Noobulosity

Sure. Pretty much all color cameras have a Bayer matrix. You could practice on cheaper, old cameras.

Totally forgot to post an update here. I finally had an opportunity to test my 7D mono mod, after months of nothing but clouds around here (and a few clear nights where I had no opportunities to image... but mostly clouds). I didn't get very far before more clouds moved in, but I managed to get some shots in on IC5070 Pelican Nebula with 600s exposure times. I shot H-alpha only, using a Baader 7nm H-a filter, 600s, a mix of ISO400 (2 frames), ISO800 (6 frames), and ISO1600 (3 frames). Last time I had a working sensor, someone suggested longer times were best with narrowband filters. So, that's what I tested. No calibration frames or dithering here, I just didn't have time. And... I was just plain lazy and didn't feel like it. This was just a test anyway, not a serious imaging session. In any case, this is what I ended up with. Still pretty noisy, which I'm sure would improve with additional exposures and calibration frames to smooth things out. Taken with my WO Zenithstar 103. This one is just the straight stack, no editing at all: With a little work done to it:

These lighters have more of a jet flame than a lazy candle flame. Like a small propane torch. It's just a style, not a brand.

If you plate-solve and sync your mount, you can also use the Sky Atlas to find and slew to targets. Often if you slew close to your target and plate-solve, choosing to slew again will get you right on the spot you wanted. It can also import coordinates from planetarium softwares using the little map pin / GPS marker icon thing in the framing wizard.

Well....... I guess I just couldn't leave well enough alone. I picked up another sensor from eBay (my 4th one...) and went at it again. This time, I'm really pleased with the results. My method: After dismantling the sensor a bit, I was able to remove the cover glass relatively easily using a torch-style lighter to break the epoxy and a hobby knife to very gently lift the glass. (Add a touch of heat to help it release if it doesn't want to lift.) Once the cover glass is removed, I reapply the plastic frame that held the UV filter (I removed it). This acts as a guide for my scraper and helps me avoid hitting the tiny gold wires. Use a sharpened oak dowel to begin the removal process. Once I start seeing decent wear, I added some Maas Metal Polish to the tip of the dowel. This helps to wear through the Bayer matrix to the bare photosites. DON'T OVERDO THIS!! Once I start opening up areas through the filter layer, I switched to a cotton swab/Q-tip with more of the Maas Metal Polish. Gently rubbing and swirling to help erode and remove the epoxy Bayer matrix. This worked REALLY well! I was able to get a nice, uniform removal over the majority of the sensor, only leaving behind the border areas to avoid hitting sensitive electronics. As-needed during the process, and to check progress, I used 91% isopropyl alcohol to clean off the metal polish, then a dry swab to clean up most of the alcohol and swarf. Once I reassembled the camera, it worked like a charm! It takes nice, clear, sharp images. I can't wait to test it using my telescope. Since it's a really bright moon right now, I may test out some H-alpha narrowband imaging and see what I get. Flat: Converted flat: Converted daytime image: Highly-stretched to inspect for defects:

Unfortunately, disassembly/reassembly didn't fix the issue. I still have the regular intervals of vertical dead pixel lines. I wonder if I touched something adding the copper cold finger and messed something up on the sensor. It's tough to see what's actually between the sensor and its PCB, so I wouldn't be surprised if I scratched something with the copper plate as I slipped it between the two. I recall there being a burr on the copper plate when I tried putting it in initially. I did sand that off and it went in fine. But, maybe I scratched through something in that process. As much as I really, REALLY want to keep at this, I think my attempts at this project are done. It was fun and rewarding. I just can't keep sinking money into it, at this point. Any idea if dithering might help to minimize the impact of these dead lines? Or is that just an exercise in futility? Anyone want to buy my Canon 7D and pick up the project? Shoot me a PM.

I'll try some more daytime shots to see what I get. It wasn't doing this before, and I tried to stay away from the sensor surface when I added the cooler. I can also try reseating the ribbon cables.

I have to agree. This has been educational and quite enjoyable. I know it'll never be a "real" astro camera. But, I've learned a lot in the process.

Ended up testing a bit more, and this interpretation seems to be a bit more blended. Feels like fuzzier details, though. I didn't get this with daytime photos, so this just feels very confusing. dcraw64 -r 1 1 1 1 -d -4 -T -b 16 *.cr2 (FYI, I did stretch the image a touch, which is why it appears brighter.)

I added a larger TEC (50W, this time) and heatsink. It dropped the EXIF temperature very quickly, and condensation began forming within a few minutes of having it turned on. I needed to use a desktop PC power supply to get this one started, as the laptop PSU had some type of short-circuit protection preventing it from running. I noticed something interesting while I was messing around with my camera again. I went back and looked at a photo with light leaks, and saw vertical lines. But, it's not "banding noise", per se... it almost looks like it's showing the gap between pixels, now that I'm using DCRAW to ignore the Bayer interpretation for RGB. I think that's what I'm seeing as vertical banding in my images. I hope that dithering will reduce that significantly. Any other ideas as to how to eliminate this? Can I "re-debayer" the image as mono, but in a way that's more like when it's interpreted as RGB to get rid of those pixel columns?

The version that doesn't work. Is that one of the nightly releases? If so, why not go back to the working version? Nightly releases aren't made to be stable, they're for testing new features. If something broke, let the devs know about it so they can fix it.

Aside from the exposed areas touching the sensor itself and the TEC side outside the camera, it's been sprayed with a rubber material. I'm sure it's not perfectly sealed off, but it should be pretty well sealed inside the camera. I plan to get some liquid electrical tape to touch some areas up. Are you referring to electrically insulated, or thermally insulated? Or both?

Also... Has anyone else noticed significantly-increased banding noise after removing the Bayer matrix? I'm seeing a lot of banding noise in stretched dark frames. And I noticed a lot of it came out when I took an image of the Eastern Veil nebula in H-alpha. Now... I don't think I dithered in that image at all, so that will likely help. But, can dithering even out ALL of that banding? I'm not entirely sure. The stretched dark frame below was done in Photoshop by just doing a Levels adjustment and dropping the white point down to 3. (Yep... 3.) Unprocessed stack from DSS in H-alpha: Slightly-cooled, highly-stretched 120s dark frame, EXIF temp 27°C (but, probably a few degrees cooler than that):

Any ideas out there on plugging up light leaks through that left side of the camera, where I have my cold finger protruding? It's coming out right by the data ports (HDMI, USB, etc.), and I have a feeling there's some light making it through the actual ports themselves. I currently have the area covered with electrical tape, which does the job. But, I'm looking for something that won't peel up. The tape seems to have a tough time sticking onto the rubber grip and port cover areas. Should I plug these ports somehow? Fill them with liquid electrical tape? I was shining a high-powered flashlight around those areas (probably 500 lumens or more, as it's a 1k lumen flashlight at about 3/4 power). This really helped me find all of my light leaks. Most of them were around the seam around the back panel of the camera where it attaches to the rest of the body. I did notice some light made it in through the top small LCD screen that displays the current settings, too. Some black electrical tape slapped over them helped plug up the light leaks pretty well. I'm just looking for something that's less... "Red/Green"-looking. I'm leaning toward the liquid electrical tape, but always up for suggestions.

That's probably too deep. It looks like you scraped through the protective undercoating. But, you can pop the sensor back in and test it to see if it still functions. Broken glass gets into pretty sticky territory. It doesn't take much to scratch the sensor too deeply and hit a photosite or surrounding circuitry. And broken glass is really sharp. It can easily scratch through the polymer coatings. I'll be surprised if that sensor still works, but it's worth trying it to see what happens.

Just finished up adding a TEC system to cool my sensor. This is from my Canon 7D, mono-modded. I'm starting small with a 30W TEC. I'm curious to see how the noise drops as the sensor cools. I ran into significant noise shooting in mono, as compared to full-color images, but that could also be partly due to the increased sensitivity of the sensor. I had banding in horizontal and vertical directions. I'm hoping the TEC will help to reduce that noise significantly. Has anyone else noticed banding/noise as an issue with these scraped mono sensors?

I tried using the Klean Strip Green lacquer thinner again after noticing the label does mention it contains MEK. Unfortunately, even with a really long soak (about 30 hours or so) face-down in a puddle of the stuff, all I got was apparent damage or breakdown of the layer underneath the CFA where I'd already scraped the sensor clean. I think that it's safe to say MEK isn't effective at even softening the CFA material. My guess is methylene chloride is going to be our best option, and that's some nasty stuff. It's also been banned in the US for non-commercial use, so it's incredibly hard to find, aside from some little online shops here and there that haven't stopped selling the stuff.

I haven't tried any new solutions to removing the CFA layer, yet. However, I did find the source of the light leak inside my camera. It was the rear red LED that indicates memory card read/write. I placed a few strips of black electrical tape over that area inside the rear panel of the camera, and now my 2-minute dark frame looks about as good as it can be. I can still just barely make out the CFA border area, so maybe there's a really tiny light leak still in there somewhere. But, it's a LOT better than it was. Heavily-stretched 2-minute dark frame:

A solvent to dissolve CA glue is unlikely to work, but I'll take a look at the others you mentioned. Can't hurt to have another option to try.

I haven't tried any new chemicals to remove the CFA, yet. However, I did want to share my latest test image. This is a very quick and dirty edit of a small stack and short integration time, only 16 minutes of light frames, shot in H-alpha only. Basic stretching of the data and noise reduction are the only real edits done here. To me, there's zero question that this has noticeably improved sensitivity. It's exciting to see where this project could go. I may consider adding cooling at some point. Also, I left the CFA outline because I actually think it frames the image nicely. It's a cool look, to me. Target: M8 Lagoon Nebula 8x 120s lights 6x 120s darks 24x 1/2s flats, using my new cheap EL panel and a t-shirt

Yep, that one does. Mine is the "green" version, which appears to be called the "Safer Stripper" version, at this point. That still has some type of methanol in it, but it specifically says it contains no methylene chloride or NMP. So, it's not the standard version of the product.

I can appreciate there are some nasty chemicals out there that can dissolve a lot of things. I'm just putting off trying some of them until I have no other options. Dichloromethane is one of those I'm avoiding for now, but may try later on if I run out of options. https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Dichloromethane#Toxicity I have a can of Klean Strip varnish stripper that says it works on epoxies, too, but I couldn't see much of a result from it. It also evaporated extremely quickly, so keeping enough of it on the surface to even start doing anything would be challenging. MSDS sheet says benzyl alcohol with some small amounts of additives.

I've gotten one response from a chemical company, so far. They recommended KMG GenSolve 475, which just stated that it's an organic solvent and is about $400 for a gallon bottle. No actual data on the solvent type used. So, unless someone knows more about it, that feels like a dead end.

No worries! I have feelers out. We'll see if I get any useful information.

Turns out that the chemical company I contacted, a subsidiary of Merck, doesn't sell to the US. So, I shot a message over to DuPont to see what they have to recommend. My father-in-law has also done extensive work with plastic films, and may be able to recommend something or reach out to his contacts on this subject.