Budgie1

I pulled my EQ5 motors and worm gears apart a few weeks ago to give everything a clean and re-grease, as I'd never done it and it had been in storage for 4 years. I found quite a lot of backlash in the dec worm gear after I removed the motor. After cleaning all the old grease off and coating with new, I followed a couple of videos I found on Youtube which run through removing the backlash of the worm gears and installing the motor gears correctly. I had a quick look and this is one I used: The grease I got from Rother Valley Optics and it's the green grease you need for the worm & motor gears. Getting these set correctly should solve your problem, even though it's a bit daunting when you start pulling it all apart. I only did the minimum to clean & re-grease the mount, I didn't go for the full strip down and rebuild but it has made quite a difference and only took an evening to do. Make sure to do a good search for other videos and watch the process all the way through before you start. If you're not happy doing it yourself then don't, it's not for everyone and you can cause excessive ware to the gears if it too tight.

Sorry mate, I could only see the details about the camera sensor & pixel size. It's not a criticism of the video, I used your videos when I was setting up and they are really helpful and well put together. 👍 The setting is right above the camera sensor details, so it's quite obvious, but you need to run it for each focal length of scope/lens you're likely to use with the same camera settings as it chooses different lists each time. I my case I ran it for my Celestron 102 at 500mm, SW Evostar 100ED at 900mm and again for the Evostar with the reducer/flattener attached making it 765mm.

You can set APT to dither within the program. Under the Gear tab, click on the Guide (D) button and the dither settings are in there. APT then talks to PHD2 between exposures and instructs it to perform the dither. One thing with the plate solving that wasn't mentioned in smr's video is to select the scope focal length, as well as the camera sensor & pixel size, when download the catalogues. Especially if you're using more than one scope.

One other thing I wasn't initially aware of with APT is; if you intent to use plate solving then you'll also need to download software called All Sky Plate Solver, along with the relevant star catalogues for the scopes you have. There are links to the downloads in the settings on the Plate Solver button in APT.

Glad you like it. I'm still getting to grips with the stretching images in PS3 so I'm sure there is more that can done to bring out more detail but I didn't want to go any further as I noticed it was starting to show noise on the left hand side of the image and the stars were starting to get bloated. I don't know if you've got any software like PS but, if not, then have a look a Gimp. It's a free download, very similar to Photoshop, with plenty of tools to help you bring out what you've captured.

Bortle 2 for me. Now, if I can just figure out how to stop the clouds forming........................

Hi Kyle, I hope you don't mind but I had a play with your image in Photoshop CS3. I altered the levels, curves, brightness and contrast and found extra detail in it. I hope you like what I found. If this is what you got with 90 x 1 minute subs with an un-modded DSLR, then it gives me hope when I next get a clear night. Martin

I've been going through the same learning curve as you Rustang. It is good when you get all the software & hardware going together and can see the results. Glad you stuck at it and I hope you see some great images, once the moon is less of an issue than it is just now. My only issue at the moment is the guide camera, I'm using an old Phillips SPC900 webcam connected to Celestron 9x50 finger scope. It works but the image from the camera isn't good and it keeps loosing the guide star, no matter what settings I try to use in PHD2. I have managed 5 subs and one 10 minute sub with it, but not constantly. Hopefully this will be sorted tomorrow with the delivery of a ZWO 60mm Finder/Guider scope and ZWO ASI120MM Mini camera from FLO. Here's my single 10 minute sub of the Witches Broom Nebula using my current guider setup. There is some star trailing on the edges but it was only a test to get used to all the software and to see what it would do, so I was quite pleased with it.

What type of USB-Com cable are you using, is it a cheap one or a something like the Skywatcher cable? I only ask as I ended up buying the Skywatcher cable to update the firmware on my EQ5 handset as the unbranded one I had just wouldn't work.

Did you Polar Align the mount before starting the 2 star alignment? As that can thrown things off if you forget to do it in the rush to get set up, It sounds more like the time zone setting though.

Thanks S&S, I'm in a nice spot for dark skies but have a hill to the East and tall trees to the NE & South. So I can't see Jupiter at the moment and Orion is blocked as well. The main thing about down here is the cloud cover, I think, on average, you stand a better chance of a clear night in the NE than us West Coasters. But at least I only have to go into the garden.

Hi Phillip, Wouldn't you have been better using N-gauge? Not as dramatic, but it may fit better!! I work in Corpach and the "Hogworts Express" passes the back of my office 4 times a day in the (normal) summer months. It's quite funny having to explain what the whistle is when you're on the phone or a video conference. 🤣

I had my first real go with APT & dithering last night and was really impressed at the difference it makes. I've been slowly adding software to my imaging over the last few weeks, CdC, then PHD2 and now got APT working with last night being my first time out with all three running at once. I didn't choose a good subject, thinking about it, in M57 when I'm using an Evostar 100ED but it was more a test of the system than an imaging evening. Also the focus wasn't the best but it all worked and when it came to stacking & processing you could see the difference the dither had made to the stacked image. Hardly any noise at all. I fixed the focus after these images, using the APT Focus Assistant, then the clouds came over before I had chance to do any more . The next clear night will be planned and better executed.

Since unpacking all my Astro kit a month or so ago and getting back into Astrophotography, clear nights have been few & far between up here in Scotland. So I concentrated on getting all the software updated onto a new laptop, learning the basic of how CdC, APT & PHD2 worked. In the few clear nights I've had, I started connecting my EQ5 to the laptop and ran it with EQMOD through CdC to get the hang of it. Then I introduced APT and found I needed the catalogues, so left that for another cloudy night. Finally, last night I stuck my head outside at about 23:30 to see stars, all be it with a thin covering of high cloud. So I took the opportunity to get PHD2 running and practice guiding with my Celestron 9x50 with a SPC900 connected to it. The main task was to get the guide scope focused and guiding. I didn't even both getting my camera out to start off and just used an eyepiece. The high cloud made this interesting because every time I got onto a bright star for focus, the cloud in that area of the sky became thicker and blocked the star. Anyway, after about an hour I managed it, had PHD run through the calibrations and it started guiding. I left it there while I went inside for a coffee and when I came out it was still guiding nicely and the high cloud had nearly gone, so I thought I'd do some test shots with my Canon EOS 2000D (un-moded) to see what it was going to be like when guided. I've had up to 3 minutes exposures with it unguided and that may have improved as I took the EQ5 apart last week, cleaned and re-greased the gears and took out the slack in the worm drives. Anyway, I connected the camera and started in the direction of M82 & M83. Awful images, stars jumping around all over the show, and that was only with a 1 minute exposure to check I was on target! I forgot to re-calibrate after I slewed the scope. The clouds started to get thicker in that direction so I picked a target on CdC, M57, slewed round and re-calibrated PHD2. Started guiding and waited for it to settle down, I did a couple of short exposures to make sure it was guiding okay then thought I'd try a 6 minute exposure, just as an experiment to see if it was tracking correctly and to see what the camera would capture. Here you go, not bad for a single exposure tidied up in Photoshop. There's a bit of start trail at the edges, but that's to be expected, and the Celestron 102mm Wide View makes the nebula a bit small, but it's only a test image, so I'm not worried about that. After seeing this image, and with it pushing on for 02:00, I thought I would have one more go and picked The Witches Broom Nebula, only this time I went for a 10 minute exposure. Again, I wasn't too worried what it looked like, I wanted to see what my setup was capable of. The high clouds had started to come in again when I started this image and PHD2 kept bleeping that it had lost the guide star. Fortunately PHD2 found it again quite quickly a never really had to make too many big corrections. So here's the 10 minute image of NGC 6960. You can just make out the nebula and, if anything, the star trailing on the edges is better that in the 6 minute image. Now I'm happy with CdC & PHD2 working together and that the guiding is good with the EQ5, next on the list is to connect the camera to APT. That will make life easier with plate solving and focusing. Thngs to do: I've now got a USB hub to attach to the EQ5 tripod, to connect the guide camera, imaging camera & Serial to USB cable for the mount. I've only got two USB ports on the laptop and with the wireless game controller for the fine adjustment, it wasn't all going to get connected directly. Buy an EQDIR lead so I can do away with the hand controller. I'm not using it anyway now, so no point having it on there just to act as a connection. Get a proper table and a box or something to put the laptop in to stop the dew from covering it and to cut down on the light it puts out, even though I've got a NV theme running on it. Thanks for reading this and I'm happy for any comments from the more experienced members to help me along. Martin.

Have you tried using Blind Solve? As long as you've downloaded the catalogues for the focal lengths of the scopes you're likely to use/are using then it should work. I'm still on the learning curve with APT as well, I only started using it last week and had to download All Sky Plate Solver, then the catalogues before it would solve anything. Although APT did give warnings if something was missing.

Hi, Chris, I'll be watching your progress with interest as I'm looking to do something similar. Unfortunately our old 8X6 shed has already been converted into a wood store, a fence to block the wind from the greenhouse and a cold frame, using the shed windows at the top. So I'll be using a new cheap shed for the conversion. Just to clear up about the plywood; Marine Ply normally has 5 layers which are glued together with exterior grade glue. It also has better quality wood which has no voids between the layers and is stronger then the standard ply. It's not waterproof, as the wood isn't treated with anything, it just resists water for exterior uses. Standard ply normally only has 3 layers and interior grade glue. When cut you may see voids between the layers from knots in the wood. If it gets wet for a long period or regularly then it may start to de-laminate. If you're using normal ply then give the edges a good soak with the wood preserver before you put the walls up, as that's where any water is likely to leach into the ply. Good luck with the rest of the build and keep those videos coming! 👍 Martin

Hi All, After 5 years away from astronomy and SGL, I finally got around to getting the scopes and mounts out, cleaned and dusted off again. I used to be "Budge" on here from 2010 to 2015 but moved from the Western Isles to Fort William in 2015 with a new job and never found the time to get back into astrophotography. Like a lot of others, I found a I had in bit more time on my hands over the last few months so started back into the hobby. I tried to fire up my old membership on SGL but, unfortunately, I don;t have access to the email account I signed up with so I couldn't get my password reset. So I've started afresh. Fortunately, all my astro kit has survive 5 years in storage and has been given a good clean. Last night my EQ5 GoTo was pulled apart, cleaned, re-greased the motors and worm gears (I found quite a lot of slack in the Dec gears!). I've also got a dedicated laptop running Windows 10 with EQMod, CdC, APT and PHD2 installed, I'm still on the learning curve getting these running together but a few more clear nights should have that sorted. I've had a couple of clear nights recently and got a few subs & darks completed on M31, without guiding with PHD2. So to finish off my re-introduction to SGL here's my first light back into the hobby. (it should say EOS 2000D for the camera! )