powerlord

https://www.theguardian.com/money/gallery/2022/feb/11/homes-for-stargazing-in-pictures

Even @vlaiv will struggle to find fault with that. 😀 well done! stu

This is the PSU. Basically it's a decent quality 600w PC CPU. It can provide more amps than I'll ever need in very clean 12v, 5v and 3.3v (not needed). As you can see, it's being stripped down, and the labelled. I have 3pin aviation GX20 connectors ordered. 3 of those sockets will be installed in the PSU, along with insect mesh across the fan and fan inputs. the pins will be GND, +12v, +5v. The 5v is for my dew heaters, most of which are 5v USB - but full on they use about 2amps, so it's best not to plug them into USB sockets - and anyway, they are best used for actual USB stuff. I will be connecting to power resisters across the 5v and 12v line just to give the PSU a decent base load to balance against - this helps smooth and stablise the 12v and 5v lines. these will be screw mounted (and thermal pasted) to the bottom of one of the shelves too (shelves are galvanised steel). The PSU will be installed under a shelf of the ikea HYLLIS shelf I've bough (screw onto), providing extra protection from dew, etc. I'll be making up 14AWG 3 core cables with quality silicone cable and GX20s both ends to feed power to each of the 3 mounts. At the mount I am making a small breakout box, which take the GX20 in, and surfaces 3 2.1mm 12v sockets, and 3 phono sockets. Im using phono sockets for the 5v, and phono plugs will be attached to the dew heaters. This allows me to have the mount fed direct, and the asiair fed direct, and the camera fed direct, which I prefer to everything going through the asiair. The PSU itself will be plugged into a smart plug so that it can be controlled remotely.

oh sorry chaps - it was the L3 - I just assumed he'd have more of them. 🤐 Well.. it shows it was a bargain at least 🤪 Just did disk test, and getting a steady 500MB/sec write speed. Which is not going to win any awards these days, but should be quick enough to max out my video captures on my asi224/553/1600 which is all that matters. As an aside, I hate to say it, but windows 11 is possibly my least hated windows so far - it's not that bad. though it stuffs 'Edge' down your throat at every opportunity so that's getting replaced with firefox.

when roof is off you mean ? I'm not gonna be imaging them I'd imagine. With it on, it's rock solid - as I say - it's already been through 50mph winds and was no bother at all. IF it was mildly windy and I was imaging, I'll just pop something on top of the roof when it's off to keep it on the grass. stu

Just in case of use to anyone else - I wanted a laptop to leave in the new obsy - for stuff like planetary/lunar, etc. maaybe for nina at some point (i use asiair). wanted something fast, tough, and ideally touchscreen. this company selling refurbished lenova yogas, and I got an i7 quad core, 8gb ram, 256gb ssd with touchscreen/convertible for 179 squid. its all aluminium case, etc. these cost >£1000 quid new. https://www.ebay.co.uk/itm/283606063064?var=586202378301 Its come with a fresh activated windows 11 pro on it, and (as a mac user that detests window and most windows HW) it's actually really really good. really nice touchpad, bright full HD screen, and of course touchscreen too. Anyway, oodles cheaper than others being sold on ebay, so thought I'd pass on the link. stu

yeh, no - scopes are east and west (it's 8" circle. middle is free, so no bother there. I do need to work out the best 'knack'. I think lying it on the top roof is best when off, though does mean it will get dewy during the night. will have to play that by ear.

I've reach the first massive milestone today - and think this therefore deserves a proper thread. So work continued with updates here:

Started a thread here: Now that it has progressed to the stage of 'IT WORKs!!!!' - I'll continue the build thread here. Read the above thread for up to now. This week was about stengthening the sides with thick fibreglass poles, even though it had already stood up to 50mph winds and torrential rain, I figured it wouldn't hurt: After that I had to wait for lighter fibreglass rods I had ordered to arrive - these were to provide struts into the roof to keep the roof taught - which also helps it stop flapping in the wind, and I hoped would make it easier to take the roof on and off, with the rods giving the roof a stabler cone shape: I designed and printed the central hub and spoke holders, and all these are hot glued together. Then, for the first time I was at the stage where I felt I could try and remove and replace the roof. Up until now it's been a project based on hope really. I had to build it this far before I'd really know IF the roof was going to be able to come off and on easily. Well.. I'm chuffed - here's the very first lift off (videoed just in case it was the LAST lift off!): So now, I know it is all going to work!! This is the real milestone compeleted. I can now furnish the inside. Here I will be placing 2 sets of steel shelfs, a custom build PSU (12v and 5v) to feed everything, and 2 EQ6s, with a 3rd EQ5 or azgti sometimes. It has power, already. I will be adding ethernet. There is plenty room inside also for a stool and desk (prob use one of shelfs) for a laptop for planetary/lunar stuff when I need to be out there. Building wise, I am waiting on a ducted air port which will be installed in the front top wall of the roof. At the rear will be going a fan duct blowing air out. Since it is otherwise airtight effectively, this will suck air in the top, and out the bottom. It will be on 24/7. This will keep the air circulating inside and should keep the humidity down. In times where the humidity is high, I will be installing a heater. With this on, and the fan off, hot air will heat the interior, exiting at the top, and drying the slabs, air. All power is smart. so fan, heater, PSU can all be controlled remotely via IFTTT/Amazon. I should be able to get all that stuff done in the next week or so. I'll keep updating this post as I go.

startools is for processing your images. Nina doesn't do that I don't think ? It's just about control ? But yeh, I'm the same - I follow some tutorial, get great results. 2 months later, i am getting rubbish results and have totally forgotten I even watched a tutorial on what I am hacking my way through. 🤣

nice mount. Wilsontown Forth ? I grew up (and parents still live) in Kilncadzow a few miles away. Give startools a go - I've found it pretty decent with Galaxies. stu

@ONIKKINEN - do you know if there is any success in running zwo firmware with the rising cam imx251 ? I'm a through and thorugh asiair'er (3 of them), and I'd love to grabo one of these beauties if I can make it compatible with my asiair. otherwise, it's a non starter. I know, it's a long shot bot though if you are following risingcam forums, etc you might know ? stu

Exactly Still time for that '23 what ? centiwhat ? I just assumed it was inches you meant' moment.

Yup u need a uv/ir with asi533. Lextreme is great. Do remember you will need much longer exposures so make sure your mount and guiding is up to it. Stars wise, take some short exposures and stack them for stars. Use starnet to remove the stars from your stacked sets once they have been stretched a bit. Then you have clean sharp stars from the short exposure stacking you can use. You can then focus on stretching and combining your different exposure stacks and out the stars back at the end. Tip: to get stars only, put starless image in layer above the one with stars. Make it as subtract blend type. You should now be seeing only stars. Save that as an image. To put stars back, add a new layer and add that image, and make layer blend Add. You can then play with star opacity to reduce stars as u wish. Stu

you did better than me, I gave up with Oiii and just made a false oiii channel out of sharpened/contrasted Ha for my 1499

No idea if its the 'proper' way, but yes - I process as seperate stacks. then bring each into affinity photo (photoshop for you), and mask, etc to add different bits using 'add' blend more. sometime with differnt opacity.

very nice. added that to my todo list - didn't realise there was so much there!

An hour with my Canon 6d, 135mm and lextreme.

yeh true does a bit. My hot tub is in the conservatory 🙂, so suppose neighbours might think I've two of the things now! Actually really good point though - if I was to put some wooden edging around it really would just look like a hot tub.. hmm... I'll admit I was a little surprised it held up. Still blowing a gale today - I went and sat inside it - no movement at all - with the internal edging it really is very strong. If anyone is thinking of something similar: 25m x 1m correx £50 3 x 10m edging £45 glue sticks £20 concrete bricks £15 So a bit over my 100 quid at £130 or so all in. Add another £20 for the fibreglass rods still to be fittted.

here: https://www.ebay.co.uk/itm/284533518518 roll of correx from ebay too. And you'd need the proper glue: https://www.ebay.co.uk/itm/292517417145 Good call about toolstation. I've one 5 mins way - will drop in later today or tomorrow.

The roof weighs about 2kg... so that would be a bit overkill 🙂

I think I'll add a 60w pipe heater in there, that should keep things nice and dry and keep the humidity down without costing much to run 24/7 - though I'll add a temp or humidity sensor eventually so it will be off for summer/low humidity. There IS also enough space and headroom to actually sit in there too, so if Im lunar/planetary imaging with the laptop, etc I can sit out there. Also, I've put one of my smart plugs out there for the outlet for all the mount stuff (wifi on all the time) - so to turn all the mounts, asiairs, dew heaters, cameras and cooling on I just say 'alexa turn observatory on' from anywhere. Can't do much else now till I get the additional stengthening in. IF I find the roof removing isn't easy, an alternative I can pursue is for the roof to fold back in 3 or 4 folds. That would work great generally, but I've not though of a way to 100% seal it when unfolded. One possibility is magnetic strip (like for fridges) along the edge of the top, and edges of the roof part, but I need to experiment if that's required as don't know if strong enough. Got some in the garage so I'll try some stuff. I might get some wee potted bushes and stuff to put around the front of it - disguise it a bit and make it look a bit less like, as @tomato say , some sort of watertank/massive composter.

Well, it was 50mph winds all night and heavy rain. I did check on it a few times through the window, but come morning - all is well, and it's still there, undamaged, solid and dry inside 🙂

And here's my Orion - Canon 6D and 135mm/Lextreme again. About 60 mins of subs. With and Without stars.

I shot two targets last night - elephant trunk and orion. Here's elephant trunk. For me, old skool is my Canon 6D - not used it in months, but nice FF gets me some wide views with the 135mm. L-extreme of course. There's life in the old 6D yet I reckon - came out ok for 80 mins of subs.