Help etc

[Stu Wilson]

This image aint good I know.

Its only 20 mins of data on the veil however...….

Can someone please tell me if my new coma corrector is working or not?

I think not, but not 100 percent sure.

Also with this coma corrector fitted (Skywatcher) I don't think its a reducer, and new quadband filter in there too

I cant for love nor money get pointcraft to plate solve in APT. Just goes through its sequemce for 3 mins then times out.

Any ideas welcome.

 

Cheers

 

Stu

[Stu Wilson]

PS and that's not lovely pinpoint stars as advertised on the suppliers page before I threw 150 quid at them so somethings not right 😞

[jambouk]

The stars on the left look more eggy than the stars on the right. Is the imaging train square on to the light path? Is collimation perfect? Is it a quality focussed? 

[michael8554]

Hi Stu

jambouk beat me to it !

I'd be very happy with these star shapes on my setup 🙂

But to be super-critical:

You should look at single subs, stretched if necessary, because Stacking will have merged the star shapes to an extent.

So there's a hint of distortion on the left side of the image, which could be due to tilt.

Try shooting the same image with the camera and CC rotated 90 degrees.

If the distortion moves to the top or bottom of frame it's tilt, if it remains to the left its probably in the optics and not correctable.

Michael

[Whistlin Bob]

Agreed with the previous two posters- the stars look more like tilt then coma to me.

For APT and plate solving there's and excellent guide in the software section 

For troubleshooting, when you launch the platesolve you should see the background programme launch in your taskbar- have a look in and see what it's doing. You should be able to see the image you've asked it to solve and the stars it has chosen. Less is more on this- I normally do just a two or three second exposure for plate solving as it runs more quickly. If everything seems to be working ok here, but it's still not solving, then double check your telescope and camera settings in APT as it can't work if these are wrong. Also, you mentioned that you didn't think you cc was reducing- it's critical that you confirm this one way or another. If this isn't right in APT then you haven't a hope of it working.

[Stu Wilson]

Hi guys thanks for the replies.

Yeah ive realised that the coma corrector is a focal reducer x0.9

Booted APT up this morning and changed the settings from the old 1000 focal length to 900 and hey presto Blind solved in 20 seconds.

Fantastic so now I think a collimation session and make sure everything is running true.

Oh yeah and nearly forgot.... A clear night.

Thanks again

 

Stu

[bottletopburly]

Try solving using astap in APT if you have more problems find it more reliable, 

[Stu Wilson]

Got it sorted.

Wasn't sure if new coma corrector was a reducer too but turns out it is.