A successful test

[peter shah]

I've been working very hard solving problems and tweaking the kit over the past few months. I'm finally at the stage where I can start collecting a good set of image data. The scope has been stripped down and rebuilt improving alignment including fine tuning the mirror cell. Ive had a problem for years with the sensor in the camera not sitting completely flat. The scope has a tolerance of 30un so the tiniest bit of tilt in the camera will show. So I've stripped the camera down removed the sensor and re-seated to within the tolerance. I've also had the filter wheel carousel made to fit my 50mm un-mounted filter. I've cleaned the mount gears and tidied the cables so I don't get any cable snagging during an automated run. All to improve the performance....here is the first results from last nights test shot......I'm please with the result, my data is much sharper...there was a slight increase in guiding errors after the meridian flip which was just a balance issue...all sorted.

The Rosette in H-alpha 3x30min subs....thanks for looking
Peter


 

[Starlight 1]

Good test nice and clean with lots of data,  its nice when something works well.

[Stargazer33]

Looks like all your recent hard work has paid off! Very nice image with lots of depth in it.

[Sp@ce_d]

Pleased!!.... I'd be ecstatic with that result [emoji12]

I seem to make things a lot worse & take months to get back to where I started when I do tear downs.

Great result Peter

Sent from my iPhone using Tapatalk

[pietervdv]

Great image Peter! May I ask what exactly you did to finetune your mirrorcell? I am also a using a fast Newtonian, so I'm interested to know...

I've also struggled with an annoying tilt in my ccd sensor. I have bought a Gerd Neumann detilter to fix the issue.

Thanks,

Pieter

[Uranium235]

Nice to see you got it sorted Peter, taking the CCD apart is probably something I wouldnt be brave enough to try. How do you measure the tilt when adjusting it, when the adjustments needed are so small?

[peter shah]

Thanks everyone

Great image Peter! May I ask what exactly you did to finetune your mirrorcell? I am also a using a fast Newtonian, so I'm interested to know...

I've also struggled with an annoying tilt in my ccd sensor. I have bought a Gerd Neumann detilter to fix the issue.

Thanks,

Pieter

I did a slight modification the nylon cell feet...by adding a rubber washer around each one of the nine. I adjusted each nylon down to fit a fraction shy of a rubber washer. The idea of the washer is to add a little grip to stop lateral movement when the scope is tilted. It allows you to have the mirror looser in its cell keeping its figure at any altitude......hopefully keeping the image nice and sharp......I've noticed the difference

[peter shah]

Nice to see you got it sorted Peter, taking the CCD apart is probably something I wouldnt be brave enough to try. How do you measure the tilt when adjusting it, when the adjustments needed are so small?

I took it that the ally machining was square and true....so I ground down three glass blocks to the same height as the peltier cooler and put the sensor back in making sure it was seated well on the blocks it was very difficult to get right as the peltier needed a thermal sticky pad which changed the height slightly.......

[peter shah]

Not a very accurate representation as there are a number of things that can effect the sharpness not to mention there is also the broader band  luminance data but this is data from before the scope was tweaked. Ignore the bigger stars...but you can see the detail in the nebula is much sharper....im very happy  with its performance so far