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QHY PoleMaster

johnrt

By johnrt
in Discussions - Cameras

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Demonperformer

Demonperformer

Posted
Posted
13 hours ago, Dave Gary said:

AstroTortilla is fast, the price is right (free) and it's extremely accurate. Plus, features such as "Polar Align" make the program that much better.

Not wishing to go too far off-topic, but be careful of the Polar Align feature of AT, Dave, it can be VERY temperamental. I ran it three times, without adjusting anything on the mount between them, and it reported errors of 12.19', 53.29' & 20.21o!

That said, I find the solve-and-slew feature to be absolutely brilliant.

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sloz1664

sloz1664

Posted
Posted
17 hours ago, Allan the plumber said:

Thanks Steve, Stuart and Peter. Think the only problem I'm going to have is running two laptops. I did think about this as I'll have to go back to main laptop ( set up in summerhouse) to move mount with ascom and use polemaster on small net book ive got 

 

Will give it a go and again thanks for the assistance, if you here a scream Steve ( as you're in Nottingham) it'll be me lol

If you shout loud enough I should here you. I'm only in Long Eaton

 

Steve

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Mav359

Mav359

Posted
Posted
15 hours ago, Allan the plumber said:

Sorry to ask has anyone had problems with the drivers I cant get both laptops to find equipments drivers and yes I have download them is there any fix I can add to my drivers to see the camera 

 

 

Don't know how turned off firewall and it worked turning back oin now 

I've not had any issues running the downloaded drivers on either Windows 7 or 10. What OS are you using??? Try a different USB cable.  I suppose you might have a faulty unit, it does happen.

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PeterCPC

PeterCPC

Posted
Posted

When I first used Polemaster it could not find the camera but a normal off/on again solved it.

I used it last night and decided to use the previous rotation point. The PA was good but not as good as going through the whole set up routine. I think that I will set up fresh each time as it only takes a few moments more anyway.

I ran PHDLab and got the following error

Capture3.PNG.e0433209ab0f98c1eb3df4dfde2

and the guiding was not bad either although the RA error was a bit higher than usual but I got some nice round stars at 600secs subs.

Capture2.PNG.f1627158bad7be1f52a8177899e

Otherwise I am still very pleased with the performance of Polemaster.

Peter

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nightster

nightster

Posted
Posted
2 hours ago, PeterCPC said:

 

 

2 hours ago, PeterCPC said:

When I first used Polemaster it could not find the camera but a normal off/on again solved it.

I used it last night and decided to use the previous rotation point. The PA was good but not as good as going through the whole set up routine. I think that I will set up fresh each time as it only takes a few moments more anyway.

I ran PHDLab and got the following error and the guiding was not bad either although the RA error was a bit higher than usual but I got some nice round stars at 600secs subs.

Otherwise I am still very pleased with the performance of Polemaster.

Peter

 

I learned the same. Sometime the camera drivers don't automatically get picked up by either Win7 or 10.  Standard Windows plug unplug USB debugging will work with that.  I also tried using a previous nights rotation point. Not really saving you much time to make sure your equipment didn't move during the day. Just run through the rotation again, it takes 2 minutes. Your results are seemingly becoming the standard for this product. I see the same accuracy, and I was finally able to get 1200s subs without trails. Though that focused me on another problem I have, a bit of drawtube sag, but that should be remedied with 2016's big upgrade.

Doug got my second batch of video edited and I've reviewed it and it will post on his youtube channel in 4 days so those on the fence can get a look at its installation and operation.  It turned out well from the hours of footage I sent him, being able to boil it down to 15 minutes is an art.  

The only question I have left is for those that can get these results using the other types of Polar Alignment.  

How long does it take to align and verify your PA down to the .5 arc minute range?

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A40farinagolf

A40farinagolf

Posted
Posted
On ‎05‎/‎02‎/‎2016 at 16:30, Dr_Ju_ju said:

For the questioner asking about what version to get for an AZEQ6, you just need to get the EQ6 version. 

If you want to check if it will fit, if you have a digital Vernier, measure the diameter of the top hole, & then look up the adaptor dimensions on the QHY site. Measuring the openings on my other mounts & after mailing Bernard @ Modern Astronomy

(superb service BTW), I also bout the AVX adaptor as a separate buy, so can now move the one camera between multiple mounts :)  

And yes I will be taking it to SQLXI, so if anyone wants to look.....

Hi Julian,

It was me who asked about AZEQ6 and thanks for the response, if it's OK with you I'll locate you on the SGLX1 camp map and introduce myself for a demo.

Thanks,

Mark

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sloz1664

sloz1664

Posted
Posted
2 hours ago, mindburner said:

very interested in this. The big ,et dow with these systems is that one still needs to physically move the Alt/Az bolts on the mount - is this still the same with Polemaster?

Need motorised bolts

Yes I'm afraid so, you still need to manually move the Alt/Az bolts. You would need high torque motors to set the mount if you want to automate this procedure.

Steve

 

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nightster

nightster

Posted
Posted
1 minute ago, sloz1664 said:

Yes I'm afraid so, you still need to manually move the Alt/Az bolts. You would need high torque motors to set the mount if you want to automate this procedure.

Steve

 

Those coarse threads are the worst. If they simply tapped the hole with a Fine thread it would move so much better. Sure it would take more turns to move the mount but that would increase precision.  Problem is with the type of material they've cast it with. 

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mindburner

mindburner

Posted
Posted
18 minutes ago, sloz1664 said:

Yes I'm afraid so, you still need to manually move the Alt/Az bolts. You would need high torque motors to set the mount if you want to automate this procedure.

Steve

 

hi Steve. Yes I though a much. Until I can afford an Avalon or something (yea right) I think I will order the Polemaster and get out in the dark like a proper skywatcher:)

 

Yep - back in stock this evening

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monty87

monty87

Posted
Posted

I just got my PoleMaster last week, and finally tried it out this week. I am using it on my CGEM DX mount. So far I have tried it few times and am not getting results that some of you have. I am using PHD2 to verify my PoleMaster alignment, and on the Az drift I am getting about -2' to -4' PE error and on the Alt drift I am getting about +4' PE error. I made sure that my axis rotation was correct based on the software instructions but still having the alignment issue. I event did the reverse where I used PHD2 to do the drift align down to .45' PE error and then fired up PoleMaster, and the two red and green circles did not stack on top of each other.  I have contacted QHY support and waiting for their answer. 

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knobby

knobby

Posted
Posted

It's pretty critical how well lined up the red dots are, use the left/right arrows on keyboard or scroll wheel on mouse to fine tune it. Also I had reasonable success in back yard (over roofs) with polaris boiling about the screen but far better results in a nice dark open field .

Have another crack , Sunday looks promising ... Good luck

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StuartJPP

StuartJPP

Posted
Posted

The problem with PoleMaster is that each pixel is equivalent to 30 arcseconds so achieving this requires accurate "clicking"...not sure if this works in practice though...when I double-click Polaris it seems to be offset from where i clicked slightly...I usually make sure the zoomed version looks spot on which sometimes means clicking slightly off "centre"...same applies to the rotation star...it always feels just a bit off...but that may just be me.

I also wonder how accurate their CCTV lenses are batch to batch...though as long as they match the on-screen template exactly things should be okay...

 

 I know that precession affects accuracy and next year will probably require a new software version (unless it is now built in, it is not mentioned on their site anymore).

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PeterCPC

PeterCPC

Posted
Posted
On 04/02/2016 at 21:20, knobby said:

 

6 hours ago, monty87 said:

I just got my PoleMaster last week, and finally tried it out this week. I am using it on my CGEM DX mount. So far I have tried it few times and am not getting results that some of you have. I am using PHD2 to verify my PoleMaster alignment, and on the Az drift I am getting about -2' to -4' PE error and on the Alt drift I am getting about +4' PE error. I made sure that my axis rotation was correct based on the software instructions but still having the alignment issue. I event did the reverse where I used PHD2 to do the drift align down to .45' PE error and then fired up PoleMaster, and the two red and green circles did not stack on top of each other.  I have contacted QHY support and waiting for their answer. 

http://www.cyclopsoptics.com/content/drivers/PoleMaster v114 Setup.zip

Make sure that you are using the latest beta version. Link shown above.

Peter

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Mav359

Mav359

Posted
Posted
Just now, Zakalwe said:

Probably a daft question, but would this work with a Windows tablet and USG On-the-Go cable? It'd mke a handy field device for use with portable mounts such as the Star Adventurer.

Not sure about the first part of that but i dont know how you'd attach it to the star adventurer, i bought one of these for my CGEM mount but if i could use it for my Star Adventurer iit would be a huge plus

 

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Mav359

Mav359

Posted
Posted
9 minutes ago, Zakalwe said:

I'm sure that there would be a way of bodging it onto the dovetail. It looks like the device has three equi-spaced holes around the periphery, so it may be possible to drill and tap some holes on the Star Adventurer dovetail to suit.

 

56c2ec810de1d_PoleMasterDimentions21.jpg

Those holes are for the mounting bracket, if your just buying it for the SA then yeah but in my case i wouldn't want to have to take the CGEM mounting base off everytime. I am now wondering if there is a way to mount a base plate to the dovetail, if you could then i'd just buy another CGEM mounting bracket so i could use the same base.  worth some thinking about deffo

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Zakalwe

Zakalwe

Posted
Posted
3 minutes ago, Mav359 said:

Those holes are for the mounting bracket, if your just buying it for the SA then yeah but in my case i wouldn't want to have to take the CGEM mounting base off everytime. I am now wondering if there is a way to mount a base plate to the dovetail, if you could then i'd just buy another CGEM mounting bracket so i could use the same base.  worth some thinking about deffo

How does the PoleMaster fit to the adapter? If it is easy to remove, then just getting a separate adapter and screw that to the SA dovetail. Or bond it with some epoxy?

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