PHD2 causing short star trails ?

[Swoop1]

Last night I set up for more practice and decided to try a couple of short imaging runs on The Leo Triplet.

When launching guiding, PHD2 came up with a message about calibration issues close to the stellar equator (or similar).

I went ahead anyway and the first 30 second sub had all stars showing trails.

Not sure what was happening, I switched off tracking and did another 30 second sub and the resulting trails were around twice as long as the guided trails.

Wondering if the issue was due to the warning message, I switched to M81 and restarted tracking/ guiding. No message this time but the star trails were back. 

I disconnected PHD2 and the trails were gone on the subsequent sub.

Any ideas?

Thanks.

Matt.

Edited March 30, 2022 by Swoop1

[michael8554]

Hi Matt

Rather unfair to say the problem was due to PHD2, when you went ahead with guiding instead of fixing the Calibration ?

Were the trails in RA or Dec ?

The Leo Triplet is at Dec 13, but M81 is at Dec 70, which might reduce the effects of the poor Cal.

A good Cal is crucial to good guiding, so it's worth trying to understand the error message and correcting the issue.

23 hours ago, Swoop1 said:

I switched to M81 and restarted tracking/ guiding. No message this time

You wouldn't get the message when guiding, you might have if you started a fresh Cal.

Michael

[Same old newbie alert]

Calibration near the celestial pole isn't advised so that's what the warning was.. PhD won't cause trails.. providing you do your part it works extremely well..

[Swoop1]

@michael8554 I meant to add a ? to the topic title but missed it. I wasn't blaming PHD2, I just wondered if it was the cause. Missing ? rectified (I hope)

[michael8554]

Hi Matt

Question mark noted.

You will need to post the PHD2 GuideLog so that the error message can be read.

Michael

[Swoop1]

19 minutes ago, michael8554 said:

Hi Matt

Question mark noted.

You will need to post the PHD2 GuideLog so that the error message can be read.

Michael

👍

[snowy911]

I've come across something similar, I resolved mine by calibrating PHD2 again, somewhere near the meridian and celestial equator, making sure I had all the correct settings, focal length, pixel size, etc. Again there could be other issues but this worked for me and I've been using PHD2 for many years now. hope this helps