Success - kinda. Guiding, PHD2 and NINA.

[Dean Hale]

Isn't it nice when something works the first time which is quite unusual in this game? Well for me so far it is.

I've been curious around trying guiding and luckily last week a camera came up within the ads on SGL. It's cloudy and rather windy here. I don't think it's dropped below 30mph since late last week and being impatient why not test through the attic through the window. At the least to see if I could get the camera to focus. Quite a chore with the guide scope, but finally sorted. Used an old SVBony helical focuser I had lying around which was much easier to use.

Onto installing Phd2 and NINA. Amazingly simple. Plug and play. Understanding what is being presented is another matter but shall read further. All running on a Beelink mini pc and it seems rather responsive.

Yep, the graph looks like an earthquake is happening and useless but at least I can see something is being returned. I'm easily pleased. Think I may have a beer.

[edarter]

Nice!

Looks like you may not have multi star guiding enabled though, I would highly recommend that. It dropped my average guiding error from about 1.2" to 0.6" !
Its somewhere in PHD2, I can't recall where offhand but I'm sure a quick Google search would soon sort that.

Ed

[Shibby]

I would also recommend increasing your guide camera exposure time, otherwise the guiding chases the seeing and noise. The SNR of 14 is not high enough, so that will help.

[rickwayne]

I'm not so sure about the increased guide exposure, once multi-star guiding is working. My experience bears out the theory: the turbulent cells in the atmosphere are actually small enough that your guide stars are almost certainly going to be in different ones. This averages out the seeing effects. It's still possible to go too short, of course, and a too-dim noisy image will challenge the algorithms. But one should definitely experiment with one's own setup; rules of thumb from before multi-star guiding was available may not apply.

Now, sound from within the dwelling vibrating the window as a unit...OK, I'll grant you that this sitch might not be exactly canon!

Edited February 2, 2022 by rickwayne

[Shibby]

@rickwayne Perhaps you're right, but when you look at the star profile above it is very noisy, because the SNR is very low. It has lead to constant corrections in both directions. As you say, multi-star will help and it all depends on what works and also how bright the stars used are.

[Dean Hale]

Finally managed to try this in the garden. The graph is much more stable now. Think i'm on the right track? Please, if i'm missing something do chip in. Forgot to enable multi-star but will try that next time. Thanks