iwols

mine set to 0.9 ,when the calibration and guiding works its great,its just that when guiding goes mad i know if i do a calibration theres no chance on completing might do 30 steps but not move accordingly

thanks malc will look into the above ,cheers -everything seems ok slewing its just when i seem to be making small pulses to the mount in phd calibration/guiding it either works or struggles(its a mystery)

thanks peter now sorted

hi how do i know what firmware i have on my heq5 mount and do i need a handset to update firmware or can i just connect  my pc to the mount thanks

well tried tonight everything seemed ok for half hour then guiding went nuts,tried calibration again and hardly moving and erratic readings again 1,3,5,4,6,5 ect ,refocused guide cam made a few setting adjustments and seemed ok ,but it was late,so packed in.Is there anyway of measuring the pulses sent to the motor,not sure where to go again, is it the eqmod cable,the mount although its been stripped/regreased,phd2 guide cam,the motors, not even sure how to narrow it down anymore🤔  or do i need to go away from my oag??    Just ordered another eqmod cable but dont suspect it?

just reinstalled nina and now seems to be working just need them clear skies as usual🙂

thanks kev🙂 will bare that offer in mind

16 hours ago, symmetal said:

Dec should read +90:00:00 and Az should read 00:00:00 in the Northern hemishere default home position, (weights down and scope pointing North). If it doesn't then you've still got previous sync alignment points being applied. Expand the Eqmod window to show setup options and under 'Alignment/Sync' delete the sync alignment points by clicking the button to the left of the DxSA and DxSB readings. These should then read zero and your Dec and Az readings should also then be correct. You can also delete the 'Point Count' by clicking the button to its left too but I don't think this affects things if the DX readings have been deleted.

Also ensure 'User Interface' in the same section is set to 'Dialog Mode' and not 'Append On Sync' or you can end up with slews and centreing being well off target, if you're using platesolving to centre your target. Multiple resyncs during platesolving generates sync points very close to each other which can play havoc with Eqmod's pointing model if 'Append on Sync' is selected. 'Dialog Mode' deletes nearby previous sync points automatically to avoid this problem. 

On power up this home position is what Eqmod assumes the scope is positioned in and it works out the first slew to target from that assumed position. If the scope isn't in this home position when powered up your first slew will be off, though the first platesolve and sync should 'correct' for the wrong initial home position, and subsequent slews should then be OK.

It's worth deleting the saved alignment points, as mentioned above, at the start of each session, as platesolving makes them more of a hinderence than a help.

Alan

Thanks Alan ,following your recommendations i slewed with eqmod so i had dec 90  and Az 00,i then deleted the settings you mentioned set up a start point in eqmod and used the spirit level to set up the park position which is now what i call the start position(that i set up earlier) so hopefully everything was back to normal ,slewed to m81 in nina ,but instead of going NE it went SW(totally opposite,brought back to the start position(parked)  and treid with SGP and this went NE,also tried in cartes de ciel and this too went NE so hopefully problem may be solved??,but now have to see why nina is different to these 2 programs thanks guys

12 hours ago, Dr_Ju_ju said:

Is the right location set in the EQMod control panel ??, i.e. expand the panel, with the spanner >>  icon at the top ....

sorry this is just an example not my actual setup thanks

the trouble is when im in home position the mount position in eqmod is wrong what should the dec and az read in the northern hemisphere? in parked position

never disconnected them

hi just stripped down my mount and now i dont think it knows where it is, slews wrongly very wrongly do i have to resync the mount and if so how, thanks guys

37 minutes ago, Budgie1 said:

Yes, set it to the same guide rate in both ASCOM & PHD2, somewhere between 0.5 & 0.9 is normally good. You can start at 0.5 and see how it goes, then increase it later if you think it's needed.

Superb wlll try that, gives me some hope 

1 hour ago, drjolo said:

In my experience 0.5x guide rate is a good starting point for HEQ5 and EQ6 mounts.

So do I have to set the 0.5 in both the phd2 advanced Guiding settings and in ascom pulse guide settings in eqmod as well, totally lost it cheers

Hi. Michael I'm having a senior moment with this, should it be set at 0.9?

just wondered if the above would be ok as my oag on my scope struggles in sharpcap polar alignment thanks

and does the sidereal setting at 0.10 look correct for a heq5 mount,seem to think it was different on the initial setup cheers

hi does the step setting setting look ok for a 580mm scope with a 0.7 reducer thanks

hi just half dismantled my heq5 and just wondered what the best grease would be for the ra and dec  pinions cheers what about this

https://www.screwfix.com/p/wd-40-specialist-white-lithium-grease-400ml/46103

Well ive just fitted a rotator (to a setup thats worked great for some time)and made a few changes to my setup inc taking the backlash out of the mount,but now im struggling with guiding,im really struggling with the initial calibration,firstly it was only doing 3 steps but moving 50,then when i moved it to a different position it started to calibrate in good steps but it would move to say 4 then 6 then 4.3 then to 7 ect ,which is abnormal,set up the camera prefs again but still same,mount seems balanced just not sure where to go.Even altering the calibration steps didnt seem to make a difference,any help advice appreciated thanks.My scope is 580mm and oag cam 2.9 um

all great but love the orion colours

yes but rotator instead thanks

hi all just fitted a new rotator to my imaging train and using with nina,just wondered how you used your rotator with phd2 as this is what happens ,i start the sequence in nina ,it slews ,plate solves,autofocus and turns the camera with the rotator which means when phd2 starts to guide it actually needs recalibrating ,what do you do,do you calibrate everytime and can phd2 be made to calibrate after rotation,i also have the problem if the scope is too high it says calibration will be poor,any advice? thanks 

thanks for that Billy ,must say when i left the spare plugs hanging i did think "is there any  socket available to isolate these,probably a bit of heat shrink?

well splitter cable arrived and fitted suspect it might be better than a box??  not having to mount anything