My Second AP Rig

[cjdawson]

Hi everyone.

For years, I've been working on and trying to do imaging using my Meade LX-90, over the two decades, I've played with various cameras, a film based SLR, A couple of Canon EOS cameras (30D and 70D), then finally moved on to ZWO ASI1600MM-PRO with filter wheel.   I've also switched around guiding gear too, and am using my trusty SkyWatcher ST80, with a Starlight Xpress Superstar as the guide camera.   Added dew heater (home made) and myFocuserPro2 and I finally feel like I have a rig that is capable of doing the Smaller object justice.  Which is great with a 2 meter focal length scope.

However, There are objects out that which are huge.  M32, M42 and of course the Horsehead region to name a few.  So I just caved an have assembled the following setup....

1. Sky-Watcher Star Adventurer Pro Pack

2. Sky-Watcher 3/8" Stainless Steel Tripod

3. William Optics SpaceCat 51

4. ZWO Mini Guide Scope

5. ZWO ASI290MM as guiding camera

6. Raspberry PI4 4GB - With Raspbian Buster, Indi, KStars and PHD2 installed.

7. 15.6" LED Display

8. Canon 70D unmodified.

9. 5v USB Dew heater

 

I've got the little adapter so that I cam mount the ZWO stuff on top of the SpaceCat.   I've got an M48 to EOS adapter coming so that I can attach my DSLR to the SpaceCat.     The plan is for me to run the PI and it's display (And the ZWO Camera) from a USB Battery Pack (30,000mAH) the heater from it's own battery pack and the Star adventurer from it's own pack as well (yes, 3 battery packs)    Ultimately, I'll be looking switch over from my PI4, to a PI3 with a touchscreen, so that I can do everything without the need for a keyboard, but for now, I'll stick with what I have working.   The idea is that I'll be able to use the ZWO Camera to help me get very accurate PA, also I'll be able to run it as a Guide scope and give the mount a bit of a help to extend the time before trails happen.

 

Today I took delivery of most of the parts, so here's my first impressions....

ZWO Mini Guide scope (already had the ASI290MM)   This thing is tiny, with my camera offers a 3° Fov! so that's plenty of opportunity to be able to find a guide star.  I don't think I'll have any problems guiding with this setup. ZWO's kit has been good to me so far.

William Optics SpaceCat 51.   It's a 250mm camera lens, well, that's my first impression, expect that it appears to be extremely well built, made mostly of metal, has all the bits needed to attach to my Star Adventurer or dovetail for that matter.  I love that it's got a Bhatinov mask built into the lens cap and that it's also got a dew shield that can be removed and slipped back over the scope for storage.  I'm looking forward to giving this a try with my 70D and hopefully grabbing to deep sky objects.   The only thing is I didn't realise that the mount isn't a standard T2 mount, it's an M48 thread instead, so had to order an adapter to be able to fit it to my scope, there's always something

The Star Adventurer Pro Pack and Tripod.  This is a story with many parts.   Firstly, I decided to get the Stainless Steel Tripod rather than the aluminium tripod, this simply because I believe that the heavier tripod will be more stable and so should help me get better images in the long run.   The Star Adventurer first impressions are a bit of a mixed bag.  The wedge feels strong and sturdy, should do the job nicely.   The Motor unit should work well and the polar scope may help me with getting setup quickly (I'll have to align that at some point soon)  the Dec Plate, counter weight are all good too.  I had no problems mounting the SpaceCat, and balancing the setup, there's even plenty of extra wiggle room for when I add the DSLR on to the mix.   The there are a couple of parts that feel very cheap and I can see why they've been criticized before by others.   The plastic covers for the battery and polar scope feel very cheap, the Battery cover is very easy to slip off.  The Polar illuminator is very much an after thought, this thing is really wanting a redesign, it feels flimsy and cheap, there is no proper on/off switch and the brightness wheel is not very sensetive, the difference between full illumination and empty is almost no distance at all.     I like that it can be mounted even with the DEC Plate in place.  However I feel that it would have been much better to have figured out a way that the LED and brightness parts could have been designed into the motor unit directly without the need have a seperate device.  Finally, the Polar scope's lens cover cannot be put on whilst the Dec plate is in use so it's likely to get covered in Dew every time it's used.

In my case, I may just do a rough polar alignment using the polar scope, then use the ZWO Camera to do a proper polar alignment so I can put the cover over the polar scope whilst setting everything up.

Compared to my Meade LX-90 setup, this is going to be a much lighter piece of kit, much more portable and so should be much much most likely for me to get it out and use.

It will be very interesting to find out just how long I can do autoguiding using a battery pack.  From my rough measurements, it looks like I'll be able run for about 10 hours before batteries start going flat.  That should be plenty for a night's observing.   Though, I may also switch employ my tracer battery pack, which should be able to cope with everything for the whole night without breaking a sweat.

I'm looking forward to seeing first light on this setup.

[Davey-T]

I have a similar setup although I have a guide scope I've never actually gotten around to guiding the SWSA, the beauty of it as far as I'm concerned is that it can be plonked down, PAd using the built in polar scope which works well enough and you can have a squint up it while imaging and adjust it to keep Polaris tracking round the circle, then start imaging with DSLR and no computers / power packs involved.

A useful addition is an RDF fitted in the flash shoe and centred on a star using live view, this helps a lot finding stuff.

Like all mass produced stuff they are very variable in performance, mine can do 2 / 3 minutes  unguided with the Redcat.

The guide scope can be mounted on the other end of the dovetail bar to spread the weight if needed.

Dave