Tracking and Alignment issues

[TomAstro]

My equipment

Skywatcher Eq5pro mount 

Skywatcher 150pds 

ZWO asi224mc pro Guide Camera 

Svbony SV106 60mm guide scope 

ZWO ASI533MC PRO

Intel Nuc is used to run the software 

Imaging software; Nina 

Guiding Issue:

A frustrating night 😔  the issue I'm having with guiding is it'll be doing the calibration steps and the mount for no reason just decides to stop tracking (sidereal). Eqmod shows the track rate as "Not Tracking"

I reinstalled PhD2 guiding to no solution.  Changed the mount cable into a different usb port (of course made sure it connects to the right comport),  restarted the intel nuc, and still no solution.

Alignment 

Once via the synscan controller I have done the setup process and chosen the align 1 star, (tonight was vega). The telescope will move to the correct area for me to manually center it. Once done, and says alignment complete on the controller, I will the enable the pc direct and plug the mount in.  

 

I'll manually move the mount to the starting position, then I'll tell the mount to look at Vega (or any star chosen) and it only moves a little and stops.  Obviously Vega isn't north..    

Temporary solution for this is to click "park to home position in the eqmod window and then tell the mount to go to Vega in NINA and it does fine..   very strange. 

 

 

 

 

 

[ONIKKINEN]

Not sure about the loss of tracking issue you have here, could be some compatibility thing you have with the many software you are using. Particularly the Synscan controller, which is not needed since you use NINA. PC direct is also not something you should be using with NINA, you would be better off with an EQMOD cable attaching to the hand controller port on the mount (and getting rid of the handset). I used to control the 2 Skywatcher mounts i have used so far (EQM-35, AZ-EQ6) with a USB cable and had intermittent weird issues that i just couldn't explain or figure out. The EQMOD cable connection method has been reliable night after night, so would recommend that instead.

For go-to alignment you should set up plate solving, which is very easy to do in NINA. This way you never have to do star alignment again and all go-to slews are as accurate as you set them to be in the settings. As the plate solver i will recommend ASTAP with a star catalogue that suits your field of view best.

[TomAstro]

Thanks for the advice!

 

Yeah I've got it all working fine now, astap is brilliant, it didn't work at first but I fixed it.  I've also fixed the tracking. The mount limits in the eqmod settings was turned on. Clicking this off has fixed the guiding Issue and I'm tracking and guiding perfectly again. 

I do remember the mount limits option causing trouble in the past.