Philips SPC900NC deepspace objects

[Sm!nT]

how hard is it to make these webcams into a camara that can take pics of nebulars and clusters and galaxies. can it do brighter stuff without modification, and how hard is it to do by someone who has never touched a circuit board?

[jgs001]

I've not been brave enough to try yet, but the details are here There are also a number of people on here who have modded their SPC900 webcam for long exposure and it's supposed to be pretty easy.

[Sam]

I modded one at the start of the year, here's the post where I described it - with links to some useful websites:

http://stargazerslounge.com/index.php/topic,20858.msg214456.html

cheers

Sam

[Parallax]

It really is quite easy. Just take your time, practice soldering on an old circuit board, read Sam's (Lightbucket) report and double check everthing before switching on.

Take a look at this thread also -

http://stargazerslounge.com/index.php/topic,23726.0.html

If there is anything that needs clarifying etc, then there are lots of us here to help.

Steve

[Keagle]

I'm tempted to buy one and have a go. Hmm.

[Russell Allen]

Does anyone know of some good step by step instructions for doing this mod to a toucam pro 2 (pvc840k)

Regards

Russell Allen

[Ajohn]

I've been looking around on this subject. A google of "modified webcams" brings up lots. People have not only switched the amp off, got long exposure times but they have even fitted black and white ccd's for even more sensitivity. Some have even fitted larger ccd's, even cooling.

Some things that I haven't seen mentioned.

Just thought to add about eyesight and small electronic bits. I did work in a area where I had to modify boards for development work from time to time and eyesight becomes a problem. Most people there even the young used a stereo microscope. They crop up on ebay from time to time very cheaply. Anything from 5 to 10x is ok even a magnifier helps a lot. Keeping the board still while it's being worked on can be a bit of a problem too. Do make sure you have some way of doing that. Best to find some very fine solder as well as very very little is needed. Solder wick can be used to remove excesses but oddly it's often more successful if more is put on 1st. Just make sure it doesn't run under a chip. Same applies to solder suckers. Tracks sometimes lift when they are resoldered and too much heat is used but can be repaired with strand of wire out of some ordinary household flex. Just scape carefully with a scalpel till you can see copper. A flux pen can be useful too. These days due to health and safety the flux in the solder itself isn't so good. The pen is just used to put a bit of flux on the parts to be soldered.

Tools really depends one what's to be done. Electronics pliers and snips can be very expensive but there are cheap ones about usually in sets. Liddl sometimes have some. Not up to lingstrom standards but usable.

John