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carastro

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Everything posted by carastro

  1. carastro
    Oh dear, my smaller HEQ5 has replacement bolts, but I always do PA fully loaded even with a dual rig, as I go to Astro camps with it, and am not going to faff around in the dark loading everything up afterwards when I could be getting on with imaging in the short time I have there, been doing this for quite a few years. Carole
  2. carastro
    That's correct.
  3. carastro
    When you say Do you mean the orientation is different because you removed the camera between imaging sessions? If so then you'll need new flats, if the orientation is different because of slightly different GOTO then you can use the same flats. I always find it easiest to stack the different nights individually and then stack the stacks. there is a group stacking function on DSS but I am not sure if it works well/at all if the exposures etc are different. Even when I used to use the group stacking method I still found I got better results from stacking the stacks. HTH Carole
  4. carastro
    I would say a mono would be the wise choice, if you get an electronic filterwheel you can capture Luminance and colour in a sequence. Also gives you the option to do narrowband. Also the mono camera (if you're spending all that money), will give much better detail. Carole
  5. carastro
    OK, well looks like your problem is due to something different. Carole
  6. carastro
    I am inclined to agree with Olly, but in the meantime, here is a tip I was given some years ago: Do you keep your SD card in the camera when you download to the laptop? I was told that removal of the SD card reduces this problem because something electronic (which I don't understand) can happen in the download due to the SD card being in place. Anyway, I removed my SD card and it greatly improved/got rid of the horizontal banding problem. This was some years ago, so I can't remember all the details 100%. Might be worth a try though, and as stated previously try not to let power cables touch USB cables. Carole
  7. carastro
    Imaging is very difficult on a mount that only moves in Alt/Az mode. The hyperstar is fast, but you're going to be cheating yourself of good data by taking such short exposures. I have no idea on length of exposure as never imaged on the sort of set up you have. Is there a wedge available for this mount? You would stand a better chance with that, and if you say you have bought a guider for it, it is obviously capable of guiding, you just need to make it work, but it will struggle if not in wedge mode. It looks like a nice piece of kit you have but just not really suitable for long exposure imaging with the current mount. Might be worth starting a new thread on this topic and hopefully people who have used the same or similar kit can give you better advice. Carole
  8. carastro
    Glad it worked. BTW my name is Carastro, White Dwarf is my classification on the SGL. Shame about the mount, is it on a wedge? Carole
  9. carastro
    I think it's definitely the cosmetic tab, I had a similar conversation with some-one on another forum only yesterday, who had holes in his stars, and after me advising him to re-stack unticking the cosmetic tab, they were perfectly fine and the stars looked pretty much the same as the ones you are showing. Carole
  10. carastro
    If you are using DSS to stack, check what settings you have on the cosmetic tab. If it's ticked, then untick it, it is supposed to remove hot pixels, but seems to eat the centre of stars as well. Carole
  11. carastro
    A couple of mine taken at Astro camps. Not that you can see the kit very clearly. 1st one was in a camp in East Sussex 2016 you can see my campervan behind (the one with the slits of red showing through). You can just about make out my dual rig of the ED80/WOZS71. PS: 2nd photo is taken as a screen shot from a video that Mark Shelley made with his A7S walking around Kelling at 4am in April 2016. He says on the video that the sky was black and he couldn;t see where he was walking except through the live view on the camera, just shows how sensitive the A7S is. Again you can just about make out my ED80. My laptop had red plexi glass over it, and was inside a plastic box and yet it looks bright white, again due to the sensitivity of the A7S. PS: Just looked at the photo again, and I think this was my gold ED120 (not the ED80).
  12. carastro
    Straton will remove stars from Mono images, so you have to remove the stars of each channel. I can see how the above would work with a narrowband image, but surely you are going to remove all the colour data from the stars of an LRGB image. Carole
  13. carastro
    Thanks Neil, you've been most helpful. I can see how that would work, but I think I'll leave that mod alone in case we mess it up completely. Carole
  14. carastro
    Thanks, just one more question, what stops the focusser from winding all the way out? i.e. is there a wider bit that acts as a "stop" that I shall be sawing off? Carole
  15. carastro
    Wow, that's unusual Carole
  16. carastro
    That's what I thought, so chopping a bit off should sort that out, just need to sweet talk my engineering friend as I don't have the tools to do it, and neither does hubby, he's more of a carpentry man. Carole
  17. carastro
    That's why I want to adjust the length of the focusser. This is what a defocussed star looks like:
  18. carastro
    I am not concerned about the dark segments, I am concerned about the weird non circular blob shape of the central part of the star. Carole
  19. carastro
    Thanks Spillage, though I can't see how the remaining protruding parts of the tube in that link wouldn;t still cause a problem. If you guys think you have problems with star shapes and the focusser just take a look at mine (this is a crop):
  20. carastro
    Thanks for all the advice guys, have copied it off to show my friend when the time comes.
  21. carastro
    Which end did you cut it off, the inner end or the eyepiece end? I am not at all able to do this myself, but need to be able to give my engineering friend instructions if I ask him to do it for me. If you take it off the eyepiece end, is it easy to remove the bit that had the compression ring on and put it back on again? If you take it off the inner end, I presume you have to unscrew the whole focusser assembly to get it out, so is there some sort of "stop" mechanism to take into consideration that might get cut off (i.e. that stops you from winding the focusser all the way out. Any pointers and links would be appreciated. Carole
  22. carastro
    I have in the past before I got dithering working stopped the imaging for a few secs and put the slewing onto the slowest speed and pressed the button for a second or two to move the mount slightly, it seemed to work.
  23. carastro
    Right, not sure if you can do this with only an RA motor. But APT talks to PHD and tells it to dither between subs, I don't know how it works but all I know is I have done it when I only used a handset. The APT/PHD commands somehow tell the mount to dither, the same as PHD tells the mount to make guiding corrections. Carole
  24. carastro
    See my previous post, can be done automatically with APT - no need for mount control or doing it manually. Carole
  25. carastro
    Yes, I don't use mount control I use a handset. I used to dither with APT when I used my DSLR camera. APT (Astrophotography Tool) also supports CCD cameras. Very cheap and good support. It talks to PHD so it knows when you are taking a shot and dithers in between shots. Carole
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