pete_l

+1 There are a small number of "crowd pleaser" objects that are frequently talked about and imaged when people start off. They also tend to be the objects illustrated in magazine reviews as they are bright (so produce results quickly), easy and familiar. However over 90% of Messier objects are smaller than 40 arc-minutes across and half of all of them are less than 10 arc-minutes. Likewise most other DSOs tha Messier didn't spot With a small FoV the biggies can be imaged as a mosaic. However with a large FoV the majority of objects will always appear small.

Yes. There are better reverse polarity protection circuits that use a p channel MOSFET

Since you know that only one reed switch will be "on" at a time, you can use a resistive divider network and just a single analog input https://www.g7smy.co.uk/2015/09/multiple-buttons-on-one-pin-with-an-arduino/

@Gina Yes, the Skywatcher manual recommends their 13.7V power supply. With the cabling and connectors it is easy to drop a Volt when the motors are drawing peak current at startup, so a 12V supply (at the source) would be right at the lower limit by the time it gets to the mount.

Excellent work! It illustrates perfectly the old adage of "those who say it can't be done should keep out of the way of people doing it"

sticky bearings? (stiction)

A wise move. The circuit-board power converters are not rated for outdoor use, so they will need protecting from the elephants elements. They don't like moisture, high or low temperatures or insects crawling on them (which can be surprisingly conductive when electrified). As for enclosures, Bitsbox have a selection at reasonable prices and honest P&P charges

I would also be inclined to run the mount from a higher voltage source (e.g. 13.8V) and to over-spec its current requirements. The reason is that there can be a significant voltage drop from the regulator in the power supply, through all the connectors and cables, to the actual mount motors. Especially if people use "cigarette lighter" type connectors. IMHO most of the "funny" problems that people have with their mounts - controlling them in particular - can be traced back to the power supply. Whether an under-voltage as the motors start up, or noise from a switched mode PSU that was only ever designed to charge a laptop or strange things happening between the zero-volts common ground with their computer..

Here are some examples of what others have produced with an ST80. You will have to check the images to see which are from a DSLR. https://www.astrobin.com/gear/10883/orion-st80/

The NEQ6 is in the "20kg" class. You will find that to take the next step up, in either quality or load capacity is where it becomes expensive. There are outfits around that will hypertune the mount for you, which might be all it needs after 8 years: degrease, clean, regrease with better lubricants, adjust the worm spacing and possibly upgrade some bearings.

Cash on collection? Doesn't sound promising. I think that a buyer would have this more for its ornamental value than to do any observing through. You can't even be sure that it would take 1.25" eyepieces

Sometimes rephrasing the question helps. If you say this instead, does it help? Should I buy a nicer scope on my cheap mount, or put my first scope on a good mount.

Very interesting. I look forward to reading more about your adventures with this/

For than money I would go for: ED80 + 0.85 FR / flattener HEQ5 Finder-guider Astro converted DSLR ASi120 guide camera EQDir, motorised focuser plus the adapters and cables. The HEQ5 Pro + ED80 is a popular combination. The mount is a Ford Transit type, not trendy but a known quantity that just does what is needed. The ED80, likewise. Your camera is good for small FoVs but for deep sky will limit your choice of tagets,

The payload capacity is not a hard and fast quantity: 4.9kg does not equal "perfect" and 5.1kg does not equal "unusable". They are largely estimates made for sales & marketing purposes that represent the absolute maximum weight of your equipment (excluding the counterweights needed to balance it all) that will gave any sort of usable control of movement. How that relates to a particular mount's ability to keep tracking to the 1 part in a million (roughly: 1 arc-second) needed for imaging, depends on the quality (i.e. cost) of the parts, the goodness of the design and the integrity of the manufacturer. But it gets more complicated! It is harder for a motor to control the movement of a 1kg payload if that is positioned at the end of a pole 1 metre away, than if the same 1kg payload is right up, close, to the motor. The same principle applies to counterweights: if they are close to the mount they aren't as "whippy" as if right at the end of the counterweight bar. One might even discover that the ability of a motor varies whether it is "pushing" a payload upwards, or "pulling" it downwards - on the east or west side of the meridian. While some people will say there are "rules" about de-speccing an advertised load capacity by X percent, that is not a complete guide either. Telescopes come in all sizes: long ones, short ones, thin ones, fat ones. Ones with things sticking out at all angles (which makes balancing them in all 3 axes virtually impossible) and ones that vary considerably with / without dew shields, finders, heavy cameras, filter wheels, extension tubes, dangling cables and all the rest. The weight of the payload is only part of the story. How it is distributed (and how close it all is to the motor) is an important factor too.

Do the slabs or concrete base extend outside the observatory? If so then you have a route for moisture ingress.

Since we're talking in an astronomy forum, it seems to me that the best place for an anemometer would be close to your telescopes. That way you can assess the impact that wind has on them and on your imaging. With experience you could then know when there were good conditions for viewing, or when it was too windy for the telescope to remain stable.

So its down to the angle grinder then 😬

The simplest way to do that is through a package called esp-link That provides a web interface through its own (on the ESP8266) Wifi access point. Then all the config stuff is held in the 8266 n/v memory Generally, the ESP8266 is rather old now. ESP32's have more speed, more pins, more memory (both for code and to store files) and more features, such as bluetooth. As far as cost goes, they are a little more £1-ish more expensive

First, check that the camera actually works! Take it out of your telescope and see if your imaging software (I have one of these cameras) can tell the difference between the camera in light and when you place your hand over the sensor. If that shows any sort of difference, then at least you know the camera is working. After that, in daylight put the camera in your telescope aim at some landscape: a building or something equally large. Now do whatever it takes to get an image through your telescope. It may be that because the telescope sends too much light to the camera, you will have to put a paper screen over the telescope aperture, with just a small hole (2-3cm), That will limit the amount of light getting through. Until you can get a focussed image like this, there is no point trying for a target in the sky. Be aware that the sensor on these cameras is tiny. Your telescope will have to be pointed exactly at the object you are trying to image. So once you have got your daytime target visible, align your finder so that your image is precisely in the cross-hairs of your finder. Otherwise you will never be able to find a small target like a planet, just by dead reckoning.

ISTM that "fast"-ness is purely an imaging term. Since the size of the sensor is fixed. With optical use, as you say, the two elements: objective and eyepiece interact. When eyeballing, greater magnification gives more detail (and darker backgrounds) but at the cost of reduced intensity. Wide field / low FR gives brighter extended objects, but at the price of smaller size.

tighter stars, less flare, almost no gradient. If you can get that from your location with a RC6, I'm coming over

I have a wh3080 weather station that is powered from a solar cell + battery, so it's a case of "look dad, no wires!". It transmits on 433MHz and has been operational for many years, now. It seems to me that this is a good solution. You have to be frugal with the power requirements so an Arduino would have to sleep a lot and I doubt a Pi could be configured to work like that, Having said that, the amount of processing required is very small. So even an Arduino might be overkill.

You can add a fuse and a "crowbar" circuit after the PSU (switched or linear) to protect against over-voltage conditions. Basically this comprises a zener diode to act as an over-voltage sensor and an SCR to short-circuit the output voltage. That short will cause the output fuse to blow. Since the SCR will switch on very quickly, it will protect your equipment for the milliseconds that the fuse takes to cut the power.

Have you considered POE - power over ethernet? One issue with long USB cables is the resistance of the cables leads to voltage loss. You might be injecting 5V at 400mA into the cable, but what comes out could easily be only 4 volts! Watch this Youtube video from the guy with the Swiss accent for an illuminating (if worrying) explanation. But POE operates at 48 Volts. It can easily provide 10 Watts at the remote end - possibly 20!. You need to down-convert that voltage to 12V or 5V to feed your equipment and you can use either WiFi or ethernet for communication.