Camera for Skymax 180

[Chrb1985]

Hi!

I have tried to do the math for my scope. If i use a 2x barlow on mye scope which 2700 f15 it would be f30 with the barlow. Than i calculated that it will need pixel size of 6. so the closest camera i found was this one: https://astronomy-imaging-camera.com/product/asi174mm It has pixle size of 5.68.

Am i right here or did i do some thing wrong in the math? Im really new to this, All help is much appreciated

[Chrb1985]

just noticed that it is a mono camera and the closest color camera is https://astronomy-imaging-camera.com/product/asi294mc-color and has 4.63 pixel size. would this work on my scope with 2x barlow?

[johninderby]

You may find this online calculator useful.

https://astronomy.tools/calculators/ccd_suitability

 

Edited June 6, 2020 by johninderby

[Chrb1985]

thank ypo

10 hours ago, johninderby said:

You may find this online calculator useful.

https://astronomy.tools/calculators/ccd_suitability

 

Thank you! But i can not make sens of it? How do i know what camera is suitable? And what is the color scal in the bottom. When chaning the binning it get bluer ther higher binnning i chose is this good? i dont understand it. hehe sorry

[catburglar]

You don't say specifically, but I assume your doing planetary imaging if you're using a mak and a Barlow. The link given above seems to be based on DSO imaging where for the relatively long exposures used, image resolution may be seeing limited...

However, for fast frame rate planetary imaging, the situation is somewhat different- here you want to sample at approx 1/2 to 1/3 of your max resolution.

So you can get an idea of the optimum pixel size for any specific focal ratio (irrespective of focal length) you should aim for the situation where focal ratio is between 3.5 x pixel size and 5.3 x pixel size.

In your case, I'd be tempted to ditch the Barlow and image at f15 with a camera that has pixels between 2.8 and 4.3 micron. There are a few chips in this range- ASI290 series @ 2.9 micron or ASI224 @ 3.75 microns. If you particularly want the 174, then with the 2x Barlow you're still in the right ballpark for critical sampling.

Clearly there are other factors that also come into play, and I'm not a planetary imager, so these may not be the best overall match for your setup, but in terms of critical sampling I think the maths is correct.

 

Edited June 7, 2020 by catburglar

[Cosmic Geoff]

I assume you got the Skymax for planetary imaging.  A focal length of 2700mm is relatively long.  In the real world of bad urban seeing, I have in general not found it worth the bother to try a Barlow lens with my 2000mm focal length C8 and ASI224MC camera.  I found the imaging results very seeing dependent.