the yesyes observatory - the build

[Gina]

Oh!  That's something I didn't know   Thanks for the warning Chris

[skybadger]

"When you plug in a USB1.1 device into a USB hub, that whole hub slows down to USB1.1 speeds"

Unless you buy a hub that doesn't  - I was careful to buy some that didn't - haven't seen them since....

Mine are Belkin stackable.

Mike

[Zakalwe]

What a super build! Super neat and tidy as well!

For tracks, this is the sort of thing that you need:

Steel on steel with galvanised rails. Mine have been up over a year and no sign of rust on the rails. Plus they move super smoothly.

You can get them from sliding gate suppliers

[yesyes]

"When you plug in a USB1.1 device into a USB hub, that whole hub slows down to USB1.1 speeds"

Unless you buy a hub that doesn't  - I was careful to buy some that didn't - haven't seen them since....

Mine are Belkin stackable.

Mike

I was wondering if that applied to every USB hub or just the "cheap ones".. It kind of made sense to me (after realising it the other night) that the hub can't communicate with the PC at 2 different speeds. Maybe the hubs that don't slow down keep the 2.0 speed towards the PC but are able to slow down individual ports to 1.1 and send that data at 2.0 speeds to the PC. I might research that a bit more later... for now the 2nd hub solves that problem.

[yesyes]

What a super build! Super neat and tidy as well!

For tracks, this is the sort of thing that you need:

Steel on steel with galvanised rails. Mine have been up over a year and no sign of rust on the rails. Plus they move super smoothly.

You can get them from sliding gate suppliers

I was looking at those when I designed the obsy and selected materials. They seemed to be the ideal solution, especially as they allow the track to be screwed down very easily through the flat part. But I seem to remember that they were VERY expensive and I discarded them as an option back then. Thinking about it now and knowing the total cost of my build (around £3400), the additional cost would probably not have made a big difference.

Anyway, too late now. For my build at least...

[Mukv]

retro fitting is possible this is the section of hardware that has everything needed http://www.fhbrundle.co.uk/groups/13SWR200__200_kgs_Weight, worth a look.

hindsite is a wonderful thing, but your creation stands head and shoulders above obsy builds costing much much more.

Andy

[mhard26339]

well, this looks promising... tonight might be the night...

img0032.png

Hi Chris,

What sotware are you using for the prediction?, must admit I got caught on Tuesday night, just got everything set up and took a couple of great shots of clouds, they rolled in very quickly. There are some downsides to being controlled remotely,

Regards

Mike

[yesyes]

Hi Mike,

this was a screenshot of the metcheck website. They have specific forecasts for various hobbies, including astronomy.

http://www.metcheck.com/HOBBIES/astronomy.asp

[Tinker1947]

That's quite a intensive Weather forecaster, similar to the FLO system, I won't bother to order my next TV Nagler as its not to likely to get used....Mike i thought it was clear here Tuesday, well i know i had to evening when i could see the brightest Moon of the year...

[yesyes]

It's done. I have finally worked up the courage to clean my primary mirror. That was one of the scariest things I've ever done.

first I built a contraption to hold the mirror

placed it in the bath tub

removed primary mirror cell from scope. it's even dirtier than it looked through the tube

put the mirror in the bath tub and rinsed it off with softened water (we have a whole-house water softener)

it's now back in the scope awaiting collimation.

[Mukv]

I'm sure that's Orion at the 8 O'clock position on that mirror....

[yesyes]

probably... that thing looked more like a planisphere than a mirror

[Earl]

Pretty dirty but i bet it made very litte difference to be honest, but i do understand the desire for clean mirrors

[yesyes]

Well, it was a good occasion to clean it before collimating and aligning everything. I probably wouldn't have cleaned it if I had done all those things already...

It did gather a lot of dust from standing in storage for 2 years.

[Earl]

time to start getting those photons i cant wait for my obsy any week now

[yesyes]

Yes. Imagine the disappointment.. photons have travelled thousands or even millions of years only to realise they arrived a bit early before my obsy is finished...

[Dazz8se]

Hi Chris really like you obey Clock did you make it yourself ? I've been searching online for something like that but with no luck :-(

Great Obey Build just started mine done the ground work just waiting on my log cabin being delivered so I can move forward

Dazz

[yesyes]

Hi Dazz. Yes, I build that myself a few years ago in anticipation of building my own obsy. ;-) It's based on an Arduino. There's a bit of info on my website, but not the usual detailed description. (I guess I was too lazy at the time). If I would do it again, I'd build it a bit smaller though. It takes up quite a bit of space...

http://www.yesyes.info/index.php/diy/observatory-clock/

Do you have your own build thread on here? You know you MUST post about your build and upload loads of photos! :D

Good luck with your build!!

Edit: forgot to add link

[Dazz8se]

Hi Dazz. Yes, I build that myself a few years ago in anticipation of building my own obsy. ;-) It's based on an Arduino. There's a bit of info on my website, but not the usual detailed description. (I guess I was too lazy at the time). If I would do it again, I'd build it a bit smaller though. It takes up quite a bit of space...

http://www.yesyes.info/index.php/diy/observatory-clock/

Do you have your own build thread on here? You know you MUST post about your build and upload loads of photos! :D

Good luck with your build!!

Edit: forgot to add link

Thanks Chris I have some photos of the ground work I have done so far I will post them in a thread soon as I get home from work thanks for sharing the link

[yesyes]

yes yes YES! It has finally happened!

Some of you may have wondered what ever happened to my observatory. The thread had gone quiet before any reports of first light.

The weather has been awful. Hardly any clear nights and when we had one, I didn't have time. So it has taken a long time to set up the scope and align everything and other things that do actually require a clear-ish night. Too long. Faaar too long.

Until last night. Finally another clear night *and* I had time to go out to the obsy. So now the mount is polar aligned and synced with EQMOD so it knows where it's pointing. There's still some tweaking to do (isn't there always?) but I have finally reached a point where I can just start everything within a few minutes and have reasonably accurate gotos.

Although technically first light was during alignment, these are my "official" first light images:

M57 - Ring Nebula

40x 60second frames ISO800

Canon EOS1000D

Orion Optics SPX250, 1200mm, f/4.8

APT, DSS, CS2

full frame:

same light frames stacked with custom rectangle and 2x drizzle in DSS

And here is my control centre :-)

[JamesF]

I had been wondering whatever had happened to you, Chris.  Not seen you posting for a very long time that I recall.  Pleased to hear you're finally up and running though

James

[yesyes]

Yeah, I've been rather busy with other, non-astro projects. I've spent a lot of time in the warm room building electronics stuff, but not much astronomy was happening there. Now I'm back in the swing of things and ready for long, dark, clear nights.. ;-)

[JamesF]

I know the situation.  I've spent a lot of time over the last nine months building the brewery.  Far more than I thought I would.

James

[Earl]

WOO HOO !!!! I can  paint it grey for you

[yesyes]

The nebula?? ;-)