teoria_del_big_bang

My take on the battery box.

Added 4 two pole Aviation sockets which is what I use for 12V connectors.
Also added switches to control each output and a volt & Ammeter.

Only mistake I have made (I think) is that the voltmeter/ammeter is where the strop hoes so covers it up.
So I will print a blanking plate and move it somewhere else, another day.

Once again many thanks to @SMF for the info and sorry for just about copying your idea but it is perfect for the job and should power the scope and all its equipment easily for many hours.

Steve

My you have been busy. When you said you were changing your direction I though it was just an idea not just about built.

Looks  a much more manageable design.

One question what stops the cameras moving in the direction of the red arrow and disengaging the worm from the gear ?

Steve

Wow this is some waring. Always an issue though on big areas.

As you only intend to use 2 cameras for now maybe the best approach to start with a dual image setup and lessons learned can then go towards the re-design of the triple imaging rig.

Please put a link on the end of this thread to the new one so I see it 🙂  

Although with the amount of people looking into getting the new ASI2600MM camera there may be a glut of very reasonable priced 1600's appear on the forum 🙂 so the triple setup may not be that far away.

Steve

1 hour ago, nephilim said:

I've read some negative comments about this guide scope, I went for the Skywatcher 50ED which seems really good quality.

 

The Skywatcher Evoguide  50ED is a brilliant guidescope. Not exactly cheap but quality.

Steve

Just now, david_taurus83 said:

When I suggested using the guidecam, my thinking was this.

Start APT but not PHD at first. Connect to the guide cam in APT. Connect to the mount in APT. Slew to your chosen target. Take a 10 second exposure with guidecam. At 130mm focal length you should pick up a good few stars. In Pointcraft, press Solve. If that fails try Blind. Fingers crossed, it solves the image. Press sync. Repeat until you are on target. Close APT now as you no longer need it. Connect up PHD and start your calibration/guiding. Set your Fuji to start imaging however you plan to do this.

There are a few things to consider before you try this. First, as Steve points out, the guidescope needs to be pointing in practically the same position as main scope. You can do this by aiming at a far off target during the day or at the moon at night. Secondly, you need to make sure you add a profile into APT for the guidecam and guidescope. Also, you need to make sure you have the relevant indexes installed in All Sky Plate Solver for the field of view of the guidecam and guidescope. Out of curiosity, I tried something like this myself. I struggled to get Solve to work but I got Blind to work. Fingers crossed it may help you as well.

Yes that pretty much how I would see it working 🙂 

I hope I am not adding confusion here as @david_taurus83 seems to have the best suggestions but if APT does not support your main imaging camera what is APT actually doing for you?

I expect nothing but you just want to use it to plate-solve and that you are using stellarium to say what your target is and then would like to plate-solve so you can correct the wrong position of your mount and get the image same as the FOV you selected in Stellarium.

If that is wrong then ignore the following.
So you cannot easily transfer an image from your main imaging camera to the laptop running APT / Stellarium but you are working on a way to do it via WiFi.

I would say using the guidescope and guide-cam is a possibility, but it does give you several things to overcome:

• Guide-camera would need to see same FOV as your main camera - which it won't - but at least the center of the image needs to be on same center as the main camera if that makes sense.
• Also the rotation of the guide camera needs to be same as your main imaging camera (or very close withing a degree or two)
• Both the above will take a bit of doing but possible and so long as you do not dismantle guidescope and guide-cam from main scope after each session should be fine as you do not want to do this start of every session. Or at least have a way of removing the guide-cam and guidescope and making sure it goes back same rotation every session - which is easily done.
• In both APT and Stellarium I would think you then have to set them up to say your guide-cam is the main imaging camera and your guidescope is the main telescope as this is what will give the FOV and image and it needs the Pixel size, image size and focal length etc of those to use in calculations in the plate solving.
• I think it should then just work as APT and Stellarium just think you are imaging with guidescope and guide-cam.
• The issue may come then when using PHD2 in that APT has a handle on the guide-cam and I am not sure PHD2 and APT can connect to same camera (maybe if using an ASCOM driver and not native driver - but this is something I don't know what I am talking about so no real idea). Or I guess you could hold off connecting to PHD2 until you have plate solved and in correct position and scope is in tracking mode then turn camera off in APT and connect APT then start guiding.

As I say sorry if I have misunderstood but they were my thoughts on the issue.
I guess if you can get the WiFi transfer of the jpg images between camera and laptop working then that would be easier and just get APT to look at the image and plate-solve. It will then move the mount to correct any error with respect to Stellarium and all is good.

Steve

17 minutes ago, ollypenrice said:

What would be the benefit in your view?

Olly

Well really that's what I wanted to know.

The no amp glow that is promised is obviously great, but not necessarily worth the cost as it can be dealt with calibration frames.
A greater FOV would also be a benefit but with my setup not sure I will get that, if I have to crop heavily due to issues with filters not being big enough or close enough to camera.

Also my lack of knowledge means I do not know what other benefits it may give me,regarding quality of the raw images (reduced noise etc) hence was hoping for some guidance.

So far from the info received it is looking like maybe it is not a consideration unless I look at replacing my FW if a bolt on 36mm one becomes available and even then maybe all the extra weight is going to cause issues with my stock focusser.

Steve

I can only echo the previous posts in that must be the best, or at least up there with the v=best images of this I have seen.

Simply, Stunning and deserves to appear in a magazine anytime soon 🙂 

Steve

4 minutes ago, savcom said:

Hi Steve

I was aware of the USB-C issues but a quick trawl revealed these (which may now be resolved of course). Looks to mainly apply to earlier versions of the Pi4.  Also - it's not clear if these would affect the uses we are putting them to.

USB-C issues:
https://hackaday.com/2019/07/16/exploring-the-raspberry-pi-4-usb-c-issue-in-depth/
https://www.cnx-software.com/2020/02/24/raspberry-pi-4-rev-1-2-fixes-usb-c-power-issues-improves-sd-card-resilience/

Raspberry Pi failure rate and main instability sources:
https://www.raspberrypi.org/forums/viewtopic.php?f=63&t=295976&p=1785170#p1785170

 

HDMI issues:
https://forum.libreelec.tv/thread/20161-rpi4-hdmi-cec-not-working/
https://howtoraspberrypi.com/raspberry-pi-hdmi-not-working/
https://www.raspberrypistarterkits.com/guide/raspberry-pi-hdmi-not-working/

Cheers I had seem things about the HDMI but so far not had an issue and unless I get some issue whereby I cannot get into the Pi with VNC, Remote Desktop or the like never really needed it. One thing I have noticed is that when I do plug a HDMI monitor in the Internal WiFi is just about useless. I now use a USB WiFi adapter and that still works fine.

I hadn't heard about the USB C issues and to be honest a lot of that link is over my head. I can't say I have had an issue with it though so far, touch woo.

Steve

9 minutes ago, SMF said:

I charge the battery connecting directly to the trolling motor posts (the outside ring terminals).
I didn't see a problem and the instructions don't mention it one way or the other.
Been very pleased with it so far and for the cost, after a little DIY, I think it's hard to beat.
The twin USB with the volt meter from amazon is handy. Gives you continuous battery health and is reasonably accurate +/- 0.1A

Cheers Oh that looks a great addition.
I also am really pleased bargain for such a profession looking and powerful supply. Many thanks for the heads up and the help 🙂 

Steve

57 minutes ago, TerryMcK said:

Just to say I have 2 x Pi4 4GB and have never had any issues with them at all. Not sure where you are hearing the unreliability from.

Me too (well one 4Gb & one 8Gb) and the 4Gb has run fine for over a year now, No reliability issues with the Pi4 for me (YET, should I have said that !)

1 hour ago, savcom said:

I've heard much the same - and it's not clear where the unreliability is coming from

2 hours ago, Xilman said:

I have been hearing bad things recently about reliability of the Pi4 range,

But it does interest me what  may be unreliable, can you send be some links to this please ?

🙂 Steve

On 01/01/2021 at 21:18, SMF said:

This will do the job, I already had one.

https://www.amazon.co.uk/gp/product/B009A83P1E/ref=ppx_yo_dt_b_asin_title_o03_s00?ie=UTF8&psc=1

Just taken delivery of the box, battery & charger 🙂 

To charge it do you open it up and put the charger on the battery terminals directly, or is it safe to charge via the cigarette lighter socket or the outside ring terminals. I assume these only go through the breakers so unless uni-directional, which I very much doubt, should be olay.

Similar to you I intend to put some better connectors on as I hate those cigarette lighter sockets, too easy to pull out accidently or get bad connections.

Steve

Funny really, when I first considered taking up Astro Photography and not really looked into it properly, I expected there to be very little software available for controlling things, and because of the niche market, and lack of it, that it would be astronomically expensive (apt phrase or what).

But 3 years later I find there are so many I cannot choose which one to go with and, whats more they are either free or very reasonably priced, so makes me feel I need to try them all out to see for myself.
So probably go with my current EKOS / KStars for now,and maybe mid year when the darkness fades I may start with NINA which seems to get a lot of praise.

BUT, if anything like what I have used so far (APT and KStars) then probably little to choose between them, all so far have done a cracking job and far more than I ever envisaged when I started.
What these guys writing these have done for the hobby is incredible and really changes the whole hobby in terms of what is possible, so my admiration to all of them 👍  👏  👏

Steve

2 minutes ago, g-rex said:

I totally agree about Kstars being quite light as a planetarium. It almost put me off initially after using Stellarium, but the fact that everything is under one roof so to speak (even the guiding works okay) made me stick it out. Also once I've done a go-to and started imaging that's the planetariums job done. Also it's only light aesthetically I suppose. It works well. 

Exactly my thoughts, When I first tried KStars I nearly gave up straight away after using the planetarium, but stuck it out and glad I did as all other aspects I really loved.
As I sat at my laptop, or a desktop inside and connected via Teamviewer, or remote desktop I just ran stellarium on a 2nd screen to use to search for what was about and how high up it was, then used KStars and just typed the target in and it went straight there.
And as you say  once sequencing starts that's the planetarium over with, unless you want to search about for a 2nd target when your main target goes out of view, but again I could do that in stellarium anyway.

8 minutes ago, g-rex said:

Plate solving will be a game changer for me and it works fantastic on Kstars - not that I have anything to compare it to. 

Don't get me wrong it works well on APT and a while since I used APT so may have changed as well, but I don't think quite as easy and so many options as EKOS / KStars.

Steve

I have gone the other way and gone from APT with Stellarium to using KStars / EKOS on either Ubuntu or on RPi.

To be honest I liked APT and thought it was a great bit of software and for sure love Stellarium
So why move ?  Well curiosity really, I saw so many on SGL using KStars with EKOS I wanted to try it so I belaced the hard drive in a smallish Fanless PC, so I could keep the Windows OS and go back to it if required.
Since I have also use dit on a RPi and with some tweaks even the RPi seems to run it okay.

I am torn a bit as there are a lot of aspects about EKOS/INDI I like, I really like the way the sequencer is set out and all the way there is a seperate tab for all the equipment and having all the parameters on there easy to view.
I also love the plate solving in EKOS and being able to drag an old image out from a previous session and plate solve so the mount goes to that exact position again so you can add data.
Now don;t get me wrong the plate solving worked great in APT but I don't think you can do the same with the previous image (but forgive me if I am wrong or it has been added)

EDIT - Yes it can. So was probably just me that had only just started plate solving and not realized I could do that.

What I do not like in KStars is the planetarium, it does a job but compared to Stellarium I think it is very clunky with some poor images of DSO's.

So difficult to suggest which is best, if any, as both have their merits and you have to see what suits you.

I also need to try NINA as this has some very good comments last year or so, trouble is if not careful you spend more time messing about setting up and learning how to use software when there are precious few clear nights where I live (and the OP) as it is 🙂 

Steve

On 12/11/2020 at 21:30, Paul M said:

As above, but a bit different. Astroberry and I didn't get on with each other. So now I have a mini PC for at the mount with Ubuntu (20.10) and run KStars/Ekos, PHD2, ASTAP and a few other utils. I recently put Stellarium on it too because KStars is a pants planetarium but Ekos won't talk to Stellarium (It will talk to SkySafari but that doesn't run on Linux...). I use RealVNC to control it all either by WiFi and a tablet at the mount or Ethernet to my Windows Lappy indoors. 

It's been a dreadful few months weatherwise and I've hardly even tested it fully. But any trouble and I'll put Windows on the Mini and revert to APT, which I actually prefer for user friendlyness. Ekos is too configurable for my needs presently but as I progress...

It seems that there is something of a frenzy over N.I.N.A. as a full bodied imaging suite for Windows. Might be worth looking at?

Anyway, "Hey Google, set up my telescope"

Just seen this, and I know exactly what you mean about KStars planetarium. If only I could use Stellarium with EKOS I would be over the moon (well very happy anyway) 🙂 

Steve

2 minutes ago, Paul M said:

I was going to write a long post

I am glad you didn't 🤣

Steve

Regarding cases I don't think the standard red and white case has any form of cooling and if the RPi gets hot then it automatically slows it down.
So would stay clear of the standard case for £5 or whatever it is and get a metal one with passive cooling like this FLIRC case

Now a metal case does well for cooling but does reduce the effectiveness of the WiFi but if you are using Ethernet then that is not an issue.

Regarding memory I have been told that 4 Gb is fine and that you will see no significant improvement with 8Gb.
I have both the 4Gb and 8Gb RPi 4 and although not tested both thoroughly certainly nothing is standing out to say the 8Gb is a vast improvement.

Steve

49 minutes ago, baggywrinkle said:

Just cancelled my booking with an apology to Lesley for doing so.

Stay safe everyone.

Sorry, maybe I didn't understand, is the campsite not aware all the bookings need cancelling. Should we all cancell our individual booking at the site?

It's no problem I just assummed as it was an event they would know we all needed to cancel but if not I will let them know.

Steve

I am afraid you will probably get replies with differing ideas.

I would agree with @Snoani and I do take flats for each filter used during that session and if possible take them every morning after a session and not rely on flats from previous sessions.
The idea being that dust bunnies can change from day to day and they will be different on each filter.
But, i also have never done any tests to see if using one set of fats would make a significant difference to the final image, I always just used the logic that if I can do them easily for each filter then it can't do any harm 🙂 

After saying that others only use one set of flats from either Lum or Ha and others even use flasts from previous nights so long as the camera, FW etc are at the same angle as previous nights and with great results. So up to you see what works for you. My personal preference , so long as I have time is to do them for all filters as I use a flat field generator and so is a pretty quick affair. If using white T Shirt and natural light then may not always be easily possible so then you may have to use previous flats.

Steve

Stunning images.
I think this looks great in just Ha.
Personally I prefer some stars in there so would go for the lower image but both are great images 🙂 

Steve

1 hour ago, rnobleeddy said:

I've done some playing around with this and for me, the Pi's wifi strength is great until I stick it behind a large metal telescope! If you have a way of maintaining a clear line of sight between the Pi and the WiFi signal in the house, it tends to do well. Once it's behind my telescope it's often unusable.

However, I did find that a decent quality separate USB WiFi receiver helped signal strength, as did adding a WiFi repeater by the back door.

I agree. I think my point was that in most circumstances we use the RPi in AP the Pi internal WiFi does not work reliably (Well in my experience).

• Most setus will have the RPi in some sort of case, and often that is metal used as a passive heatsink, that is the first obstacle (so the alternative is a plastic case with fan yes that is better for the WiFi)
• When mounted on the scope or mount often there are other metal obstacles in between the RPi and our home network router, when we start a session this may not be too bad but as the scope rotates this can get worse and cause signal loss.
• Often there are one or more walls the signal has to negotiate.

Also, certainly in my experience with a couple of RPi's generally the transmission speed was poor anyway even with a clear line of sight and close proximity of RPi to router.

But for sure the WiFi as it is can be used and if everything is running on the Pi and you just need to connect from a laptop to set things going and if the signal drops now and again then perhaps that's okay.
But even with this I personally just found it annoying, at best, and so for little extra effort I think it is a good idea to somehow improve this connection which as you state can be done in several ways.

1. Easiest, probably fastest and probably cheapest is to use a hard wired Ethernet connection. If you intend to download pictures direct to your laptop or desktop, or run KStars on them then this is my preference.
2. Use a second WiFi adapter on the RPi. Up until now I have always used the Ethernet cable but this was recommended by @Stuart1971 and just tried this and so far I have a great speed over 100 meters and through 2 walls with no drops in signal that I have seen so far so very happy with this method.
3. As you say many people do use a repeater nearer to the scope to boost the signal between a router indoors and the RPi and that works well to.

Steve

Welcome Martin to SGL and no apology necessary.

Steve

3 minutes ago, Ouroboros said:

I think I must have been running KStars wrongly set on UTC+1 for years and never noticed. I just changed it to +0 and as Teoria says it reverts to 1 when you restart the programme.  It needs saving by clicking the thing that looks like a floppy disk. Funnily enough it remembered my location name, coordinates etc, so I must have saved it at some time. 

The funny though perhaps not surprising thing is that the polar alignment routine still worked as did the plate solving to calibrate the pointing model.  

So thanks @teoria_del_big_bang for asking the question. I’ll check it out when government lifts restrictions and I’m no longer socially distanced from my telescope which is 200 miles away.  

Must admit not sure how mine has been running the past year. I am actually setting up a new RPi with Stellarmate. Previously I have had another RPi running Astroberry which I should look at.
I am a bit embarrassed to say but my mount, scope and all my gear had been in cases since I took them on holiday to south coast last September. Weather just not been brilliant since and had other things going on in life just have not done any imaging back end of last year.

But I think I had that set up to update KStars from the GPS in the mount so maybe all this is not a big issue anyway, and hopefully thats how it will work with this setup. It was just annoying me and I was sure there was a way of getting it working so just kept trying to see how to do it.

Steve

Ha Ha done it.

When Stellarmate powers up it automatically opens KStars.
I Trued all ways to change to either Skipton, Bradford, Leeds but always went back to Greenwich. Tried clicking on settings - Geographic and changing there and also clicking on settings - Startup Wizard and set it there but always went back to Greenwich.

What I never did was change it and then close KStars down before rebooting.
This time I first closed KStars and re-opened it and it was still on Skipton.
So now I have rebooted and still on Skipton, so the missing bit of the puzzle seemed to be closing the application after changing the location.

Thanks all for the help 🙂 

Steve