azgti wifi question

[davekelley]

7 hours ago, Gfamily said:

I'm not sure what you mean by "I started a 2-star alignment with Jupiter ... the scope was nowhere near Jupiter". 

If you were aligning with Jupiter, surely your first step is to manually slew it to that planet - or am I missing something? 

The scope tries to slew to Jupiter, it should at least put the planet in the fov (32mm plossl)  but it's nowhere close.  I have slewed it and centred it, and then it will slew to the next star, and be miles away from that!  i can centre that star and then confirm alignment, then even if I ask it to goto jupiter, it'll be nowhere near!

 

[davekelley]

I am beginning to think it could be my phone that is the issue, the app keeps hanging up.  I'm not sure it is even feeding the mount the right coorninates.  the app says  51,55N   2,06 W.   If i google Cheltenham UK  I get 51,89N   2,08W.     I am hoping someone on here will know if that small variation should make such a big difference?   You'd think I'd still be getting pretty close?

I'm not going to give up on this I really want to get this thing working !

Clear skies

Dave

[johninderby]

Should be close enough.

What are your phone settings? If you’ve got power saving enabled that could be rhe problem. Go to your advanced WiFi settings and select always on.

[davekelley]

1 hour ago, AdeKing said:

With this mount, I normally do a three star alignment. 

Starting level and pointing North the mount moves to the first alignment star which will be a long way out, but after aligning on it, the mount gets closer to the second alignment star and after aligning on that it moves to the third alignment star which should be very close.

After aligning on that and completing the procedure most targets are within the field of view. 

The first target will always be way out as the mount only has a crude model of the sky at that point. As you align on more stars the model it has gets more accurate with each alignment star. 

I don't personally use the level and North align option on mine I normally use 1 Star Align for quick sessions, brightest star align or normally the 3 star align which gives most accurate gotos but whichever option I use the scope always assumes that it starting point is level and North when it starts the alignment procedure. 

I'll have a go with mine using North and level next time I use it and see if I get similar results. 

Just a quick question, are the clutches on both of the axes tightened up. The Azimuth one needs to be fairly tight. You shouldn't be able to easily move the scope by gently pushing on either axis. 

Ade

Yes I have the clutches tightened as it says in the instructions that will give best results!   the options I get in "Alignment" are "Brightest star"  (which is a 2 star method)  and "North Level" which also asks you to confirm 2 stars!!  No 3 star option.  reading reviews of the mount everyone says that even the 1st star in the process should be somewhere in the fov in a 32mm plossl.  I don't even get it in the fov of the finderscope.

It's beginning to really bug me now!!

Dave

[davekelley]

27 minutes ago, johninderby said:

Should be close enough.

What are your phone settings? If you’ve got power saving enabled that could be rhe problem. Go to your advanced WiFi settings and select always on.

I've got power saving turned off and wifi on.  I do seem to have bugs my phone is always complaining that this or that app has "stopped working"  My phone is rubbish.  Having said that, when I do an alignment and confirm the position of Jupiter and then Deneb, why then if I ask it to goto Jupiter, does it get nowhere near?  How can that happen?  I already told the scope exactly where Jupiter is located!

 

 

[knobby]

Longshot but have you updated firmware, seen people on the USA forum saying it resolves pointing issues ?

[fireballxl5]

With mine I've found that I need to enable the secondary encoder to give reliable goto performance. This has now become a natural instinct to avoid disappointment!

[Steve Clay]

I pretty much gave up on the phone app and brought a v4 synscan handset from astroboot. Much better as slewing buttons are tactile and no need to look at what your hand is doing.

[AdeKing]

4 hours ago, davekelley said:

Yes I have the clutches tightened as it says in the instructions that will give best results!   the options I get in "Alignment" are "Brightest star"  (which is a 2 star method)  and "North Level" which also asks you to confirm 2 stars!!  No 3 star option.  reading reviews of the mount everyone says that even the 1st star in the process should be somewhere in the fov in a 32mm plossl.  I don't even get it in the fov of the finderscope.

It's beginning to really bug me now!!

Dave

OK, forget the 3-star option, that will be because I updated to the firmware that allows the mount to operate in equatorial mode or alt az mode. 

I can't answer why the goto for Jupiter is so far out after you've aligned on Jupiter and Deneb, it should return to either alignment star after you get the "alignment successful" message. 

There were some issues with the early firmware versions, it might be worth updating the firmware to see if that helps. 

http://skywatcher.com/download/software/motor-control-firmware/

Just be careful about which firmware version you use as the "right arm dual mode" version allows use as an EQ mount but also requires the tube to always be fitted to the right hand side of the mount, whereas the default setup is on the left hand side.  I think the above version will just cause more confusion.  Just select the AZGti v3.16 firmware but remember that you'll need to download the update tool as well. 

If it doesn't help and if the mount is in warranty then I'd suggest returning it to the retailer to swap out for a new one. 

 

[davekelley]

On 05/07/2019 at 13:09, AdeKing said:

OK, forget the 3-star option, that will be because I updated to the firmware that allows the mount to operate in equatorial mode or alt az mode. 

I can't answer why the goto for Jupiter is so far out after you've aligned on Jupiter and Deneb, it should return to either alignment star after you get the "alignment successful" message. 

There were some issues with the early firmware versions, it might be worth updating the firmware to see if that helps. 

http://skywatcher.com/download/software/motor-control-firmware/

Just be careful about which firmware version you use as the "right arm dual mode" version allows use as an EQ mount but also requires the tube to always be fitted to the right hand side of the mount, whereas the default setup is on the left hand side.  I think the above version will just cause more confusion.  Just select the AZGti v3.16 firmware but remember that you'll need to download the update tool as well. 

If it doesn't help and if the mount is in warranty then I'd suggest returning it to the retailer to swap out for a new one. 

 

I am quite confused as to how I load the firmware update onto the mount.  If I download the file to my pc how do I get that onto the mount? Or can I download directly into the mount?  

 

[davekelley]

Well skies are predicted for tonight so I shall be re tightening everything, resetting the alignment and trying again.  One small thing mentioned in the app instructions is that the final slewing direction in the centering for alignment purposes has to be up and right.  Something so casually mentioned but perhaps significant.  I shall report back hopefully with better results this time.

[Steve Clay]

15 minutes ago, davekelley said:

Well skies are predicted for tonight so I shall be re tightening everything, resetting the alignment and trying again.  One small thing mentioned in the app instructions is that the final slewing direction in the centering for alignment purposes has to be up and right.  Something so casually mentioned but perhaps significant.  I shall report back hopefully with better results this time.

Unless you move up and right you don't have the ability to accept that the object is aligned.