SkyWatcher synscan Goto AZ not playing ball !! Help !!!!!

[Mr TamiyaCowboy]

ok heres the story so far, 

skywatcher synscan AZ goto , running V3.02 firmware ( i think anyways its update-able)

12V 12 AH Lead acid battery with a 2amp fuse for safety 

ST80 + canon 350D mounted prime. 

all input data has been added correct IE: location - time - daylight saving - 

Alignment was done via Procyon and regulas ( also PAE on both stars to)

i center with a 25mm then i run a 2x barlow with a 10mm eyepiece to fine tune center

**************

so i go about my viewing, i have my NORTH-SOUTH marked out and a level base.

scope is set Mag north with digital compass measuring in Mill  on heading so im very very close.

it gets late and my battery system monitor starts warning of a low voltage,
I flip the mount to OFF and plug in a new 12v 12ah battery source ( i have spares lol)

when i turn on mount, i hit enter, then enter again, and the stupid thing now asks me to align the mount again

via brightest- 2 star alignment, but its not even 5 mins ago i had already aligned. 

this is happening all the time, any time the mount is turned of i have to re align mount all over again.

have to input time - date and just skip location ( its already remember it). 
highly frustrated at this point i tend to shove everything away and give up. 

**********

now this is not the only problem, we have aligned to the stars and we say hey GOTO M66

mount slews around and then beeps ( heres m66 fool ) , so i take a gander and guess what

BLACKNESS maybe a star ( scopes focused to) , ok i say Mount GOTO MOON.

mount starts up whirls around and beeps ..... now yeah before i even look i know this darn mount is not pointing at the moon.

but again i have to adjust, and this aint no small adjust just a tap left/right, this is a slew speed8 zzzzzzzzz, zz ,z burrr.

Tried to image the leo cluster, but i was around 1.5 degree off ( up-left), camera wise thats a whole frame up and across.

I just dont know what to do anymore, and i really do not want to be flashing the handset, cannot afford to replace it

if it breaks or gets bricked up.  

so any ideas would he helpful to say the least.

is this a common problem amongst the skywatcher brand, how can it be fixed  or atleast have the huge errors removed, 

ie i say GOTO somewhere and it does that, ? 

at the moment i can point out areas better than the synscan can and i have no clue what im looking at.

Its that Bad, and the mounts  not covered any more, ( purchased more than a year ago and that was a 1.5 month hassle )

[Carina Lass]

Update the handset.

Or use your laptop on eqdirect and don't use the handset at all

[Mr TamiyaCowboy]

it is an ALT - AZ mount , 

EQDirect is EQ mounts ? if so it would not work on an ALT-AZ mount as there is No RA-DEC.

updating the handset is more a chore, its two updates, one to update the second to fix the update because it gave false voltage readings.

My laptop i had to loan to my Niece for a couple weeks she just started University ( will look a reight geek with all the astro / photography software on it).

so i am stuck to using the gaming computer to run things. 

It is also the main reason i have stayed well away from the ascom stuff and direct control,

being it used always on EQ mounts and never on ALT-AZ

[Lonestar70]

The only thing skywatcher mounts (possibly not the EQ8) remember when you turn the power off is your location (which it stores in flash memory) everything else is forgotten, since these are dynamic variables. 

It is also possible that the stored location could be corrupt if the low power light was flashing...since the info is stored on power down.

Where are you getting your time and location info from?... a small error in either can throw the GOTO out.

There are some known errors in the earlier AZ handset firmware which have been corrected in the latest version...so my advise would be to update the firmware... it is quite easy to do and should not pose any risk to your handset... just follow the installation instruction to the letter... you will, of course, require the correct update cable for the handset and an RS232/USB adaptor if your PC/Laptop does not have a serial RS232 output.

The latest V3.35 synscan software is the one to use along with the firmware loader download.

Keep happy.

Best regards.

Sandy.

[Mr TamiyaCowboy]

i have a USB serial adapter, i use it to control the mount for panoramic photography / timelapse.

also had it hooked upto stellarium once. 

My location comes from  GPS status and matches google maps  

time is taken from my mobile phone and is correct to GMT/BST

time input is ALWAYS taken from the mobile phone, no other time device used, just the phone.

as it says in manual use the same clock when possible.

[proflight2000]

Not 100 per cent on this scope, but when you switch her off what keeps the information? as the power source is not internal, the power source is the battery you have just changed, so the goto as such would be affected, may be wrong on this so apologies if I am and your scope has an internal power supply. The other thing, I have noticed and been advised in here that my own mount requires a minimum of 3amps, are you running off Two amps and how long is the power lead from your power supply to the scope.

[Pyrodave]

 Not sure about Alt/Az mounts dont you have to park them or is this just EQ .

If I park my EQ and switch off it retains alignment but I have to reinput time/date and location when switching back on.

[ronin]

If you power off then the scope loses information or adopts a default - time being the obvious one.

So yes you will have to do the alignment again.

It should have kept the location data so you will have to confirm this location I think, then give it the time, and DST then perform the alignment.

Any reason why you appear to be switching it off/on several times?

Also not sure that performing PAE on the alignment stars during alignment is safe. PAE takes the new position as the new start point/datum and I would guess you are losing information about what errors need to be corrected for.

Just centre each of the alignment stars, don't try PAE in the middle of the alignment procedure.

[Mr TamiyaCowboy]

Park home, you select this, then scope slews back to North pointing and horizontal.

the location is stored inside the handset ( nodoubt something like a 8-16kb cmos or the likes)

my scope is rated for a 12v source and no more than 2amp, hence the 2a fuse fitted inline on the pos lead.

i need another hour before i can boot up the mount  and get it to go direct to M66 from home/park.

will skip alignment as the mounts not been moved since last use. and im governed by stars moving into view from window.

[Mr TamiyaCowboy]

If you power off then the scope loses information or adopts a default - time being the obvious one.

So yes you will have to do the alignment again.

It should have kept the location data so you will have to confirm this location I think, then give it the time, and DST then perform the alignment.

Any reason why you appear to be switching it off/on several times?

Also not sure that performing PAE on the alignment stars during alignment is safe. PAE takes the new position as the new start point/datum and I would guess you are losing information about what errors need to be corrected for.

Just centre each of the alignment stars, don't try PAE in the middle of the alignment procedure.

am doing PAE after alignment, align stars, skip to m66 and its off, so back to alignment stars and PAE them 

slew back to M66 its still off by lots

[Carina Lass]

Check your clutches!!

You sure it isn't slipping???

[ronin]

What location are you using?

Your signature says N 52° 65' - E 1° 21'

However you cannot get 52° 65' Minutes stop at 59'.

Just it looks odd giving a location in the signature that cannot exist.

I guess Cromer and you hit 6 insted of 5?

When you have to do the second alignment after removing and reapplying the power don't rush it, just wondering if you are missing the "Is DST On/Off" option and what is going in is incorrect. So 15 degrees out.

No point arguing with a computer, they will wait happily for a year or until they die for you to enter the correct information. If you get annoyed they don't care either.

These mounts were produced some 15 years ago, the processor is a small 8 bit thing with I suspect no more the 4K of memory, I suppose they may get to 1M, they are not a 2.6Ghz processor PC with a terabyte drive attached and 16Meg of memory. The chip is probably unable to count to a value of 1 gig, never mind run at it. Half the bits to make a handset could be difficult to source now they are so old.

[Mr TamiyaCowboy]

Scopes balanced, and adjustable slider rail is fixed solid so no slippage at all.

100% sure on slippage not happening. 

not skipping or missing any input features DST is selected when needed, 

Cromer is a bit off, am just outside norwich near a little village called easton.

well i waited and waited and finaly M66 was in my viewing window.

booted up mount, skipped alignment ( mounts not moved)

hit goto M66, nothing at all, black'ish sky and no big stars anywhere.

So i unhook camera and check images back, every image is around  a full frame and a half out 

thats more than one degree, its a huge error. 

so i go back, recycle power and start again, this time i re-align.

hit goto m66 take a 25s shoot, view it back and YEP .....

its still out by a frame width or two, thats still a huge error and nothing had changed. 

i have better luck trying to capture a screengrab from stellarium than this goto finding an object. 

this is how bad it is, i go from north and horizontal to the moon, handset beeps. 

i have to adjust ALT by 5+ degree ( upwards) before the moon is near in view, this is with a ST80 and a 25mm eyepiece.

then i have to slew a few marks AZ( no clue the handset does not tell me how much my deviation is in AZ) and it comes into view. 

clear sky tonight i will give it one final go, and restart the whole thing with all new data input inc gps location data.

if that does not work..... i dont know where to go next other than just give up all together.

[Lonestar70]

Hi,

Easton is 52deg 39min N   1deg 9min E

52.65deg N    1.16deg E is the decimal version.

your handset needs the first version... or it will get confused and throw the GOTO out of sync.

Hope this helps.

Best Regards.

Sandy.

[Mr TamiyaCowboy]

back again..... 

flashed the handset to 3.35. 

Now have a lot more choices added,

for a start my merlin mount (synscan goto) was said to control camera and take pictures.

it never ever did or had a camera option ( one of the reasons i got it) , now i have camera control on the handset. 

ALSO my manual is nothing like the one online, its more indepth at explaining PAE and aligning.

IT IS NOT SAID in my manual anything about the last two inputs of aligning star should be right and up. 

and if you over shoot you need to use left and down, then finish with right and up. 

so yeah are you puzzled yet ? , trust me it gets even more wierd. 

MOUNT should remember where it was last and should not need re-aligning is somehwat a fib.

if you want full mode YOU HAVE to align each time you reboot system.

If you just wanna rough guess point and cruise ( newbie friendly) you skip alignment.

BUT both methods are accruate and the same . 

anyways new firmware uploaded, i did not know about motor board firmware so did not download or install

as i had no clue what ones to use.

[Cornelius Varley]

I think you've got this wrong. If the mount is switched off all alignment data is lost. A star alignment is required every time it is switched on so that the handset knows where the mount is pointing. In fact the handset only knows where the mount is pointing after the first alignment star is centred in the eyepiece.

[astronymonkey]

Hi Tam,

have you sorted the location co-ords yet as this seems to be one of the variables which could be out .

also your time input, is this taken from a radio based source or from a manually entered time ie what you have on your phone.... even a 1min difference will give a 0.25degree error so using an atomic clock app that uses gps satellite time signals will give an accurate true time.

hope you get it sorted but id go bqck to first principles and work from there...

- levelled

- Correct location entered

- correct time entered

- star aligned

cheers

[Mr TamiyaCowboy]

location fix gps sat lock = 4/6

N 52° 38  -  1° 13 E

i left a couple numbers off, mainly the sub zeros lol. 

time, i get this from my HTC phone, no clue it just tells me the time. 

heres how i input time 

i click the hours and input say 23:45 , then when it gets to seconds i just click ok,

phone dont show seconds so i guestimate kinda think with my man-senses , its about 20 seconds now, spam enter. 

i have used no other time device. 

i have about an hour till my powerpack is beefed up (13.7v and going up, i used a fair bit last night to)

i am also in two minds to grab a DC-DC converter and wire into my powerbrick, this way the feed to mount is fully regulated.

I have read that a un-regulated source can cause problems ( battery is not regulated ?).

Its not going to beat me astronymonkey, its frustrating and a headache lol.

GOTO make your astronomy simple ( i thought the advert meant, not pull your hair out and grow gray whiskers making it goto)

[Cornelius Varley]

Batteries don't need regulating, the mount will draw only what it needs. When an unregulated PSU is put under load the output voltage will drop causing the mount to perform erratically or simply stop working.

[astronymonkey]

Ok, so with the co ords right next try to get the time right. On google, play there is an app called atomic clock which picks its time from gps satellites and is free tomdownload. This will show your phone time to the second, plus satellite time to the second meaning you can see how far off your ohone time is.

there are loads of similar apps but its essential that the time you have on the handset is correct or the mount will always be off although the star align step may compensate for this slightly.

i used my tablet for ages for trying to find satellites but it never seemed that accurate, so I downloaded the atomic clock app and realised my tablet was about 2 mins slow which explained why I was missing things..... so accurate time is key for some things and id say your mount would fit into that category

keep trying, youll get there in the end.

cheers

[TwoPi]

MOUNT should remember where it was last and should not need re-aligning is somehwat a fib.

if you want full mode YOU HAVE to align each time you reboot system.

If you just wanna rough guess point and cruise ( newbie friendly) you skip alignment.

I think you've got this wrong. If the mount is switched off all alignment data is lost. A star alignment is required every time it is switched on so that the handset knows where the mount is pointing. In fact the handset only knows where the mount is pointing after the first alignment star is centred in the eyepiece.

This didn't sound right to me so I tried it with my SynScan AZ GOTO last night.

I had the scope aligned (I always use 2 star alignment) and was observing Mars. I then parked the scope, so it slew around to 0° alt / 0° az and displayed the "Position Saved. Turn off power" message. I switched the power off. Switched it back on again and pressed 1 for "Start from park pos.? 1) Yes 2) No". I then went through the initialisation procedure (date, time etc.) but unlike a normal power on, there was no prompting about alignment at the end of the initialisation procedure. Instead I simply asked the scope to show me Jupiter and sure enough the scope slewed around and Jupiter was visible in my eyepiece.

So it definitely *should* work!

I must also confess, I've never had any bother with the GOTO - perhaps I've just been lucky. It's a doddle to set up (and yes I was fortunate, my manual does include the bit about finishing each alignment on 'up' and 'right' commands) and it always slews to the target with enough accuracy that it's in the field of view of my 50x mag eyepiece. I've never even bothered with PAE as the 2 star alignment has been close enough.

Hope you get it sorted - it's worth persevering, honest!

[astronymonkey]

Id agree with the above comments. As long as the scope remembers where it is relative to alt az when parked then when its switched back on, and the date and time is entered, it should know where it is pointinng in the sky based on the alt az position it was last at.

Its like leaving any scope parked due south and elevated at 45 degrees, if I then looked at these co ords on stellariun the following day then thats exactly what i should be seeing in the scope ....l as long as I have the right date and time in stellarium.

only if the scope doesnt remember its last position should there be a problem, or if the scope has very basic software meaning it cant apply saved co ords to a new date and time setting.

hope this gets sorted as it sounds pretty frustrating.

cheers

[Cornelius Varley]

This didn't sound right to me so I tried it with my SynScan AZ GOTO last night.

I had the scope aligned (I always use 2 star alignment) and was observing Mars. I then parked the scope, so it slew around to 0° alt / 0° az and displayed the "Position Saved. Turn off power" message. I switched the power off. Switched it back on again and pressed 1 for "Start from park pos.? 1) Yes 2) No". I then went through the initialisation procedure (date, time etc.) but unlike a normal power on, there was no prompting about alignment at the end of the initialisation procedure. Instead I simply asked the scope to show me Jupiter and sure enough the scope slewed around and Jupiter was visible in my eyepiece.

So it definitely *should* work!

I must also confess, I've never had any bother with the GOTO - perhaps I've just been lucky. It's a doddle to set up (and yes I was fortunate, my manual does include the bit about finishing each alignment on 'up' and 'right' commands) and it always slews to the target with enough accuracy that it's in the field of view of my 50x mag eyepiece. I've never even bothered with PAE as the 2 star alignment has been close enough.

Hope you get it sorted - it's worth persevering, honest!

I stand corrected, like the man said in his orthopaedic shoes.

[Mr TamiyaCowboy]

gave up last night after an hour,

 powered on with NEW firmware. 

done my brightest star alignment ( am indoors so i only see 1 star either regulas - procyon ) 

its off but nearly in view in a 25mm, my problem i dont have a 25mm eyepeice fitted , i have a 350D canon camera dangling from the telescope

that small  mistake on my 25mm eyepiece is huge in the camera. 

so i swap and tell it im looking for stars in the south west ( my room window points 210 degrees)

low and behold procyon is on the list ( its also on the south list ) so i chose this and try again.

Still off not much but its off.  

NOW heres the wierd part, i unhooked camera and shoved in the 90 degree and a 25mm

took a gander, next i barlowed up and popped a 10mm in.

now i adjusted mount to center star and , i could hear the motor clicking away , but the was a lag

the scope would whirr a little then start moving !!!
 

BACKLASH !!!! i have a feeling that maybe this is my error ? each time scope is ordered around it adds that small error.

and we all know if you add lots of small errors together they grow to a huge messy error ?

so whats your ideas ladys n gents, could i be seeing large backlash errors from the rotary encoders / motor engagement gearing. 

[TwoPi]

The backlash shouldn't be an issue if you've finished the alignment on an up and right movement. The test is whether moving the mount with the direction keys is fairly even in each direction. If not, follow the instructions on Backlash Compensation in manual.

In terms of alignment stars, appreciate you might be limited by what's visible but as the manual says ideally:

The altitude of the two alignment stars are between 15 and 60 degrees and the deviation of altitude is between 10 and 30 degrees.

The azimuth deviation of the two alignment stars can be between 45 and 135 degrees, it is best to be close to 90 degrees.

Just to double check, when you're doing the alignment are you using high magnification to make sure the star is dead centre in the field of view? I typically swap to my highest mag (400x) to get them spot on.

One other question, have you got the park, power off & power on working now so that you don't have to re-align when powering on?

Hope you get it sorted.