valleyman

On 15/07/2021 at 18:18, tooth_dr said:

I’m not sure if you will have the same experience as I did, but I couldn’t resolve NRs completely with my 120MM mini with the above tilter. 

Thanks for the heads up tooth. Will have a try with My ZWO 183MC before spending any more money.

Dog just cost me £340 at the Vet and then the cooker just packed up grrrrr another £500.

Pat 

1 hour ago, Rusted said:

The usual advice is to use a tilt plate on the camera adapter.

ZWO T2 Camera Tilt Adjuster II | First Light Optics

Thanks Rusted will give it a try, was wondering what next to spend even more money :).

I see you are from Denmark. I did some sailing there during the 70,s and 80,s out of Kiel round the Islands. Sonderburg, Faaborg, Aero, and round Fyn. Learnt my sailing there and ended up as a Instructor with the Army.

Had some fantastic memories round there and just loved the country and People. Envey you mate. 

Gone back to Solar imaging after a long lay off, and have been out the last couple of days at last as the weather turns decent at last.

Taken a bit of time tuning the mount and Scope to speed up the start up time but now it is all up and running I.m getting the dreaded Rings on the images.

Any advice would be appreciated.

The kit is a Williams 81m APO with a Quark and 120 mini Camera .

regards

Pat

Nice one Chaz. Sunshine here this morning too. First time for about 3 weeks. Will get the kit out a bit later when the sun becomes visible from my viewing site.

Fingers crossed

Pat

15 hours ago, Stu said:

The disk looks blank at the moment in White light, so you didn’t miss anything. Which scope were you using the wedge in? If conditions were reasonable then you should see granulation across the surface even if there is no activity. As Roy says, you won’t see prominences in white light, an Ha scope is needed for that.

Using a WO 81 Zenithstar with the Lunt and continuum filter and a 120mm mini from ZWO. Will put the Quark on today and see what we get then. Thanks for the advice. 

Pat

Bought a new Lunt wedge last week and got out this morning amongst some broken skies and had my first look at the sun for which must be a couple of years.

Had a nice sharp rim with a Continuum Filter fitted. But it all looked pretty quite just now. No spots or Prominces at the moment.

Hope I am right with that and I was not doing anything wrong🙄

Pat

Was out last night all ready to go for a astro session. Was doing a PA with the ASI Pro. Came to setting the scope back to the Home Position but the RA motor would not return the scope. Set it back manually and tried to move the RA with the Mount control on ASI but it would not move.

Having given up last night on a perfect night for Astro, had a look this morning and my thoughts are that the Clutch clamp is going tight in to its housing but there is still slight movement in RA and you can still move the RA on full clamp. My gut tells me the clutch needs adjusting but no idea if this can be done. On mounts I have had in the past(there has been a few ), When you tighten the clutch there should be no movement .

The Dec clutch is rock solid when tightened with no movement.

The steppers are working and there is drive to the clutch.

Any suggestions please

Just the Reds and Greens to do then.😏

One thing you can try  if your problem is not solved, is In AirPro, open the mount Link then sync the mount to the ASI Pro

The choice was basically cost related.

I am in no way expert with Astro. So spending £1000,s was not an option.

The 533 came in at the lower end of what I wanted. ie Cooled. Which would cut down on the amount of time photoraphing.

Darks not needed. Although I do have a Darks Libaray . As far as quality goes ZWO takes some beating for the Price.

Pat

10 hours ago, Jonny_H said:

Nice! I am currently looking at the 533 or the 294mc pro. Pulling my hair out (what's left of it) deciding which one to go for! How are you finding the 533? Any issues so far? 

Unfortunately I don't have a cable with a 9 pin female but thank you for the feedback.

It works fine, Had very little time this winter to use it because of the constant  grey skies here in South Wales .

Heres a pic from it 

17 minutes ago, Jonny_H said:

Thanks for your reply. Assume you are using the same Lynx Astro cable as my link above?

Looks like a nice set-up you have there? What imaging cam are you using just out of curiosity?

Yes it is the same cable The camera is the ZWO ASI 533MC-PRO USB 3.0 Cooled Colour Camera

The EQ Mod cable is good for it.I use it.

You connect from the connecter on the mount straight to the ASI air via the USB connector. 

The only cable I have running from my shed is the Extension cable. then Power for the mount and the ASIair run from there.

I have 2x ZWO cameras, 2x Dew heaters and the Focuser powered from the ASIair.

It works great. Polar alignment takes about 2 minutes. Plate solving about 30 seconds. 

Best money I have spent on Kit. Heres a pic of my kit. Looks a bit of a mess with the Cables but when packing away I just disconnect the two power cables, disconnect power connector into ASIair and Disconnect the USB end of the EQ Mod cable. 

The whole lot is then lifted off with everything else still connected.  If you are not using a Focuser then just mark the Extension Tube with a marker pen so you find the focus point quicker next time you use the scope.

I assume the Lights were saved to the ASIair memory stick. I dont use DSLR but there is something in the manual about DSLR.

I am not sure but I think you can save direct to the DSLR scan disk. Kick me if I am wrong.

Here is a copy of the manualZWO_ASIAIR_PRO_User_Manual.pdf. Hope this helps

Get it all working indoors in the warm during the daylight. Makes life so much easier

Nicely done

Ive manager 3 hours in 3 weeks :(.

Finally got some clear sky last night for the first time in what seems weeks.

Rushed out with the gear and managed to get 15x120sec lights of M42 (the old favourite). No darks so used some from the Cupboard, Camera was dithered and cooled to -10c. Clouds started to drift in by 22:30hrs so wrapped it up for the night.

At least it gave my enthusiasm a kick in the right direction.

Is it upside down?🤔

You can try cleaning the contacts on Lens and Camera. Also update the firmware on the Camera.  Do you have other Lenses with IS that work OK on the Camera? Also maybe a friend has a DSLR you can try the lens on.

Nicely Put. Happy New Year guys.

Pat

Been getting the same problem with my ASIair. I swap the guide scope between Telescopes for imaging. After doing a Calibration it goes away and works perfect.

I do it now everytime before imaging. takes a few minutes but better that than get started with a sequence then have to stop to Calibrate

Got the chance to go out last night after weeks of cloud and rain.

Good chance to use all the new kit gathered over the summer. 

Headed to M45 and got this.

BTW, f you are using iMac or Windows PC then the ASIair App can be used by downloading some software called Bluestack.

https://www.bluestacks.com

Pat

I will try storing the Cams indoors as a precaution against the damp in the shed. That might help.

Could it have been caused by the CCD not being 100% secure on the scope.

 I noticed this morning when I went to investigate the problem that there was some very slight movement between the CCD and scope with one of the locking screws not complete tight. 

Was out Saturday night for the the first time in weeks due to the weather.

Had everything up and ready for Astro dusk, nice clear sky so spun round to NGC891 and started an auto run of 40/180 sec Lights.

Went back an hour later to check everything was Ok and found this (see pics) on the Preview. 

I had Dew shields on the front of the Williams and they were heated when I checked. Was using a Williams 81 Pro with a ZWO 533 MC Pro. Cooled to -10c

In the pictures you can see the condition gets worse as time goes by. 

Any suggestions would be most helpful.

regards

Pat