Setpoint cooling temp

[Black Knight]

What sort of value should I use for cooling the Atik 314L+? Should I be aiming at a specific temperature?

[Uranium235]

I use -10, thats a setting you can use all year round - apart from when the ambient temp is below -10.

[swag72]

I used -10 in the winter and at the moment I have raised that to -7 as I live in Spain and the temperatures are in their 20's on a regular basis in the warmer months.

[Black Knight]

Sounds like -10 might be a good all-rounder! Thanks muchly!

[Freddie]

I set -15, not out that often in summer so not many nights I can't get down to that.

[Catanonia]

On my QHY9 can easily manage -20 even on hottest nights, so I stick with that all year around with normal 30% draw on the fans.

Did go as low as -40 once, not much difference other than much harder in summer and much more strain on the cooling.

[Uranium235]

I think the QHY series of cameras offer more powerful cooling (some are 2-stage I believe?), the 314 only has a maximum of 27deg cooling which allows for a max night temp of about 17deg (hence -10 cooling) which is about at hot as it will ever get at night in the UK.

Not that it matters too much since with the 314 and its very low noise, applying darks will usually wreck your image (just use bias and flat).

[Black Knight]

I was wondering about darks. I have read elsewhere that many do not use them with the 314. Something to avoid then, which is good actually. Saves a bit (or a lot) of time .

[Uranium235]

Yep All you need to do is find a way of removing the few hot pixels & cosmic ray strikes you cant avoid (can be done with DSS), and use sigma clipping if you have enough subs.

[Black Knight]

OK, sounds like a plan!