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AstroEQ for EQ mounts

Oily

By Oily
in DIY Astronomer

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Quatermass

Quatermass

Posted
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Nothing wrong with buying a nice shiny NEQ6  :grin:  but there are plenty of other things I want to buy this Christmas and the ASTROEQ is a great solution for those of us with an EQ5 mount, just wish it was around when I first started my journey into astrophotography back in 2010. If you get a cheap webcam and adapt your finder scope you can guide with it as well using PHD. Plug your webcam into phd and select your webcam, then because PHD will sync with EQMOD and ASTROEQ you can use pulse guiding. No need for a separate st4 port.

I think many people in the astro community out there are very grateful for EQMOD and projects like ASTROEQ from clever people making our lives that much better with there open source projects. I give a lot of my free time teaching others the art of processing images and learning about the night sky and for me that is part of the pleasure of it, giving to others is not always about making a profit.

During the recent storms my next door neighbours tree got blown down, he is in his 80s and was very upset. I went round with my chainsaw and helped clear it all up for him as he could not manage it on his own, he wanted to pay me for doing this, but I refused and said it was a pleasure to help him out. Later in the week he popped a letter through my door and in it was a voucher for a meal in our local restaurant. Not only did I get a great view of the eastern skies but I also got a free meal for me and my wife for helping him, out not bad going for just helping some one out. Any way its that time of year for giving just hope you get what you all want this Christmas :grin:  

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Javert

Javert

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Thanks again Quatermass. I just popped back on here to ask about guiding. Didn't know whether tracking through the laptop would be sufficient.

Also, do you not use your 80ED any more? All your recent stuff I've seen on your blog is with the 200P. That's fine by me as I only have a 200P at present so seeing what you're able to do is an inspiration, but I'm also thinking of getting an 80ED (or something similar) for more wide field stuff.

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astromerlin

astromerlin

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As mentioned before I have just modified my old black EQ6 with new motors and AstroEQ. Before the mod guiding at 5min subs still produced eggy stars, none of the tweaks and fiddiling i tried made any difference.

For the last few clear nights I have been guiding with the new setup at 5min subs and guess what, no eggy stars. Last night just before packing up I thought I push the limits and do a couple of 10min subs just to see what the result was, well the star shape in the images just looked like the 5min ones so I'm over the moon with my upgrade.

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Quatermass

Quatermass

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As mentioned before I have just modified my old black EQ6 with new motors and AstroEQ. Before the mod guiding at 5min subs still produced eggy stars, none of the tweaks and fiddiling i tried made any difference.

For the last few clear nights I have been guiding with the new setup at 5min subs and guess what, no eggy stars. Last night just before packing up I thought I push the limits and do a couple of 10min subs just to see what the result was, well the star shape in the images just looked like the 5min ones so I'm over the moon with my upgrade.

That's great news can't wait to get my guide scope sorted and start doing that.

Sent from my Nexus 7 using Tapatalk

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Javert

Javert

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Well, I've sent Tom a message to check on the availability of one of these. Would love to get one even if it means me having to buy a laptop in order to use it.

Where's the best place to get the ST4 cables from as I gather they're different to the cables that came with my Dual Axis motors upgrade.

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Javert

Javert

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Thanks Quatermass (again!)

As soon as I hear back from Tom, I'll probably get everything ordered.

I've ran it all by my wife and I thinks she's much happier with me going down this route instead of a complete new mount. Got some inheritance due so can spend that on other stuff.

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Quatermass

Quatermass

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You might like to get your finder scope sorted out with a QHY5 guide camera if you have some spare lolly it would then enable you to connect to PHD and have a fully working guided set up perfect for astrophotography with your new go to system.

Any cheapish laptop running windows 7 would do the job a second hand Dell on gumtree would be fine for the job.

Then download the ascom drivers and eqmod with Cartes Du Cial star chart and PHD for guiding purposes and your good to go. There are quite a few things to learn about the software set up but I can help you with that if you have any more questions and Chris from the eqmod project has done a load of video tutorials on utube that are very informative and useful.

I use a standard Canon 350d with the red filter removed for my images with backyard eos to control the camera but there are other camera control software out there APT is a good one so the choice is yours. Have fun and clear skies.

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Oily

Oily

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Thanks Quatermass (again!)

As soon as I hear back from Tom, I'll probably get everything ordered.

I've ran it all by my wife and I thinks she's much happier with me going down this route instead of a complete new mount. Got some inheritance due so can spend that on other stuff.

If you want to see it in action Javert your welcome to pop up and I'll show you how everything works

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Javert

Javert

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If you want to see it in action Javert your welcome to pop up and I'll show you how everything works

Cheers Oily,

Appreciate the offer. You're not too far away so may take you up on the offer at some point.

Will see if / when I manage to get an AstroEQ how I get on.

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Javert

Javert

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Well, I'm on my way!

Confirmed an order with Tom. Just waiting for him to confirm so I can send him the payment. Have also ordered 2 ST4 cables that Quatermass recommended.

Just need to get a laptop now. I've had a quick look at some new ones (I don't mind buying new) and they're all Windows 8. Is anyone else running Windows 8 and can confirm if everything runs ok?

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Gina

Gina

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I've bought several computers from  Morgans and been very pleased with them.  I also bought one from Amazon a while back that was good value.  All either used or demo models.

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Javert

Javert

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Thanks Mark. I've watched that a couple of times now and it's the video that brought the AstroEQ to my attention.

I've also just subscribed to Chris' YouTube channel to try and learn the basics of EQMod.

I'm really excited about getting this all set up and running.

Without actual guiding, what kind of exposures is it possible to get with this setup? Previously, when just using the Dual Axis motors I'm usually restricted (due to my poor alignment) to about 20-30 secs.

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