PHD gave up at the meridian.. Any clues?

[blackparticle]

I got my Lodestar yesterday and was putting it through its paces connected to a 9x50 finder guider.

After some initial balance problems I got PHD guiding down to an almost flat line. 5 mins.. 10 mins.. 20 mins.. all perfect subs. At this point I was thinking if I can guide through 2 worm cycles then it should just be able to guide as long as I can see a star.

So I tried 40 minutes and it must have hit the meridian and I started to get smeared stars. I put the guiding back down to 20.. same thing.. down to 10.. stars still smeared.

Is there a process to go through after 90deg ? I.e Park mount and re-find the object so it isn't tipping back over on itself or re-calibrate PHD?

Cheers Alan

[shaunster]

Are you sure it wasnt something else like a cable being caught up somewhere, that could cause it.

[Merlin66]

Change of balance?

[blackparticle]

I'm fairly sure the cables were 'tidy'. So it should have gone on with no problems?

[blackparticle]

I tried re-adjusting the balance weight after the 10 minute one failed but that didn't solve it either.

[blackparticle]

One other question..

On the Neq6 handset, what's the recommended guide speed? It was set to 0.5x but would a lower setting of 0.125x be more accurate / suitable for such a short f/l guide scope?

[dmahon]

Are you using EQMOD? If so, do you have "Limits enabled"? This stops tracking at the meridien.

It's very annoying, as I've been getting data on NGC6888 which, just after I've finished setting up each night, is only about 15 minutes (time) beore the meridien. I managed to track 2 and a half hours past the meridien tonight (with limits disabled) before the scope hit the tripod, but yes, you then have to park the scope, goto it again (this time on the other side of he pier) and start again.

[blackparticle]

I've got EQMOD working but am preferring the handset controls tbh.

The tracking error happened again tonight. It's almost as if the firmware in the handset is reversing the RA at 90deg.

I swung the scope around, recalibrated and everything was fine again.

Quite odd. :/

On the plus side, my M33 image is now upside down.. and the slight chroma distortions from the EQX66 are the other way around too. With some luck these will cancel each other out and give me nice coloured halos around the bigger stars.

[chrisshillito]

Are you using EQMOD? If so, do you have "Limits enabled"? This stops tracking at the meridien.

It's very annoying, as I've been getting data on NGC6888 which, just after I've finished setting up each night, is only about 15 minutes (time) beore the meridien. I managed to track 2 and a half hours past the meridien tonight (with limits disabled) before the scope hit the tripod, but yes, you then have to park the scope, goto it again (this time on the other side of he pier) and start again.

The whole point of EQMOD limits is that its up to you to set them where you want them to kick in. Yes the defaults are at the meridian but the idea is that each user will set them to match the capabilities of their particular setup. So why not set the "meridian" limit 2 hours 29 minutes past the meridian then you can image safely in the knowledge you'll never hit the pier again. You can also use the automatic flip feature in EQMOD to flip your mount around once the limit is reached if you want.

Chris.

[dmahon]

When it hits depends on the height of the target and where it is in relation to the tripod legs. When I get a pier...

The flip function, however, does not allow me to select it.

[chrisshillito]

When you are imaging you're not generally changing declination (well perhaps a little if guiding) so any collision comes about by movement in RA. Therefore for any intended target you can first set your DEC to the the target DEC and slew around in RA until you find the collision point and set that as your RA limit.

To use the automatic flip you have to first enable it - you do this from the EQMOD setup screen. Many folks don't like automatic flips due to the risk of cable snags, equipment fall outs etc and didn't want the possibility that it could be accidentally selecting via the EQMOD it interface - hence the need to pre-enable the "option".

Chris.