Hello from Cornwall

[johnfosteruk]

Proper job. As long is it works that's what's important mate. 

[seo]

Hi Dave and welcome aboard.

[happy-kat]

Welcome

Loving the build

Please don't hate me but I'm not convinced about the top boards.

In the northern hemisphere the barn door has the hinge on the left and opens from east to west. The hinge is aligned to Polaris. Your board looks to open west to east.

I have made a static wedge base for mine as well for my latitude which sits on a chair the base has leveling feet. Not yet motorised it though.

[djh]

1 hour ago, happy-kat said:

Welcome

Loving the build

Please don't hate me but I'm not convinced about the top boards.

In the northern hemisphere the barn door has the hinge on the left and opens from east to west. The hinge is aligned to Polaris. Your board looks to open west to east.

I have made a static wedge base for mine as well for my latitude which sits on a chair the base has leveling feet. Not yet motorised it though.

Ha ha, it looks that way, but my barn door closes, rather than opens. I found it easier on the motor to let gravity help a bit rather than push the weight of the camera uphill.

[happy-kat]

Phew,  :-)

Mine is manual right now and I didn't think ahead at that time for motor load.

[djh]

45 minutes ago, happy-kat said:

Phew,  :-)

Mine is manual right now and I didn't think ahead at that time for motor load.

I looked at quite a few different designs (all opening) before I found one on the Sky at Night website, that had the doors shutting. The original design was for a table top mount, but I altered the design a bit so it would fit on my camera tripod. This made it easier to use at my favourite dark sites. 

[happy-kat]

You might like this information re tangent error.

link here

I don't have a tripod here so made a table/chair top wedge base, not disimilar just can go on a flatish surface or a car bonnett if needs must. It is not perfect and cetainly not a nicely made as you one but it works in a fashion and I got to capture comet lovejoy.

That's a new article to me I started mine August 2014, reading it now looks a good one to follow and come out with a working mount.

[djh]

13 minutes ago, happy-kat said:

You might like this information re tangent error.

link here

I don't have a tripod here so made a table/chair top wedge base, not disimilar just can go on a flatish surface or a car bonnett if needs must. It is not perfect and cetainly not a nicely made as you one but it works in a fashion and I got to capture comet lovejoy.

That's a new article to me I started mine August 2014, reading it now looks a good one to follow and come out with a working mount.

Thanks for the link. It was this that helped be choose the Sky at Night design as it used curved studding which got around this problem. The only problem I found with using curved studding, is that it needs to be shortish to stop if from getting pulled to one side from the pulley belt. There is however enough studding for over 2 hours use, before you need to reset it.

[happy-kat]

I'm liking the simplicity of driving it by using a rubber band, though my first thought was it would slip. I've book marked it for future reference. Might change my motorised plans as was not totally liking the cogs approach.

Do you have any images to share you have captured please?

[djh]

I changed the rubber band for some white clothes elastic. The rubber band tended to stretch too much and climbed off of the pulleys. The white elastic is better as you can cut a piece for the right tension and just sew the ends together. It also has a better grip as well. I also made a 20mm pulley for the drive and then looked around on Ebay for a geared motor that would work well at around 10 revs a min.

I will have a look for some images, I have only used it properly once after getting it set up and working. I do however have a few test shots where I was seeing how long I could expose before the stars started trailing. These are just single shots from my back garden at 400iso so they didn't turn bright orange from the light pollution. I will have a hunt for them later.

[PeterCPC]

Hello and welcome.

Peter

[djh]

4 hours ago, happy-kat said:

 

Do you have any images to share you have captured please?

Please note these are only test shots.

18mm lens 4min 6 sec (if you look carefully you can make out M31 near the bottom left)

52mm lens 4 min

55mm lens 60 sec

135mm lens 60 sec

 

[Seafury]

Hi from another lurker gone active now back to armchair lurking thanks to bad knees ,back etc.etc. I,m in Truro

 

Gordon

[Knight of Clear Skies]

You've made a good start there. This is a 20 second shot of Andromeda with a 135mm lens, there are plenty of good targets up there at this focal length:

You have decent star shapes in your test images so you should be able to stack multiple frames without any problems, which will allow you to go much deeper.

[davidscanlan]

Welcome to the Forums.

I like your mount....the ingenuity of amateur astronomers never fails to amaze me

Well done

Dave

[happy-kat]

Thank you for sharing your test images. Definitely worth continuing to use it and as NofCS mentioned if you take several/many and go stacking then using Deep Sky Stacker it pulls even more out.

You've caught a satellite in the 135mm image.

[djh]

Those pesky satellites get everywhere. 

I have had two goes at stacking. The first was with my Sigma 24-70 f2.8 lens of a view of Orion. I took 50, 30sec subs and it was not too bad, but my focus could have been better I think. The second time was a test and I took 40, 1 min subs just pointing my 135mm lens towards Leo (in fact a bit below) I just wanted to see if they would stack OK in DSS with the darks and Bias. 

Imagine my surprise when I stretched the image in Photoshop I noticed three small and dim Galaxys. After some heavy cropping and massive Photoshopping, I got something out and realised I had the Leo Triplets. Although poor by the standards on this site, they did give me a boost and managed to put a smile on my face. Shear utter fluke though.

[tony210]

Welcome Dave - the  people here have taught me a lot! - best wishes Tony Sussex

[Dave Lloyd]

Hi there, welcome.

[glowjet]

Hi Dave and welcome to SGL, you have done well, my design is still on the drawing board I am afraid, one or two pieces have been acquired for the project though, like a 12V DC, 1 RPM motor from the States, when my friend was stationed over there. Interesting to see how you are going to get on with it, please publish future images, I am sure many will be interested, enjoy the forum

[sloz1664]

Hi Dave and a very warm welcome to the Lounge

Steve