Last night PHD calibrating near equator and all sky plate solving

[Craig123]

Hi everyone

I tried to use my Heq5 mount via ascom last night for the first time. I've been building up/putting it off for ages and stuck with ST4. However i need to get platesolving worked out and had just added EFW so last night was the big night for ascom and whatever else that leads to.

I connected and slewed via Stellarium which was a nice little buzz to watch as the clouds whizzed around eveywhere except Cassiopeia as i was trying out on the Heart. It didn't hit dead centre but pretty close. I tried plate solving through sharpcap using All sky plate solver but got a message saying only one star detected. It suggested changing something but in all the drama i forgot what that was.Perplexing as there were alot of stars and nebula on the subs.

I centred it and then pressed PHD for guiding feeling elated to have got so far..ish.Then i got a message saying calibration wouldn't work well as i was not close enough to the equator...Change the dec to between -20 and +20.I had no idea what this meant and pressed re calibrate.

I have never played with the settings on PHD and have guided for up to 20 minutes with ST4 but of course i changed the settings based on a tutorial as i went through an ascom test run in doors. The calibration message  may just be because i switched to Ascom. I'm not sure.

I've put screen shots up of my original settings that i just left as is from first use of phd and the new recommended ones. Which looks best as a starting point ? How do i change dec calibration between -20 and +20.

I then tried imaging and with my very sketchy knowledge i thought the guiding looked Ok. Tried 5 minutes and stars looked ok. Then heavy rain....SO ...Can anyone help with these issues please. I feel i'm getting closer thanks to great advice on here and if i get this worked it will be a great day. I'm off to look at the phd manual for a while and see what i can glean from it.

Screen shots below plus last months target of Tadpoles and thanks to those that helped me get to this point. 

Edited February 18, 2020 by Craig123

[spillage]

I have always started to use the PHD drift alignment tool as this will put the mount near to the equator/meridian then cancel the drift alignment and run calibration. I do not really use planetarium software so it saves me having to load up cdc and connect the mount and I am a bit lazy.

[Craig123]

34 minutes ago, spillage said:

I have always started to use the PHD drift alignment tool as this will put the mount near to the equator/meridian then cancel the drift alignment and run calibration. I do not really use planetarium software so it saves me having to load up cdc and connect the mount and I am a bit lazy.

Thanks. Well I'm reading over the PhD manual and think the guiding tab advanced setup page is where I need to set it up. There is a calibration declination button in degrees which is at 0.Wonder if that's it. I remember getting a message saying not enough steps performed aswell now. Jeez.. Perhaps it wasn't such a great session now I think about it. 🤔

 

[andrew s]

Dec calibration between -20 to +20 means point your scope at a declination between those limits. It seems to me you need to study some basics. It is fine if your not interested but you would find things easier if you understood the basic concepts.

Good luck.

Regards Andrew 

[Craig123]

23 minutes ago, andrew s said:

Dec calibration between -20 to +20 means point your scope at a declination between those limits. It seems to me you need to study some basics. It is fine if your not interested but you would find things easier if you understood the basic concepts.

Good luck.

Regards 

Thanks.  I slewed up near the zenith and  and switched on phd looping  once I had my target framed. That's the way I usually did it with the st4 but never got this message.I need to calibrate lower down and then go to my target. Maybe because I've changed the way I connect to the mount 

[spillage]

Once calibration has been ran then it will not need doing again as long as you do not remove the guide cam from the guide scope. Also remember to run off a darks library for the guider, if you are new to phd guiding then I would use 0.5 - 4 second darks.

[Craig123]

11 minutes ago, spillage said:

Once calibration has been ran then it will not need doing again as long as you do not remove the guide cam from the guide scope. Also remember to run off a darks library for the guider, if you are new to phd guiding then I would use 0.5 - 4 second darks.

Thanks Spillage. Much appreciated . I think I wil use the new profile wizard and look at the suggested settings for calibration and run darks off this afternoon incase it's clear later. 

[david_taurus83]

3 hours ago, spillage said:

I have always started to use the PHD drift alignment tool as this will put the mount near to the equator/meridian then cancel the drift alignment and run calibration.

That's exactly what I do as well! I even platesolve and sync at this position for accuracy.

[spillage]

Not sure what mount you have but I find PHD needs some delicate adjustment of different bits on different nights.

 

Sometimes I need to adjust the exposure times other times I need to adjust the aggression of maybe RA or just DEC or BOTH.

Just make sure you only make one change at a time a give the mount plenty of time to settle.

If you have a EQ mount then use the bullseye target (think it is the AO but not sure) as this will help with balance issues.

[Craig123]

11 minutes ago, spillage said:

Not sure what mount you have but I find PHD needs some delicate adjustment of different bits on different nights.

 

Sometimes I need to adjust the exposure times other times I need to adjust the aggression of maybe RA or just DEC or BOTH.

Just make sure you only make one change at a time a give the mount plenty of time to settle.

If you have a EQ mount then use the bullseye target (think it is the AO but not sure) as this will help with balance issues.

Its an Heq5 Pro.

Working out Phd has taken a back seat as I've run into various other issues since I started imaging that have taken up each clear night so I've just plugged in and used it as is and it seems to have worked well enough to get some imaging done but of course I want to improve. I didn't realise there was a dark library option for my guidescope until last night! but I've done one now so thanks for pointing me in that direction. I noticed the RA aggression was high and followed a tutorial suggesting it should be nowhere  near 100 but each time the new profile wizard puts it up at 70.That was part of  my initial confusion. I have to admit I need ro read up on drift alignment as that is new to me aswell. 

 

[Craig123]

33 minutes ago, david_taurus83 said:

That's exactly what I do as well! I even platesolve and sync at this position for accuracy.

Thanks. I will look that one up tonight. Two recommendations .. Any recommendations for plate solving BTW. I tried all sky plate solver via sharpcap camera control last night and it didn't work. Not sure if I need to configure a solver with focal length and pixel size etc or wether ascom already has the info to use elsewhere and tells the capture software what it needs. 

Edited February 18, 2020 by Craig123

[david_taurus83]

Have you installed ASPS? I used Sharpcap for a few sessions a while ago and got it platesolving BUT I already had ASPS installed for use in APT so maybe you need to point Sharpcap to the correct folder, I cant really remember myself.

http://www.astrogb.com/astrogb/All_Sky_Plate_Solver.html

[spillage]

39 minutes ago, Craig123 said:

read up on drift alignment

Drift alignment will only help with PA. I am sure the built in PA of sharpcap may be easier to use as I think its more like the polemaster routine.

I have never used sharpcap but setting up platesolving in APT (which is free) was fairly straight forward. As you are new to imaging I would recommend using N.I.N.A as this is so much like sgpro with a few added bits and is 100% free and uses astap for platesolving.

[Craig123]

13 minutes ago, david_taurus83 said:

Have you installed ASPS? I used Sharpcap for a few sessions a while ago and got it platesolving BUT I already had ASPS installed for use in APT so maybe you need to point Sharpcap to the correct folder, I cant really remember myself.

http://www.astrogb.com/astrogb/All_Sky_Plate_Solver.html

Yes. I have it on the computer and sharpcap has the find my location button suggesting it can see the plate solve application. I tried to solve but could only see 1 star. The camera capture screen had a good field of stars but I'm thinking the solver needs different settings. 

[Craig123]

12 minutes ago, spillage said:

Drift alignment will only help with PA. I am sure the built in PA of sharpcap may be easier to use as I think its more like the polemaster routine.

I have never used sharpcap but setting up platesolving in APT (which is free) was fairly straight forward. As you are new to imaging I would recommend using N.I.N.A as this is so much like sgpro with a few added bits and is 100% free and uses astap for platesolving.

I'm good with PA in sharpcap so that's one less concern. I have been imaging for a couple of years but used artemis capture and was familiar with that. It had a star marker feature to align imaging sessions so that's how I did it. I got an ASI1600 mono recently so that has lead to new capture software (SC) and now ascom. I knew there would be a few hiccups but was trying to avoid adding another programme in like ATP or SGP as much as people love them. At least till I know my way round this stuff... I may well end up checking out NINA 

Edited February 18, 2020 by Craig123

[michael8554]

Worth reading some of the help files for PHD2.

Start with this one:

https://openphdguiding.org/phd2-best-practices/

Michael

[Craig123]

2 hours ago, michael8554 said:

Worth reading some of the help files for PHD2.

Start with this one:

https://openphdguiding.org/phd2-best-practices/

Michael

That looks  great Micheal. Thanks 👍👍