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SPC900 LXmod yesyes style ;-)

yesyes

By yesyes
in DIY Astronomer

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JamesF

JamesF

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Making progress... Looks like I may only have a problem when the amp off mod is enabled. As I'm seeing 15V+ at the cathode of the zener diode when the mod is disabled, that end looks ok and I think I must have a bridged track somewhere. Not entirely surprising given Chris's very neat super-teeny board layout and my not-at-all super-teeny fingers :clouds2:

Now I've just got to find the blasted thing...

James

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JamesF

JamesF

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And we are up and running :clouds2:

Just took a lovely 60 second exposure of my office with all light sources turned off except the lapdog screen which was facing away from the lens and behind it. I could barely make out anything, but the camera image made it look like daylight. Marvellous. And just in time for our alleged clear skies at the weekend.

Unfortunately my replacement fan is 12V and will turn at 5V but not start, so I'll have to swap that out again. No major problem there. Hopefully the replacement will arrive before the weekend and I can get some testing done under the stars.

For the record, my USB<->serial adaptor is neither PL2303- nor FTDI-based, but clearly seems to work anyhow. It is this one:

http://www.amazon.co.uk/gp/product/B00077DJIQ/

The converter board is inside the moulded rubber plug at the DB-9 end which is a bit of a pig to cut off. I cut into one side along the "seam" and grabbed the loose edges with pliers to tease them open, cutting a bit more and repeating the process until I got in far enough to find the board and cut the rest from around it.

James

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Kbramley

Kbramley

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Due to the constant drizzle in the NW of England, I decided to unbox the semi-working LX cam again to try and resolve the "Normal" mode operation, after some more fault finding I found the issue, quite a simple one in the end and not sure whether its me not interpreting the diagram below correctly or a genuine mistake with the diagram (not sure how anyone else got it working 1st time in that case :clouds2: )

Its all to do with track cuts, as far as I understand there should be a track cut on the copper strip between the DTR line and the Collector of the first transistor, also the very top track cut on the line below the 5v line appears to do nothing. Am I reading the diagram correctly or is it one of these back to front upside down things?(although the cut between the Zener appears to be in the correct place)

The good news it the cam now works perfectly in LX and normal mode with this extra cut.

Just thought I would point this out in case anyone else is losing sleep over this lol :icon_scratch:

Keith

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JamesF

JamesF

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Its all to do with track cuts, as far as I understand there should be a track cut on the copper strip between the DTR line and the Collector of the first transistor, also the very top track cut on the line below the 5v line appears to do nothing. Am I reading the diagram correctly or is it one of these back to front upside down things?

I believe you're correct on both counts. Judging by his design I'd say Chris is something of a master at squeezing as many components as possible into the smallest possible bit of veroboard. As something of a tyro myself I found I had to go over things quite a few times before I was happy that I'd not made any errors. It works brilliantly though, as everything fits into a very small box with plenty of room to spare for a 40mm fan. I can't deny however that there were a few times when I thought to myself "You know, wanting to get into soldering up electronics again is all well and good, but this really wasn't the place to start" :clouds2: Oh for the eyesight I had when I was eighteen...

James

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yesyes

yesyes

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You are right. There must be a cut. I can only assume that the cut got hidden underneath these 10k resistors. I'll add the cut and update the image on my website.

Thanks for pointing that out !!

Not sure how everyone else got it working then .. ;-)

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JamesF

JamesF

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Yes, I was about to post to that effect myself. I know I used the photo of the back of the board for making the cuts and the graphic for the component layout.

James

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yesyes

yesyes

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I'd say Chris is something of a master at squeezing as many components as possible into the smallest possible bit of veroboard.

hehehehe, yes... The idea was to make the vero board no bigger than the USB hub board so they can be easily stacked.... :clouds2:

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yesyes

yesyes

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I think the 5V are needed. It is the voltage supplied to the 3 pull-up resistors. I don't see how the circuit could work as expected without the 5V supply.

When you remove the 5V, can you use the webcam in both normal and LX modes?

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yesyes

yesyes

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What software is used to now control exposure in LX mod?, im using PHD to autoguide and want to increased exposure time. ty

PHD supports the LX modded SPC directly. Can't remember exactly, but I think the exposure time is the time you set in that drop-down menu under the video preview.

For imaging with the LX modded SPC most of us use SharpCap which is being developed by someone on this forum (not sure about the nick name now, "rwg" I seem to remember)...

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