Astro Grandad

Hi everyone, I don't wish to darken anyone's character but, has anyone out there had any issues with DFO like paying loads of money up front - getting the mount back (eventually after 4 months) to discover it's exactly the same as when I sent it. The mount is back there now again, the annoying issue is I was blamed for over tightening the RA lock and they want another £90 to repair, this brings the total to over £800 absolutely descrasefull and now their not answering my emails, so in total they have had my mount nearly 9 months.

Hi all, I have a QHY10 with cooling problems the camera is nearly 2 years old but has never been used, I didn't realise on a bench test there was a problem as I was unfamiliar with the software, the supplier said I have to contact QHY direct which I have but it takes 3 days for them to respond after I have answered a question from them, I was hoping someone out there may have experienced a cooling fault, the temperature remains at 24.1 constant I am using NINA and Ezcap qt. many thanks

Hi there Wim, had a look at your images with the 294 there good, this has given me more scope now many thanks.

Brilliant guys now I understand thanks so much, happy stargazing.

Hi, I don't really understand binning, would this help on a camera with smaller pixels !

HI everyone, I have the above OTA and am struggling to find a suitable camera (pixel size), I am looking for a CMOS camera I already have a QHY10 which I don't really get on with (to hard to set up especially focusing) maybe its just me. I am sticking to the age old calculation - pixel size/Focal length X 206.3 which with my QHY10 gives me 1.25 great, there is only one CMOS camera which comes close it's the QHY128C with 5.96 pixels which at the cheapest is £2400.00 OMG. I don't really want to go DSLR. If anyone knows of a camera please advise. Many thanks for looking.

Hi Chris, don't get me wrong the scope is a work of art - absolute precision, my gripe is without a flattener/reducer the usable imaging area is small before you get elongated stars if you get me, so my question is why did they make a flattener/reducer and not just a flattener as in my opinion you don't need a reducer, just to give you some idea of the imaging area with the flattener/reducer you could fit three or four Orion nebulas and the running man, sometimes images look to small just something to bare in mind unless you like wide field images, at the moment I am imaging the M78 and the Witches head nebula and they no where fill the field of image, anyway I hope I haven't put you off. Regards Neil

Hi, I think the table you are referring to is only for DSLR cameras including mirrorless, (the one with the extra 2mm.), the first table with diagram is for dedicated astro cameras. I have a WO GT81 with flattener/reducer quite a good scope but not amazing and your right with the confusion over focal distancing, I set mine to 5.2 + 1mm but still have minor trails but only on one side which suggests tilt not focus, I use a Altair Hypercam 269C. I don't get why your measurement is nearly 90mm though ! as you should be looking at 55mm from the face of the camera to the face of the flattener I think !!!, also why did WO make the flattener a reducer as well - no need. Cheers Neil

Hi sorry for the late reply, I have sorted it it was a issue in deep sky stacker in the cosmetics tab, I turned down the pixel size and ratio. regards Neil

Hi all anyone seen this before, I am using a WO GT81 2020 edition with correct flattener from FLO, ZWO 294C (I know the pixels are a little large), 240S subs X 40, darks X10, flats X25 and 20X bias frames running at -10 temp, Gain at 120 using Sharpcap, stacked in DSS part processed in Affinity Photo.

Brill didn't realise that will do thanks 🤞

HI everyone hope your keeping well, I was hoping someone can help I have a Hitecastro DC focus mk2 but I can't get the drivers to download on Win10 it keeps coming up with unable to write and a load of other stuff I don't understand also Windows defender smart screen pops up saying it's not a recognised or trusted supplier so, I turned off all the protection, firewall and anti virus bla bla bla but still it won't load, this is terribly confusing for an old fellow I have contacted Dave at Hitec but he doesn't have an answer, many thanks for looking and stay safe.

Just wishing everyone a merry Christmas, and I still can't sort out PHD2 with my mount

Good evening all, does anyone have the SkyWatcher EQ35 mount if you have are you able to auto-guide with PHD2 accurately as I can't, I had a brief conversation with someone I brought some kit from on Saturday about this and he said he had one but returned it very quickly as it wouldn't guide with PHD2 mmmmmm wonder if theirs a problem with the mount, I would contact Skywatcher but I can't wait three years for a reply, there seems to be a few of the mounts used around quite cheep at the moment so if your thinking of getting one hold off for the moment. Wish I could show you the graph on PHD it looks like a seismic eruption magnitude 10, and no matter what adjustments you do it never gets any better, oh well maybe Santa will bring me a solution for Christmas. Thanks for listening to me moaning, lovely out there tonight.

Hi there no I'm not using eq mod just PHD2 and a Altair ARO130 mono on a Skywatcher Evoguide 50 mm, main scope is a Skywatcher ED80 pro and the mount is a EQ35 pro hypertuned by dark frame. I carry out a polar alignment with polemaster which is very accurate and now I double check it with sharp cap pro, do the star alignment then set up set up calibration in PHD start guiding (not very well but ok) for a couple of minutes then it all goes wrong it mentions in calibration about the south steps not being enough so guiding will be impaired, I have tried suggestions from other members which has improved the guiding, I have also run the guide assistant which found a couple of areas of improvement but even when I implement these it still only runs for a couple of minutes then goes off the rails, wish l could show you a screen shot it looks like one of my 2year old grandsons drawings. Thanks for your input