Jupiter & Saturn with LX200GPS experiencing its first night out for over 10 years

[symmetal]

Put the 10" LX200GPS in the shed I recently put up to house the new weather satellite receiving setup. It had sat indoors for years as I couldn't be bothered to cart it outside for one night since moving to Cornwall. It seemed a shame taking up space doing nothing. Indoors I checked it still worked though the autostar keys needed holding down tight to work. Cleaned all the rubber pads and contacts, including LED ribbon and dabbed some ACF50 on all the contacts. Good as new. 😀 Changed the battery on the main PCB which was dead and installed the latest 3rd party Autostar software which corrects the GPS week rollover problem on old GPS receivers and the GPS worked indoors after spending around 15 mins getting the complete data information from the satellites.

After putting in in the shed though the GPS no longer works timing out after about 20 mins. 🙁 Never mind, I'll just enter in using the Autostar. Found the Autostar coily cable didn't quite reach the shelf in the shed where the PC was, so having plenty of phone cable and RJ10 connectors, quickly made up a longer lead to use with the Autostar. Plugged it in. Nothing on Autostar. Put coily lead back. Still nothing. Checked pin wiring of coily lead. It's not 1 to 1 but a mirror image. Forgot phone handset cables are mirrored and likewise the Autostar. That'll teach me to be complacent and not check the wiring first.

Autostar got reverse power. I think it's just the display driver IC that's dead but need to get the scope out. There's only two surface mount ICs in the Autostar so not much to go wrong. Real shame after it was still working 20 years after purchase.

Need to get scope working without Autostar. 🤔 Install latest Autostar Suite from around 12 years ago. It runs on Win 10 if you select Win XP compatibility mode. It's got an Autostar Controller simulator too. And it works. Easier clicking the buttons on the simulator than using the actual box. 😀 Did a one-star align and bingo. Autostar Suite has a display like an old version of CdC so it's then easy to click on a planet and tell it to slew there. And it did, well within the FOV of the guide scope I'm using as a finder scope. I had also fitted a Steeltrack Diamond SC focuser with Lakeside motor to enable easy remote focusing.

Two nights ago although everywhere was soaking wet after a days rain I noticed Jupiter at around midnight so fired up the scope and got videos of Saturn, then Jupiter. My ASI224MC would need a 2x Powermate to get the optimum focal ratio so used an ASI178MC instead which with smaller pixels has an optimum focal ratio of f14 so didn't really need a Powermate.

LX200GPS with ZWO ADC and ASI178MC, 10 videos of 45 seconds at 95fps, 6ms exposure, stacked in Autostackert, processed with Registax, WinJuPos and PS.

   

Quite pleased with the result after all that. 🙂

Alan

 

 

Edited August 14, 2021 by symmetal

[Stu]

Great to get the old scope out under the skies after so long. Those are very nice images too!

[astroman001]

You must be pleased with those after such a long break. Good reward for all the effort.

Peter

[rl]

Time well spent. Hope to see more of those!

 

[CraigT82]

Very nice results, would be well pleased with those. Nice to see old scopes doing their stuff still

[skyhog]

Nice images. I haven't used the GPS function for a few years now to be honest. I got sick of waiting for it lock and ended up putting time in manually, something I can always do faster than the GPS lock.. 

[assouptro]

Epic story! 
Effort rewarded! 
Well done! 
 

Bryan 

[symmetal]

Thanks everyone. I expect the scope enjoys doing something useful again. 😊 You're right @skyhog, if it's in one location all the time the GPS is not all that useful, and it's quicker to enter by hand, as the location is already stored in the scope anyway.

Here's a few close ups of the setup. I fitted  the capture PC and the black box containing power distribution, focuser control, dew control based on Robert Brown's design on top the scope to keep the scope balanced along with the weights on the bottom. Sandwiching them between two sheets of perspex with threaded rods and butterfly nuts easily allows changes in PC etc without having to redesign the fixing method. The little module on top the perspex is the temp/humidity sensor. The little heat given off by the PC has  no significant effect. The remote temp sensor for the corrector plate is one of the two leasd from the main dew shield heater. Only two cables, blue and white on the floor, leave the scope for power and ethernet. The black box next to the scope control panel splits the incoming power between the scope and the power distribution on top. Scope RS232 via USB/RS232 converter on front of control panel.

I made the scope dolly from some scraps of wood. It's not very strong but the tripod legs sit over the wheels so the stress on the wood is small. The wooden block on top the dolly arms go under the height adjustment screw pads as I couldn't find long enough threaded screws with knobs. The two plywood sheets lie on the paving stones to bring the scope level with the shed floor, three thick aluminium plates bridging the gap. The aluminium plates glued to the floor are to spread the weight of the wheels when in the shed as the plastic floor was bending at those points.

On the shed shelf is a cheap mini PC to allow remote desktop to the imaging PC for initial setup and fine focusing with a bahtinov mask. There's also a UPS on the shelf powering the main 150W 12V PSU on the left side of the rear mounting board. The UPS is mainly to avoid the satellite receiver and data processing PCs falling victim to a mains blip or power cut up to 40 mins, as they are running 15 programs between them and it takes a while getting them all running again together.

The clock on the wall is to enable quick entry of time and date at scope start up and the paving stones in the shed rear corner are ther as the sleeve bolts holding the shed down failed to grip in that corner and I can't get the bolt out. Note the extractor fan in the shed roof, air in from bottom right, as it gets fairly hot inside on sunny days with all the satellite gear running and the shed closed. 40 deg C before I installed the fan.

I'll next try imaging with the ASI224MC and 2x Powermate to see if the pictures are any better than just the ASI178MC. I also found the ADC setup feature in Firecapture made it simple to correctly adjust the ADC. I was surprised to find the ADC didn't affect the focus, just shifted the image which is good to know.

Alan

[Lucas_M]

Great scope!!
Congrats for the images.

[morimarty]

Two lovely captures from the old LX. Your saturn image looks very well controlled the ADC looks to be working very well.  The jupiter image is showing loads of fine detail too.