AstroMuni

You could go for an Astro camera like the ZWO ASI224mc (approx £200) if you dont have a DSLR. I found that I could get very decent images with short exposures. I am sure someone who has used the ASI with 130p can tell you if its suitable to use without any extensions etc. I use mine on a Celestron 130 which has similar focal length.

Looks awesome

Your image is beautiful btw. I am probably class 6 and I have street lights around 40ft away from where I park my scope.

There is definitely something not quite right. I am no expert in this and I got this literally as my first image and using around 500secs worth of data with no darks or flats. So comparing mine and 24hrs of yours I would have said you should have got a much clearer image.

What celestron model do you have? The focal length and aperature of your scope will determine how well (read big and detail) you can see in the planets. The moon is always a good place to start. This site will give you an idea of how the objects are likely to be seen in your scope https://www.stelvision.com/en/telescope-simulator/ Good luck.

Looking good. 🙂 Did you use the Photometric calibration? Reason for asking is that some of the stars look a bit too blue.

As has already been mentioned, I would suggest you try first with something brighter like M81, 82, M13. This will help you gauge the ideal settings on your camera etc. But if you feel confident why NOT M101

Let me explain what I mean by using the right software and techniques. Both these images of M51 taken by me, were generated using the same data. First was processed by me and second with help from a friend. And second one using the exact same data 🙂

Here is a link to my first attempts

I would say thats quite a good image. I feel that the software used for stacking and post processing can make a big difference too. I use SIRIL and Gimp. Ref your question about M101, just go for it 🙂 I will post my attempt shortly. Correction: that will have to wait when the skies clear and we have darker skies

Image is good 👍 Check the histogram in Gimp. If you find that the Blue curve is way to the right, you can align it to R & G to get a more realistic colour. The Colour/Levels menu should help. Select only the colour channel that you wish to move and then adjust the sliders at the bottom. Good luck

Do you use/planning to use the Bahtinov mask assistant in Ekos?

As others have said pls post an image of the damaged mirror as it might still be in working condition. If you need to look for a replacement, the Skywatcher 130p/pds mirror might work as well. This also has a 650mm focal length and is additionally a parabolic mirror. The 130EQ mirror is spherical so focus may not be as sharp. Its not bad - I own one myself, but the parabolic ones are superior. Good luck

Is there a link to their website?

Looking forward to seeing your cleaned up image. Its looking lovely despite the dust motes. If you view the image histogram the dust mote becomes more apparent. I suspect there is another larger one next to it as well, but much lighter. Here is a picture I took using Siril.

Great image. You have managed to get M81, 82 and a few others as well 👍 I found this useful as well, as it also gives you sample data to download https://siril.org/tutorials/tuto-scripts/

Looking good....How many images was that?

Here is my first image. Its Bode's galaxy (M81) taken as a series of around 100 x 5sec exposures, no guiding, no darks or flats. Images captured using ASI224mc on Celestron 130EQ mounted on HEQ5 pro. Software used was Kstars/Ekos and post processing done in SIRIL.

Have you had a read of PHD2 website as that clearly explains the connectivity to PHD2 and ST4 port? https://openphdguiding.org/ Ref EQMOD on ASCOM that could be used to control your mount for all other purposes.

Its called Home position (for some reason they havent called it park)

I think thats an issue with the app. I recall having same problem and had to enter manually. To check if mount is tracking ,a simple way is to look at the RA/DEC readings. If its tracking to a certain object those should remain unchanged.

I think its the Hibernate button on the Synscan Pro app. I have this on my phone but never used it as I control via Pi and EQMOD.

Check that it has your location coords correctly. Also it can sometimes think you are in Southern hemisphere and move your scope incorrectly. There is a park option in Synscan. When you execute that check where it puts the scope - that is where it thinks the Home position is. You can move your scope manually to the correct position after your have parked the scope to adjust.

That was exactly what I thought originally. Amazed with the results 🙂

That is not necessary. The RPi's ethernet is smart enough to figure out and compensate for it. 🙂 Initially I also thought that but looks like that is a thing of the past. That connectivity is working perfectly for me in the sense that I can connect to INDI server on port 7624, VNC to it etc. Its just the INDI webserver on port 8624 which is causing me grief 😞 This port 8624 is open and I can traceroute via this.