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Martthebass

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Everything posted by Martthebass

  1. Thanks DR. In my case, not sure that it matters where the meridian flip is toggled as it won't work in 'live' anyhow if I recall correctly. I was a bit concerned that the mount was 'shonky' but glad to find it's me being dim. The AA+ still has a few bugs that could do with sorting but overall it's a good pairing.
  2. Thanks Ian, I think it is an AAP issue, I sent the logs to ZWO for analysis/comment. If you use the AAP in plan mode then it should be ok as it'll perform the flip and recalibrate automatically. As I've been testing in live mode I think it just gets to the meridian and tracking stops. If you look on the guidescope view the stars just trail past without any corrections being made. I've had it tracking hours when away from the meridian without issue.
  3. You did really well with that Paul. I did a bit of opportunistic imaging, between clouds, last night and all had had to show for it was really bad gradient!
  4. I haven't done a home position adjustment on mine; I did find a couple of times that it did seem slightly off but it didn't seem to make any difference to the PA (using the AA+) and subsequent goto accuracy/guiding precision. I do agree that the adjustments are sensitive but they are so much more fluid than on my previous AZEQ5 mount and I can usually get good PA within 5 minutes. One thing I haven't checked is how much the PA 'moves' when you lock off the mount but so far I haven't had a problem. I'm still having the occasional issue with loss of guiding/tracking but I'm coming to the conclusion that that is a 'crossing the meridian' issue. So far in 'commissioning' I've only been doing 'live' stacks via the AA+ and the tracking seems to be lost as it approaches the meridian as the mount will not flip in live mode. Has anyone else noticed this?
  5. I think this is not an uncommon issue on WO scopes. I had it on my old GT81 but to a much lesser extent on my old GT71. If you're brave it can be removed by loosening off the collimation screws (do a search for which ones), I wasn't brave but found that the spikes could be just about eliminated by putting a couple of dew strips on (it was worse on winter nights). I did inform the supplier (not FLO) of the issue but didn't get anywhere; when I got my last APO I made sure it was one that was checked/tested by the supplier (in this case FLO).
  6. No I’m multistar but I’ve never figured why the crosshairs sit on one and show it’s size/brightness.
  7. No I just turned off guiding and ran a few subs through on 120s and then turned guiding back on. Fortunately the stars were still pretty centred but it did choose a new main star.
  8. Abnormally good seeing for this area last night, gave me a chance to check on the guiding issues I’d had last week. In short, no issues at all, the rms was pretty much the same as yours Ian at 0.41 for a 150minute session on IC59. Iike you I’d have loved to have left it running and gone to bed but I’m not that brave yet! Also did a check on what happens if guiding is turned off, surprisingly I still had round stars at 2 minutes and no issues with resuming guiding. I’m imaging at 432mm though and I guess much longer and I’d see effects.
  9. You could be right Ian, mine’s about average in the PE range I guess but quite sharp on the gradient. I’ve attached the PE curve. The first time this happened I was on 1s but the star shape was poor and brightness dipping into the 20s when it was lost. Second time the brightness was 50s but on 2s but didn’t see when loss occurred. Not had a problem when seeing and transparency were good but I’m concerned if a brief loss (passing cloud) will disrupt all guiding sessions and what if any fixes there could be. I don’t know if the logs are saved on my stick - I’ve never thought to check.
  10. Just a quick update on this: Fortunately there hasn't been a repeat of the 'inversion' issue. Regarding seeing, the seeing was really bad on an imaging session on Saturday evening and I think this was also coupled with some high level haze. Again I pushed up to 2s and fortunately the guiding was still kept below 0.6" rms. At some point however the guide star was lost and the AAP+ - AM5 combination appeared to be unable to reacquire the guidestar. When I noticed a few subs had been rejected in the live stack I checked the guidecam screen and saw the stars just drifting by. As I was about to close the session I shut down but stupidly forgot to send through the logs to ZWO. This isn't something I gave much thought to previously as on my old AZEQ5 mount if the guidestar was lost the encoders could handle it until reacquired. Has anyone else met this issue yet and if so got any comments/solutions?
  11. Some interesting comments on CN as the first ones are being evaluated. The EC model looks especially good with +/-3" unguided. Not sure what to make of the 'Dec Wobble' comments.
  12. To be honest that doesn’t look too different to mine. It’s about what I expected and at the FL I’m working at even subs with bad seeing haven’t been rejected in DSS. I’m using 1s guiding exposures as I’m on a 30mm guidescope, I might up to a 50mm at some point should I think it’s causing a problem. I didn’t mean the post to come over as negative, I’m well chuffed with the kit - hope I can pin down the ‘inversion’ issue as I’d like to think I can set the plan and leave it to run without worry.
  13. Rather than starting another thread on the AM5 I thought I’d add a few comments here - hopefully it won’t be seen as a hijack 🙂 There are more positives than negatives so I’ll start with those. 1. The mount and tripod are very well put together and a significant step up in fit and feel over the SW gear that this set up has replaced. 2. The set up and connection with my AAP+ and ancillaries was pretty seamless and painless even for an IT numpty like me. 3. The recent clear skies have given me about 15 hours on multiple targets. Guiding has generally been good in the 0.4-0.6” range average over the session. The negatives: 1. Not really the fault of the mount per se but after one session after the mount had been sent to home I found the scope pointing at the ground trying to destroy the scope and tripod. Fortunately the limiter had cut in but now I make sure I’m with it when it goes home. I’m putting this as an AAP+ fault to be fair though at the moment. 2. There are excursions in the guiding to +/- 4” on occasion which I’ve yet to determine a cause for. But the overall average remains good. The guiding is more sensitive to seeing than my AZEQ5 was; last night I was constantly upping from 1 to 2 sec as it was chasing less than optimal seeing. So overall I’m pretty pleased and can’t see me swapping for an EQ6 class mount any time soon.
  14. It needs 4gb on iOS. The sky atlas won't work on my iPad Air but will work on my iPhone 11! All of the features work on the iPad except the sky atlas - no real biggie. I have used the sky atlas on the iPhone just to check functionality but while it's nice it's not a must have so I won't be dropping £500 on an iPad with 4gb.
  15. I'm sure sales will pick up once a reasonable amount of info from users gets into the domain. I was interested but ultimately went for the AM5 as I knew it would integrate well with the AAP+.
  16. Still commissioning the AM5, sorting out a few guiding glitches with the AAP+. So progressed a set of mixed subs on the elephant 120s up to 300s using the Stellamira 90 and L-enhance. There was some high level haze which curtailed proceedings after about an hour so definitely a work in progress.
  17. Since acquiring my new mount I've so far only managed clouds, a few bats flying around the back garden, a hedgehog and the 'twin towers' of Huddersfield (Emley Moor transmitters). I'm hoping for better things next week.
  18. Welcome to the world of the frustrated Malcolm 🤣 I've generally found that the number of dark, clear nights is inversely proportional to the amount of time that you can devote to it at that point. You can be pretty sure that when you buy a new piece of kit that you will obviously be wanting to break ground on, that the clouds will roll in for weeks.
  19. Thinking Mexican Fenders here? I've had some pretty shonky MIM stuff but the JMJ mustang bass is a peach and as good as anything made in the US.
  20. Not me - think I get 1 hour sometime the middle of next week 😄
  21. Loved my old US of A built LX90 back in the day, it was only light pollution and the neighbour's garden becoming a forest that made me part with it. A holiday in Devon in the early 2000s at a true dark sky site opened my eyes to what a 8" SCT could do visually in the right conditions. Good to see that they are looking to achieve a viable North American production base, if my years in procurement have taught me one thing it's that Chinese supply and supply chains can come back and bite you on the proverbial.
  22. Got lucky and picked mine up today as the one that RVO managed to get hold of was knocked back by the person who had originally ordered it. A big hats off to the crew as I'd only managed to express interest last week. Expecting lots of bad weather now.......
  23. Lovely image Carole. No chance for me really with my northerly Latitude and bortle 6. Remembering my time working in South Africa when this was above my head.....ahhh, to dream.
  24. I got it too, thought it was a Cosmic ray strike, thanks for the heads up.
  25. If you can see it then it's a win as far as I'm concerned!
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