? Have you set to dither after a set number of frames? It could be the next image in the sequence has started before the mount has had time to recover from the dither. A large amount of backlash would have the effect of the mount not moving despite guide pulses so the size of the pulse increases and increases and you suddenly get a large movement which can cause it to jump and overshoot. 

First galaxy with my galaxy scope! Unfortunately I had some sort of issue with flats as they caused the strange dark patch on the right so I had to stack without and try and process out the vignetting! Thankfully there are no dust bunnies so was easy enough using GraXpert. I always found M81 and M82 difficult to process as the galaxy cores are so bright, if push the stretch too much it just washes out the outer details. Had to take a more subdued effort with this.

180 x 60s Lum, 60 x 60s RGB, 20 x 180s Ha (R+Ha blended 50/50)

Weird dark patch on the L stack with flats applied

Final image processed in Pixinsight