Wyvernp

Thanks! I recently learned about masked stretch in pixinsight which seems to work really well for galaxies.

In the end the seller extended buyer protection for another 50 days... this meant I could not raise a dispute until then... I smelt a bit of dishonesty there especially as this took me just out of my Amex purchase protection period. So I just opened a case with Amex, I feel they will have more swing as a payment provider than me as an individual. Fingers crossed...

You can actually see this happening in one of the latest Chuck's Astrophotography videos when his power supply for the Quark ran out. Have to say I did want to buy one after watching that! ahh just re-watched and it wasn't a quark it was a dedicated solar scope but the result of no power is the same.

Love the Iris nebula, and that is a great image! Just downloading the data now, hope I can do it justice! I am fro southern England though...hope that's ok? 😂

Welcome from another West sussexer? Is that a thing Hope you enjoy the vast amount of knowledge pool available here, I know I personally have learned a huge amount during my relatively short time here.

Finally got around to your M31 data, again thank you! Being without a camera at the moment it's been great to keep honing my processing.

If you want to practice processing one of our kind forum users has shared some of his data on this thread

Ahh my bad the one I’m expecting is the 163m not the 183. My understanding is that most of the why range are pretty good. The pixel size looks bang on for your ED80 according to astronomy.tools if your seeing is good. I have heard the drivers weren’t quite as good as zwo but I think that was maybe earlier on. not had any experience ordering from cyclops optics bit at a glance they seem reputable.

May I ask where you’re looking at it for that price? I only ask because I have been waiting for over 40 days for the mono version to arrive from AliExpress (lesson learned here) and am probably going to have to raise a dispute.

Some fantastic processing going on here (yours not mine ), here's my attempt at orion. Thank you Richard, for the original data. It was a pleasure to work with and I can only hope I can one day getting data like this.

Let's hope so! could probably use a spare

Well, that didn't take too long... I now have a rotating stepper I guess one payday I'll treat myself to the rotator....That's even if I receive my camera and wheel from china...serious lesson learned there. It's cheap because it will never arrive. I get to raise a dispute from friday so fingers crossed either it will magically arrive or I get my money back.

What a legend! Thank you so much for this.

So with all this time at home I'm in need of some projects to keep me going, so with a spare arduino, stepper driver and a left over nema17 stepper from my laser harp project (which never worked properly ) I think it would be feasible to make something that would rotate the william optics rotator via pc input, I'm not looking at integrating it with ascom or anything like that as I don't have the programming knowhow to do that but maybe a simple app that allows you to set the camera angle could work. I foresee a few issues one being that the rotator fits behind the focus tube which will move in and out so the stepper cannot be fixed to the focuser assembly the same as the stepper for the myfocus pro. Not currently having the rotator I'm not sure how I'm going to work this but I'm sure I can find a way. Has anyone done this before? Honestly I don't need a camera rotator but I need to keep myself busy. Wyvern

There are also a great series of youtube videos by Chris Woodhouse on Pixinsight that I have found fantastic https://www.youtube.com/channel/UCEd4A5H8HcV8ybp96WRGmsA/videos

Hey, I also own a few high power lasers. I was working on building an arduino laser harp and have experimented with various lasers and wavelengths including a 300mw Green and a 300mw white(RGB). The RGB is most definitely the most dangerous as most goggles only block certain wavelengths and have found myself wearing multiple goggles with that one.

What a result!

I had to look up the Martin Pyott method, looks feasible . And from his video it seems it did make quite a difference.

Yes of course, that makes perfect sense. Thanks. Just finished wiring up the control box with the Arduino and sensors/controllers. Again, not the neatest job but it will work.

I have this issue with the EQ6R as well, I've not found a way to rotate it to the correct orientation. Whilst yes, it's just a clock but finding the right angle to set polaris compared to the position on the app can be a struggle (for me anyway) I with there were a way on the PS Align app to rotate the markings to match my scope. I think I'll be purchasing a polemaster within a month or 2.

Morning and welcome. Lots of very knowledgeable people here.

There's a good video here on how to peltier cool an astro camera They have the advantage of being very cheap. Also even with a heatsink would be lighter than cold packs.

Here's the difference in FOV with your camera I've included the flattener for the Zenithstar, I'm not sure if one is needed for the redcat. I also plugged details for your camera into http://astronomy.tools/calculators/ccd_suitability and whilst both will be undersampled, the Zenithstar less so. What mount will you be using? As weight will also be a consideration. Either way, I've seen great photos taken with both of these scopes. I believe Trevor from Astrobackyard has done a some videos on youtube with the redcat, worth a watch if you havn't already seen them.

Not had any first hand experience with those scopes but I have a WO GT81 and the build quality is very good. One thing I would say is the focal length of those scopes mat be a little short for some of those smaller DSO's however would be great for some of the bigger nebulae such as the heart and rosette nebula. The image circle would be fine with either scope with your camera.

Well it’s not pretty but it will definitely do! that stepper is bloody heavy though. I hope I’ll be able to balance it.