Skywatcher AZ GTI mount owners thread

[fwm891]

4 hours ago, AstroNebulee said:

Very good images indeed. I'm really pleased your AzGti performed well for you last night. 😊

What camera were you using and how many pixels did you dither? The asiair should goto and plate solve your target for you I thought. That's what my asiair pro does. 

Lee 

Hi Lee,

I use an ASI585 MC uncooled camera normally with the 80mm (Altair f6 Ascent triplet + 0.8 Red/Flat) I sometime use an ASI2600 Duo for big FoV's.

Dither I think is set for 5 pixels every third sub, but I need to check that. It's just it seemed to do its dithering in one direction?

Image with the ASI2600Duo + 80mm+0.8 red. on the AZ-GTi

 

[AstroNebulee]

3 hours ago, fwm891 said:

Hi Lee,

I use an ASI585 MC uncooled camera normally with the 80mm (Altair f6 Ascent triplet + 0.8 Red/Flat) I sometime use an ASI2600 Duo for big FoV's.

Dither I think is set for 5 pixels every third sub, but I need to check that. It's just it seemed to do its dithering in one direction?

Image with the ASI2600Duo + 80mm+0.8 red. on the AZ-GTi

 

That's another excellent image there. I know I use a zwo 294mc pro which differs to you but I dither 2 pixels after every image, overkill I guess but it works for me and I don't lose to much time. There is a setting in the asiair screen to dither in RA only. Could be worth checking if that's on. 

Lee 

[Elp]

It's been a while, but you have to work with the skies don't you:

 

[fwm891]

I've come to the decision to sell my AZ-GTi in the New Year along with my home made eq mounting. It's been great for the 80mm scope I've been using it with but I'm looking to get a longer and heavier scope and I think that will just be pushing things a little too far.  Definitely retaining the 80mm that's a great little scope but my next scope up is my 10 inch f4 newt and that is way too big for the GTi. No I'm after something in the 115 / 120 frac range. I've had an Altair Wave Series 115 and like all things you sell you wish you hadn't.

https://stargazerslounge.com/topic/408199-diy-pantilt-tripod-head-for-my-az-gti/

So keep an eye on the classifieds in the new year...

NOW IN CLASSIFIEDS 

Edited December 27, 2023 by fwm891
In for sale

[Tiny Clanger]

On 28/10/2023 at 09:49, AndyM001 said:

Ah, looks like I need 50 posts to view / buy from the classifieds, and 250 posts to actually sell. I'll look at eBay, hopefully I'll get a reasonable price.

Nope, you are in luck ! Those are the original requirements posted years ago and not updated, the current situation is this :

 

 

[chopples]

First post, somewhat of a lurker. I have only recently purchased my setup but this thread has been invaluable so I thank you all for that. I am learning as I go but I have been super impressed what this little mount can do. I currently have it paired with a skywatcher 72ed and an asi 533mc pro. Still have much to improve on  but hopefully things will come together as I get more experience.

As a lot of you probably know weather has been pretty pants in the UK but I have at least managed to get a few sessions in!

The little Jupiter shot was a test with my rather poorly collimated C6 on it, I was actually surprised how well the AZ-GTI handled it although I don't think I would trust it for unsupervised long sessions!

Cheers

 

Edited January 6 by chopples

[AstroNebulee]

2 hours ago, chopples said:

First post, somewhat of a lurker. I have only recently purchased my setup but this thread has been invaluable so I thank you all for that. I am learning as I go but I have been super impressed what this little mount can do. I currently have it paired with a skywatcher 72ed and an asi 533mc pro. Still have much to improve on  but hopefully things will come together as I get more experience.

As a lot of you probably know weather has been pretty pants in the UK but I have at least managed to get a few sessions in!

The little Jupiter shot was a test with my rather poorly collimated C6 on it, I was actually surprised how well the AZ-GTI handled it although I don't think I would trust it for unsupervised long sessions!

Cheers

 

Welcome to the world of the AzGti. You have a amazing images there indeed, well done. You've certainly managed more sessions and some serious integration time than I in the latter half of 2023. 

Good luck for 2024. 

Lee 

 

Edited January 6 by AstroNebulee

[chopples]

38 minutes ago, AstroNebulee said:

Welcome to the world of the AzGti. You have a amazing images there indeed, well done. You've certainly managed more sessions and some serious integration time than I in the latter half of 2023. 

Good luck for 2024. 

Lee 

 

Thanks for the kind words Lee

Our setups are somewhat similar so I had been following your posts with interest, you amongst others have really shown what a capable little mount this is 👍

cheers 

Edited January 6 by chopples

[AstroNebulee]

25 minutes ago, chopples said:

Thanks for the kind words Lee

Our setups are somewhat similar so I had been following your posts with interest, you amongst others have really shown what a capable little mount this is 👍

cheers 

Thank you that's incredibly kind. 

Lee 

[GrumpiusMaximus]

Stunning photographs, absolutely stunning.  Your Pleiades is amongst the best I've seen!  They're all wonderful.

[chopples]

2 minutes ago, GrumpiusMaximus said:

Stunning photographs, absolutely stunning.  Your Pleiades is amongst the best I've seen!  They're all wonderful.

Thank you @GrumpiusMaximus , humbled by your comment. This was my most recent shot and I have tried to take on board things from earlier images that I could have done better.

One of the great things about this hobby is it offers such a high ceiling that you always feel you are learning and can improve

[LaurenceT]

I agree with the previous comments, excellent images. Can you briefly outline your processing method?

[Elp]

4 hours ago, chopples said:

C6

Mine struggles with the C6, you can hear the difference when slewing. Last time I did planets with it it also had a habit of "sticking" when tracking then struggling to keep up, I was imaging at 3000mm+ though.

[happy-kat]

Where you using the C6 on eq or altaz mode though

What bortle skies are you please @choppies ?

[Elp]

25 minutes ago, happy-kat said:

Where you using the C6 on eq

EQ imaging. It works fine for visual. The issue is the weight when imaging is similar to my Z61 refractor setup, it just doesn't like the larger volume C6 for whatever reason.

[chopples]

1 hour ago, LaurenceT said:

I agree with the previous comments, excellent images. Can you briefly outline your processing method?

Hi, thanks for the kind words.

I don't really have a method yet as I am still trying figuring out what works. I would say  at the moment I am standing on the shoulders of others, hopefully this will change as I gain more understanding.

Andromeda I Used AstroJourneyUK Astrojourney Andromeda in 15 minutes . For Heart Nebula I was trying for a "Hubble" palette. It didn't quite work out imo but we live and learn I used lukomatico for guidance on this approach along with the pixinsight tools provided by Bill Blanshan OSC to Hubble in record time . For M45 I followed Easy Astro Images Workflow M45 Full Easy Pixinsight.

 

1 hour ago, Elp said:

Mine struggles with the C6, you can hear the difference when slewing. Last time I did planets with it it also had a habit of "sticking" when tracking then struggling to keep up, I was imaging at 3000mm+ though.

Yep the az gti was crying a little bit. This was at stock focal length, I do have the Barlow which I could try but the collimation on it is really bad.  It was more a test to see if It could be done. 

45 minutes ago, happy-kat said:

Where you using the C6 on eq or altaz mode though

What bortle skies are you please @choppies ?

Hi @happy-kat I kept it in eq mode, in part because I am lazy  but also because I don't have the pier for my tripod and I was concerned the backside would hit a leg

 

edit sorry, Bortle 7 

Edited January 6 by chopples

[chopples]

2 minutes ago, Elp said:

EQ imaging. It works fine for visual. The issue is the weight when imaging is similar to my Z61 refractor setup, it just doesn't like the larger volume C6 for whatever reason.

I think the issue with the C6 is the fact all its weight is on the backend, makes it pretty impossible to balance

[Elp]

2 minutes ago, chopples said:

I think the issue with the C6 is the fact all its weight is on the backend, makes it pretty impossible to balance

Mines on the front end as I use Hyperstar which isn't so difficult to balance as I can clamp the OTA near the front of the dovetail. If I image out the back Ive made a vixen clamp which I can clamp to the bottom of the front of the dovetail which makes declination balancing much easier. The good thing about the azgti is it's Ra and Dec is quite stiff as it has some internal resistance so balancing can be more forgiving. With my ioptrons it has to be near perfect as the slightest mm shift can make the difference between balanced and totally off.

[jjohnson3803]

On 06/01/2024 at 04:50, chopples said:

As a lot of you probably know weather has been pretty pants in the UK but I have at least managed to get a few sessions in!

My AZ-GTi arrived from FLO in mid-December and it's been cloudy since.  But it does seem to work well in my living room.  🙃

[Soupir94]

1 hour ago, jjohnson3803 said:

My AZ-GTi arrived from FLO in mid-December and it's been cloudy since.  But it does seem to work well in my living room.  🙃

Mine has been outside once since September. Was hoping tonight might be the night but not according to the forecast - dense fog until tomorrow morning. 

My astro gear has cabin fever 🤒

[happy-kat]

You know it's cold when your non cooled astro camera when in use only read 8.1 C° last night but it was clear skies!!

[Swillis]

I've had my AZ-GTI a few months now (from a fellow SGLer), with very little opportunity to use it. When I have got out I had lots of trouble with dithering. Initially there were issues with settling after a dither, but then I noticed that PHD2 was coming up with lots of errors about ASCOM connection and not supporting pulse guiding...

The dither appeared be happening, and guiding was working ok so I carried on as the subs looked reasonable (just some with issues after a dither when it didn't settle.

It has only been PHD2 which has complained about the connection. I'm using NINA, PHD2, synscan pro app on a mini PC, connect to the mount via an eqmod cable. I noticed that when I tried to run the guiding assistant it would, after a short while complain that the 'mount cannot report it's pointing position'. So I have been using this as a way to troubleshoot the issue while it's been cloudy.

I have uninstalled ASCOM, synscan driver and app and reinstalled all fresh after a restart, but still had the issue. To check it was not a dodgy eqmod cable, I tried connecting to the mount over WiFi which didn't solve it.

I spent most of yesterday evening trying to be methodical over how I started all the software and connected to the mount, and thought I had it sorted. When connecting NINA and PHD2 to synscan I get a choice of 2 IP addressed to choose from, and thought the issue was around this, but sometime I get to choose the IP address and others I don't. So I gave up on the synscan app and installed the eqmod software, but swiftly ran away and tried Green Swamp Server. It looks like this has solved the problem 🤞

Tomorrow night looks like it might be good for some real world testing, before clear outside promises some good clear skies at the end of the week. Now I have said this the connection will drop, and the cloud will be here for another month 🤐

Has anyone else had similar issues with the synscan app?

Edited January 14 by Swillis
spelling

[Elp]

Just curious, do you need to run the synscan pro app? With an Asiair the air connects directly to the mount via eqdir or eqmod cable and that's it. It was the same when I ran Ekos within astroberry and an rpi, no synscan software was part of the operation.

May be relevant or not, with the eqmod cable have you looked at the baud rate settings of the connection and are they correct? (I have no idea what this should be for your setup).

Edited January 14 by Elp

[Swillis]

2 hours ago, Elp said:

do you need to run the synscan pro app?

Have just tested this and it doesn't connect. Synscan app or similar appears to be required when using NINA. I guess the ASIair is setup differently.

There is no option to set the baud rate in the synscan app.  I had a quick Google when setting up GSS and used the suggested baud rate of 9600.

GSS looks to be working...

[Coco]

On 30/04/2023 at 10:41, Zermelo said:

An update to my previous post.

I found a used rubber washer with exactly the dimensions I needed (extracted and retained from some previous plumbing job ... "I might need something like that one day").  The extension pillar is now rock solid at both ends.

 

The tube is made of aluminium, and I was slightly concerned that the threaded hole at the base was being stripped by the steel threaded rod rising from the tripod, during my experimentation. I wouldn't like to keep making and breaking those joints with each session, but fortunately the design of the extension allows me to disconnect the top part, by loosening three lock screws, so I can leave the main body attached to the tripod and the top part attached to the mount.

I'm surprised that the extension only ships with a washer at one end. Actually, the sales pic doesn't even show that:

 

Hows the vibration during focusing?  Would the AZ-GTiX be ok with something like my Vixen 90M be ok for visual?  Thinking about buying one for visual