Nexstar Raspberry Pi Controller

[tekkydave]

My PSU reports about 230mA current draw on the 12V supply when the motor is moving continuously.

[tekkydave]

I haven't connected anything to the MS1,2 & 3 pins - don't know if that would affect the driver's behaviour or not. Measuring with the DVM they are all pulled low internally.

 

Or the ENA pin.

[Gina]

No. 2 stepper motor modified and all connected up - that doesn't turn either

[Gina]

Thanks Dave   Think I'll make up the second HAT then.  I don't have to connect the motor Gnd to the RPi Gnd and I can leave the MS lines open, of course.  Ena is not connected now.

I'm running the motor supply from a linear bench supply of 0-15v at 1A.  Just realised, that current reading was not 400mA - it was 40mA   So the driver is not providing sufficient current to the motor!  Now the driver module is under suspicion so I think I'll test it in my epicyclic clock circuit and see if it's working in that.

[Gina]

Eureka!!!  It's working with the tried and tested A4988 driver module from my epicyclic clock.  10000 ticks turned the stepper motor output shaft by just under 5 revolutions.

Took the driver out of the HAT and put it in the clock but it didn't supply sufficient drive to run the clock's NEMA11 stepper motor so there's something wrong with it.

PHEW!!!

[Demonperformer]

Process of elimination.

[tekkydave]

Hurrah! 

[tekkydave]

I tried getting my venerable ZWO ASI120MC working with the RPi3. It is recognised by indiserver and Ekos connects no problem. I can't get a preview image to come across though. It just hangs. Maybe it needs to be connected via a powered hub.

I also tried a normal webcam with the indi_v4l_ccd driver and that produces an image ok.

[Demonperformer]

If you are running USB2 (which the RPi does) it seems that the USB turbo setting needs to be turned WAY down (like to about 40). The 'hanging' problem seems to be a common one with this camera on USB2.

HTH

[tekkydave]

How do I modify it from command line? Thanks.

[Gina]

I had my ASI178MM running from the RPi and showing the image in Ekos.  Don't think I've yet done that headless though.  I'll try that now.

[Demonperformer]

There, I can't help, I'm afraid. I have only done it in the capture programs.

[tekkydave]

Is the aim to reduce or increase the speed of the usb2 connection? There is an option in the /boot/config.txt to double the usb current to 1.2A. I'll try that tomorrow.

[Demonperformer]

I think the aim is to keep the camera from sending data faster than the USB system can handle.

[Gina]

ASI178MM running fine from Ekos

test-01.fits

Sent from Linux Mint laptop

[Gina]

Here is a JPG version.  Taken through the living room window.

[Gina]

I now have the camera, focus control and heater control working from Ekos using INDI drivers for ASI_CCD, rpifocus and rpibrd

[tekkydave]

Can you get an image via the 'Preview' button in Ekos, running on a separate machine?

[Gina]

The Preview image is on the Ekos machine - in this case a laptop running Linux Mint.  Images can also be saved to HD etc.  The client machine could be controlled and viewed with TeamViewer from another machine.  Otherwise I'm not sure what you mean.

[Gina]

I was thinking that for my general focuser I think I might have a 2 speed setup with micro-stepping but I would want coarser focussing rather than finer.  The single tick mode should be fine for fine focus with faster focus in tens of ticks.  The simple single speed focuser should be fine.  One channel of the rpibrd control could turn dew heater on/off but I might use two as there are four available and there's plenty of room on the HAT.

[tekkydave]

2 minutes ago, Gina said:

The Preview image is on the Ekos machine - in this case a laptop running Linux Mint.  Images can also be saved to HD etc.  The client machine could be controlled and viewed with TeamViewer from another machine.  Otherwise I'm not sure what you mean.

Thats what I meant really - the way you are doing it. There must be an issue with the 120MC and the driver as your camera is ok with it. When I press Preview it starts doing something then just hangs. The camera should be ok but I'll test it on my PC tomorrow to double check.

[tekkydave]

6 minutes ago, Gina said:

I was thinking that for my general focuser I think I might have a 2 speed setup with micro-stepping but I would want coarser focussing rather than finer.  The single tick mode should be fine for fine focus with faster focus in tens of ticks.  The simple single speed focuser should be fine.  One channel of the rpibrd control could turn dew heater on/off but I might use two as there are four available and there's plenty of room on the HAT.

The Ticks setting in the autofocus part is the initial ticks to use when autofocusing . Hover over the control labels to get a description.

[Gina]

I'm not pressing Preview but setting an exposure and clicking on Set - that brings up the Preview window.

[Gina]

But Preview button from the main control does the same and works fine except that the exposure is wrong - I'm still getting the hang of it all

[Gina]

Here is a screenshot of the preview window on my Win7 desktop of the Linux Mint laptop via TeamViewer.  Here I have the ASC on the windowsill of an open window.