Using a Star Adventurer during the day

[PhotoGav]

Hello all,

I have just been trying to use my Star Adventurer mount for a bit of solar imaging, but the Sun was always moving pretty rapidly across the screen. I am using a Lunt 50mm scope with an ASI120 camera. It was probably taking the Sun about 15 seconds to go from one side to the other. The light on the dial was on, pressing the RA left and right buttons successfully moved the mount and the dial was turned to Solar tracking. So, could the movement be due to poor Polar Alignment, or is it something amiss with the mount? I tried Polar Aligning with the equatorial grid on Sky Safari Pro on my iPhone held against the mount - it seemed to be pointing in the direction where I expect Polaris to be.

Any help would be greatfully received.

Thank you,

Gav.

[michael.h.f.wilkinson]

Most likely polar alignment is slightly off. It needn't be spot on, but misalignment can cause the problems you are experiencing. The ASI120 also has a small chip, so the apparent motion will matter a lot

[PhotoGav]

Thank you Michael. My plan is to polar align one night and then try again with the Sun. Hopefully that will calm down the motion. Though it did seem that turning the motor drive off didn't make much difference to the speed of movement. I would have expected it to have moved more quickly with the drive off compared to drive on?

By the way - just looked at your set of solar pictures, very impressive! That's what I'm trying to get somewhere near to achieving...

[Davey-T]

Hi Gav, I've used my SWSA successfully for solar, I've got some marks for the feet when PAd then just stick on these and level it, not perfect but good enough for 2000 frame vid's.

How does it perform at night ? the first one I received was running slow and was swopped by FLO.

Dave

[PhotoGav]

Thank you for the reply Dave - good to see the set up and hear that it works! My Star Adventurer works perfectly well at night. In fact, yesterday when I was using it for solar it seemed to be working perfectly well too. I did set up in a different spot today (by a few metres) and the scope was on the other side of the meridian, but apart from that I was fully expecting it to work pretty flawlessly. I will reinvestigate as soon as I can...

[CraigT82]

Are you sure you tightened the RA clutch enough??

[PhotoGav]

9 minutes ago, CraigT82 said:

Are you sure you tightened the RA clutch enough??

I thought so, but not necessarily! I will add that to the check list for next time. Thank you for the idea.

[geordie85]

3 hours ago, PhotoGav said:

 The light on the dial was on, pressing the RA left and right buttons successfully moved the mount and the dial was turned to Solar tracking.

Hi

I Hooe you don't mind me asking you but when you pressed the RA buttons, how fast does your mount move? Is it very noticeable? 

I'm asking because I've just bought one and pressing the RA buttons seems to have no effect on mine. Just wondering if mine is faulty or if it slews very slowly. 

Thanks 

[CraigT82]

33 minutes ago, geordie85 said:

I'm asking because I've just bought one and pressing the RA buttons seems to have no effect on mine. Just wondering if mine is faulty or if it slews very slowly. 

Thanks 

I thought that with mine but you have to press and hold for a second or so before it starts to move. The 12x movement isn't that speedy but you can hear the ticks from the motor speed up if you put your ear to it.

3 hours ago, PhotoGav said:

pressing the RA left and right buttons successfully moved the mount

Actually now I've re-read your OP now I can see that your RA clutch must have been tight enough if the left/right buttons moved the mount 

[Davey-T]

36 minutes ago, geordie85 said:

Hi

I Hooe you don't mind me asking you but when you pressed the RA buttons, how fast does your mount move? Is it very noticeable? 

I'm asking because I've just bought one and pressing the RA buttons seems to have no effect on mine. Just wondering if mine is faulty or if it slews very slowly. 

Thanks 

No it only moves very slowly, I find it handy to centre things, I take a pic then use the buttons to centre it.

Dave

[PhotoGav]

*UPDATE*

I just had a quick go with the set up as there are a few breaks in the cloud. It was only visual, but was enough to test the motors. At first the issue of slippage was occurring, I needed to chase the Sun with the Dec axis. I tightened up the screw attaching the scope to the Dec axis as much as I possibly could without actually breaking anything and all of a sudden the Sun became steady in the field of view... hurrah! So, it looks as though my issue was simply that I had a screw loose. Full testing with camera will take place as soon as the gaps in the cloud grow sufficiently large.

[Davey-T]

8 minutes ago, PhotoGav said:

 So, it looks as though my issue was simply that I had a screw loose. Full testing with camera will take place as soon as the gaps in the cloud grow sufficiently large.

Talking of having a screw loose, I had a problem with mine suddenly jumping and traced it to the allen key bolts holding the dovetail clamp on being slightly loose.

All we need now is some Sun, not looking hopeful ATM

Dave

 

Dave

[PhotoGav]

It's very frustrating when there are issues that are impossible to trace, but the satisfaction of finding the problem, solving it and seeing things working again is great! I have a focuser arriving today for the Lunt, so the chances of clear sun in the south of England are zero today... Apologies!

[Jonk]

I pulled mine apart the other day, to remove the SW glue and lubricate with TF2 Lithium grease.

I put it all back together and have found what I think is the sweet spot for RA backlash and tightness.

i also found that there are many other allen bolts to tighten up, all make a significant difference to the stability of the whole thing.

I've even bolted mine to an AZ EQ6 tripod which is night and day (haha) better than my Induro tripod for stiffness.

It's been running non stop for a couple of days to spread the grease around and get all parts of the worm mechanism working, but after what appears to be 24 hours it seems to start tracking backwards?

I know this should occur on timelapse mode, both old and new firmware, but not sure on standard tracking mode. The manual doesn't make it clear, so anyone else notice this?

Not that I will track past the horizon obviously, but I wanted to run it for a week to make sure mechanically it's ready to go for late July / early August.

 

[Jonk]

1 hour ago, Jonk said:

I know this should occur on timelapse mode, both old and new firmware, but not sure on standard tracking mode. The manual doesn't make it clear, so anyone else notice this?

My mistake - I thought the firmware update was successful previously, but it wasn't.

I've now got it running as it should in advanced timelapse mode, so hopefully I'll have some stars to test it on soon.

I suppose I could do a solar timelapse, but this will be very widefield so won't help you Gav!